American Lutherie #88
Winter 2006
No, it’s not a Jack-o-lantern, it is a double-top guitar made by Randy Reynolds. An inspection light is shining through the spruce top, revealing the soundboard construction and the bracing pattern.
Photo by Randy Reynolds
This issue is out-of-print.
Double Top Guitars
by Randy Reynolds
Randy Reynolds shows us step-by-step how he builds a double-top guitar soundboard out of layers of spruce and Nomex honeycomb.
“This article appears in our anthology book Classical Guitars.”
No, it’s not a Jack-o-lantern, it is a double-top guitar made by Randy Reynolds. An inspection light is shining through the spruce top, revealing the soundboard construction and the bracing pattern.
Photo by Randy Reynolds
This issue is out-of-print.
The back cover shows a Reynolds Brazilian rosewood back in process. The radial bracing pattern was inspired by a 1986 AL article by Gila Eban.
Photo by Randy Reynolds
The Imperator: Revisiting the Lyra Guitar
by Alain Bieber
Alain Bieber looks at the history of the lyra guitar and places it in the context of the neoclassical fad of Napoleonic Europe. He built a lyra guitar of his own design, and he reports encouraging results.
The Universal Vacuum Island
by Charles Fox
Lutherie legend and jigmeister supremo Charles Fox is a true believer in vacuum for holding guitar bodies and gluing things together. He describes his vacuum island, a self contained unit that can function in even a tiny lutherie shop.
This article appears in our anthology book Tools and Jigs.
Meet the Maker: Benoît Meulle-Stef
by Jonathon Peterson
Jon Peterson interviews French harp-guitar maker and scholar Benoît Meulle-Stef.
Rapid Prototypes of the Flattop Guitar
by R.M. Mottola
Would you believe that you could slap together a quadrangular guitar with a screwed-on back and a Formica top, and actually learn something about what a spruce-topped, curvaceous guitar of that size would sound like? R.M. Mottola says that you can, and that it is an efficient and effective R+D technique.
This article appears in our anthology book Flattop Guitars.
Meet the Maker: José “Pepito” Reyes Zamora
by Fred Casey
José “Pepito” Reyes Zamora is a leader in the movement to restore the Puerto Rican tiple to its former level of cultural prominence. Fred Casey travels to Puerto Rico to meet him.
A Different Way of Defining Body Shapes
by Mark French
If you are a big, powerful CNC milling machine, “numerical” is your middle name. And those numbers have to come from somewhere. Math prof Mark French shows us how they might profitably come from equations graphed on polar coordinates.
Product Review: Klumper tools
by John Mello
John Mello reviews the edge vise, head slotter, and rosette cutter from Chris Klumper’s Luthier Tool Company.
This article appears in our anthology book Tools and Jigs.
Lutherie Under Glass
by Ervin Somogyi
A group of luthiers in Northern California were invited to mount an informative display in a public art gallery space consisting of a long set of windows on a city street. Ervin Somogyi tells us all about it.
It Worked for Me
by Paul Hill and Marco Del Pozzo
Make your own sanding blocks to any radius. Marco Del Pozzo shows us how in this time’s “It Worked for Me” column.
This article appears in our anthology book Tools and Jigs.
In Memoriam: Ted Beringer
by Bruce Harvie
Long-time GAL member Ted Beringer recently passed away. He was making guitars when we baby boomers were in diapers. We offer a fond remembrance by wood dealer Bruce Harvie. Read his memoriam.
