Posted on July 15, 2026July 15, 2026 by Dale Phillips It Worked for Me: Magnetic Table Saw Jig for Narrow Ripping It Worked for Me: Magnetic Table Saw Jig for Narrow Ripping by Bob Gleason Originally published in American Lutherie #143, 2021 Here is a simple jig I use when I cut binding or kerfing strips (Photo 1). For this repetitive operation I needed an easy way to set up to cut the strips and also to add a zero throat to the saw. This will work on any table saw with a cast-iron table. It is simply a piece of cabinet-grade 3/4˝ plywood, cut to an appropriate size to fit your saw table, with six powerful magnets glued flush into the underside (Photo 2). Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 15, 2026July 15, 2026 by Dale Phillips New Frets in Old Nibs New Frets in Old Nibs by Ben Haskenhoff Originally published in American Lutherie #142, 2021 A 2004 Hamer Monaco Elite recently passed over my workbench for a refret. It seemed like a good opportunity to take some pictures of my process for refretting a guitar while keeping the binding nibs intact. Photo 1. There were deep grooves and flat spots on the first several frets, and the wear went farther up the neck as well. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 15, 2026July 15, 2026 by Dale Phillips The $75 Guitar Challenge The $75 Guitar Challenge by Doug Hunt and Mark French Originally published in American Lutherie #142, 2021 Mark: A couple years ago, I was walking around a big home store and started to wonder whether it would be possible to build a guitar only from things I could buy there. Obviously, they didn’t sell tuners, fretwire, or truss rods. However, I thought it might be possible if one had those three things. I decided that, given those parts, it might be possible to make a guitar with $75 to spend at the home store. Thinking it might be an interesting challenge, I suggested the idea to Doug Hunt. Doug and I have been guitar-making friends for years, having met as part of a project aiming to teach technical subjects to high school students through guitar making. (Check it out at guitarbuilding.org.) He was interested, though not looking for one more thing to do at the time. A while later, he suggested that a better idea would be to start with a budget of $75 that could be spent anywhere (he’s a big fan of eBay, as it happens). As long as the money could be spent anywhere, he thought that it might be possible to do the whole instrument for $75. Over some months of occasionally revisiting the idea, we did a little negotiating and settled on the following rules: Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 14, 2026July 14, 2026 by Dale Phillips Side Bender and Body Mold Cut from One Sheet of Plywood Side Bender and Body Mold Cut from One Sheet of Plywood by Terence Warbey Originally published in American Lutherie #142, 2021 After reading Mark French’s article about his time in the shop of Charles Fox (“A Guitar Is Born: Attending Charles Fox’s Hands-On Guitar Making Course,” AL#136 and Mark’s series, “The Charles Fox Guitar-Building Method,” beginning in AL#139), one idea kept coming back into my mind: “a library of bending forms.” Wouldn’t that be delightful, to have the forms stacked like books rather than my jumble of assembled forms, precariously balanced upon each other on a shelf, collecting dust? I was able to make such a bending form and a matching body mold from a single piece of 24˝×48˝×18MM Baltic-birch plywood, cut into four pieces 12˝×24˝. The bending form uses three upright pieces. They are notched to receive two, also notched, cross pieces. These cross pieces are cut from the spare fourth piece and have a small horizontal piece attached to the bottom of them to easily clamp the assembly down to my Workmate. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 14, 2026July 14, 2026 by Dale Phillips Meet the Maker: Stephen Marchione Meet the Maker: Stephen Marchione by James Condino Originally published in American Lutherie #114, 2013 I first met Steve Marchione writing a story for Mandolin Magazine. He was bold, confident, and opinionated; I liked him instantly. A couple of years later, we wound up next to each other at the 2011 GAL Convention. Two troublemakers with funny last names; we’ve been good friends ever since. The more I get to know him, the more respect I have for him and for his work, and also the more similarity I see in our backgrounds and in our core individuality as nerdy instrument builders. We’re working on a collaborative project in the near future that will be a celebration of the work and heritage of our mentors, highlighting the history and heritage of the first two generations of great Italian American guitar builders and pushing it beyond into the next level with our own flair. Give us a little bit of background and the early years: I was born in Texas in 1966, but as a young boy, my family moved to Bergamo, Italy, outside of Milano towards Cremona. In 1972 I was seven, and I can remember my father took me to Cremona to see a Stradivarius violin. I didn’t quite understand everything, but I knew it was very important. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
