Starting a 17″ Archtop

This will be a full-size 17″ archtop. At this point, the sides are bent, the neck and tailblocks are glued in, and the material for the top and back have been selected and bookmatched. It will be a single-cutaway with 3″ sides.  IMG_7216This is a closeup of the neck block showing how it is shaped to the bend of the cutaway.

The top will be Sitka spruce from wedges cut from an Alaskan billet I have had air-drying six years.  I bought the billet from John McCray of Alaskatonewoods, and I was lucky because I not only received my order but got good wood.  This is from old-growth blow-downs, and has the tightest grain I have seen in spruce – over 60 lines per inch!  IMG_7215

The back and sides are Vermont ‘graveyard’ maple – right, hard maple from trees that grew in a graveyard in New Haven Mills.  These trees were fast-growing and show wide grain lines.  Hard and heavy, so I will have trouble carving the back.  Here are the top and back wedges laid out, prior to gluing.  The wedges are 1″ thick in the center, tapering to about 3/8″ at the edges.  They will finish under 1/4″ at the edges.

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