Just a few days of heavy rain clearly illustrated how our earth has been carved up over millions of years. The Workshop is located up a rural road on the side of a hill, and a lot of water flows down creeks and streams—right alongside the road to the shop. But just as quickly as the rains came, the sunshine broke through the clouds and everything started to look good again. Carla and I stopped on our way to take some photos in the morning mist.
Further up the way, the evidence remained. After three days of bad weather the road was collapsing at the edges, and rocks and stone were getting deposited along the way. It wasn’t impassable, but if it had continued much longer there wouldn’t be any work getting done in the shop now. As it was, the driveway will have to be filled and raked and the town will have some work to do along many of the smaller roads.
What this all brings to mind is that the climate not only messes with the outdoors, but it affects the health and well-being of guitars and other musical instruments. I work hard to maintain a relative huumidity of 35% in my shop. That’s the prescribed level that most knowledgeable luthiers will cite. It’s a good mid point, but more importantly it errs on the side of dryness. I have some acoustic instruments that bow and bulge a bit when things get too humid, but being built at 35% allows them to tolerate lower humidity days without splitting wide open. Bulging is manageable, imploding is definitely not. It’s a good idea to monitor your instruments at home too. I had decided to equip the case for the Crow with a nice German-made hygrometer to do just that.
I’d seen a few cases with some sort of humidity gauge placed inside where it couldn’t be seen until the case was opened. I thought that was a waste, especially if you have a lot of guitars in storage. So, I decided to put mine on the side of the case where it could be seen more easily. This entailed making the case shell with a mounting hole.
After the tweed was glued on and the interior plush installed, I carefully trimmed around the hole. The gauge back (where the sampling takes place) is inside the pocket, which will have screened openings into the main body of the case.
Here, I’m marking the outside before cutting the tweed. Too much time and effort has gone into this case so it was a matter of measure twice, cut once. The next step is to install a mesh back to keep small articles from getting into the meter, then fitting the gauge. I’m off to the supply store to find a fine metal mesh and some fill stone.
Comments