As the week progresses, there's plenty of chips flyin' in The Workshop. At one end of the room Todd is working on set-up of a left-handed Korina Special with a wrap around Tone Pros bridge. At the extreme opposite side of the shop Dave is fabricating the neck for a Standard 12-string bass.
This one has a rockin' quilt top and a matching quilt headstock which is in the shot above. I asked Dave to take some photos of the process so that we can show you how we take a slice out of the same billet of maple for the headplate. It's a pretty cool little detail that we like to do on our guitars. I'll put that up a little later.
Meanwhile somewhere in between the two extremes, here I am leveling the sides on the quilt-topped Studio we featured a few weeks back. Hand blocking the finish between coats is essential to our process for a couple of reasons. It takes the orange peel out, it keeps the finish thin and it also opens up the lacquer to let more solvents escape before trapping them with additional coats. I can't wait to show this one to you when it gets buffed!
I'm be curious to see if that's my 12-string Standard, that Dave's working on.
Posted by: Jim Falco | October 07, 2009 at 04:55 PM
Yeah, that's mine!!!
Posted by: Jim Falco | October 07, 2009 at 05:02 PM
Hi,
I finally managed to put up some shots of my beautiful 2003 Studio Custom on my blog.
http://songrighter.wordpress.com/2009/10/09/hamer-%E2%80%93-handgemachte-topqualitat/
All the best to you guys, and keep on doing what you do best!
Posted by: Martin Berka | October 09, 2009 at 08:52 AM
I want that Studio bad.
Posted by: Dave | October 10, 2009 at 07:46 PM
I'm definitely looking forward to seeing more of that 12'ver when it's done. Is that going to be a long scale or medium scale?
Posted by: cmatthes | October 19, 2009 at 04:22 PM
Cool that you can follow your progress, I had photos sent to me when my Monaco was being built. 6 years of hard playing and still a beautiful sounding guitar even though I had to replace the pup screws due to rust rotting away the heads.
So Jol, orange peel is prevented by the sanding after each coat? Interesting after seeing "other"custom shop pieces hanging with orange peel.....no names shall be said though!
Posted by: Scott Wheeler | October 20, 2009 at 12:13 PM
I can't think of any other custom guitar shop (or any guitar company, for that matter) that would, or could put up a blog showing the level of detail, quality of craftsmanship & progress reports on the guitars they create.
Posted by: Jim Falco | October 20, 2009 at 12:52 PM
More "Plenty of Workshop Action"...please.
Posted by: James Falco | November 05, 2009 at 01:16 PM
Is that Studio going to a dealer? Which one?!?!?!?
Posted by: Dave | November 06, 2009 at 10:13 PM