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Talk me out of this idea - Jumbo 45 Guitar Kit

Brent Dowell

Brent Dowell

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I've built a couple guitars in the past and actually designed and built my own nylon string acoustic a few years ago.

I'm not afraid to tinker with guitars and feel like I actually kind of know enough to not be dangerous when setting one up.

I've got a gift certificate to stew mac, and I'm thinking of getting a nice acoustic kit to put together.

I've already got a nice Taylor Dreadnought, and was thinking of getting one of their Jumbo 45 kits. Right now the kits are 600$ off, and fit right within the budget.

Seems like it'd be a great project. I've already got most of the tools I need for assembly and setup.
 
I'm pretty sure you know what my answer would be...
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That looks like an awesome kit. :thumb:
 
I was perusing the StewMac site to see what tools doing this project would force you to buy and noticed their ultimate scrapers were unavailable for purchase or backorder at this time. These are pricey, but excellent and I use mine all the time. Hope it's just a temporary supply chain issue. Anyone made their own?
 
I remember Jasons Build. Was pretty impressive.

Well, I ordered the kit and one of their guitar workstations. Figured that would come in handy.

Shipping was going to be over 70$, but a one year membership to StewMax for 54 includes free shipping, so that was kind of a no brainer.

Time to download the instructions and start seeing what other supplies I'll need. Time to clean out the shop too, lol.


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Ted Calver said:
I was perusing the StewMac site to see what tools doing this project would force you to buy and noticed their ultimate scrapers were unavailable for purchase or backorder at this time. These are pricey, but excellent and I use mine all the time. Hope it's just a temporary supply chain issue. Anyone made their own?
Click to expand...

Those do look pretty beefy. Seems like you'd just need to source some 1/8" tool steel to make something like that?
 
Ted Calver said:
True, but it looks like it would need to be hardened and that's yet another area I'm not familiar with.
Click to expand...

Far be it from me to suggest such a thing.. but if you're interested.... :D

www.goodreads.com

Hardening, Tempering, Annealing And Forging Of Steel ;:…

This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur…
www.goodreads.com www.goodreads.com

High Speed Steel | Tool Steel | O1 | O1 Technical Data

Hudson Tool Steel shares technical data associated with O1 tool steel including strength and wear resistance
hudsontoolsteel.com hudsontoolsteel.com

Quite easy to do on something like a piece of O1 with a MAP or propane torch, 4 fire bricks, a jar of oil, and the kitchen oven...

  • Shape your scraper to "close" but leave the edges maybe a little rounded for now.. Grinding out the center of the sides will make subsequent polishing less work.
  • Make a tunnel with the 4 bricks and put your piece-to-be-hardened in it
  • preheat the oven to 350.
  • Put the torch at one end and turn it on.
  • Once the piece reaches bright cherry red (you can check with a magnet) pick it up with some long handled pliers dunk it in a bucket of oil and swish around vigorously, take it out while it's still quite hot (you can touch it but it feels pretty warm)
  • Throw it right into the oven and let it soak for an hour.
  • polish it out to nice crisp edges

Will it be perfect? probably not.. will it be pretty good? very likely.
 
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