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       Oct. 20-25, 2013
       Jul 27-Aug. 1, 2014

Just a quick housekeeping item that's just come up: You may have noticed that our online store was displaying a security certificate expiration notice when you tried to place an item online late last week. This was due to a renewal error by our network provider. It has since been properly renewed as secure (SSL). You may see this notice until you "refresh" or clear the cache and history of your browser. If you have any problems with this, please try clearing your cache first. If it still doesn't load as secure, feel free to call us (805) 365-7111 and we can help you place your order.

So back to the fun stuff: I hope you are getting to some festivals this summer. We know that the weather has been somewhat of a problem in the Midwest but it seems that Mother Nature has been good for most of the festivals across the country.

California is the site of some really great bluegrass festivals and our weather is generally dry during the summer (but we do get those occasional heat waves). One especially good festival is "Bluegrassin' in the Foothills" in Plymouth, California. It is located about 50 miles southeast of Sacramento, in California's "gold country" - the region made popular by the gold rush of the mid 1800s. This festival is in its 11th year and will be held September 20-23, and is a great jamming event with numerous workshops (we're doing one on setting up a great sounding banjo, and another on how to build a mandolin from a kit). If you make it to this festival, please come over and say hello.

A few months back, I reported on a special mandolin we built to test various pickups. That mandolin has a removable backplate so that we can easily test numerous pickups in various places within the instrument's body. Our goal is to capture the unique sound of the mandolin, put it through a PA system, and have it come out sounding like an acoustic mandolin - not like an "electric mandolin." Acoustic guitars lend themselves better to being amplified because the larger soundboard and air chamber, so amplifying a mandolin to get that magic woody sound is no easy task. We've done quite a bit of testing and have a lot more to do, but I didn't want you to think that we left the project in the dust. I hope to have more to report on this within the next few months.

Kali, Amy, and Nolan just returned from the Summer NAMM Show held in Nashville (July 12-14). This event is primarily an acoustic instrument show and is about 20% of the size and attendance of the main NAMM show held every January in Anaheim, California. This year, the Summer NAMM Show was held at Nashville's new Convention Center and from what I've been told, its an amazing new facility. The team met with several of our vendors and are hot on the trail of bringing you some great new products; many of them unique to us. I'm excited about the things they are working on and I look forward to sharing these new ideas with you in the near future.

For those of you who get to Nashville from time to time, and make it a habit to visit Gruhn Guitars, I wanted to let you know that Gruhn has moved from Broadway to 2120 8th Avenue S, about 6 miles out of Nashville towards Franklin. After being in downtown Nashville for four decades, in what became really cramped quarters for their showroom, refurbish department, and storage, George moved the company to a wonderful new space with lots of elbow room and display space. If you're in town, stop by and pay them a visit, and if you see George on the floor, tell him Roger sent you!

And on the last day of our recent Luthierie Camp, one of our team surprised me wearing one of the new Siminoff T-shirts that the team just came up with; a stunning new shirt in dark gray high-quality cotton with a mandolin illustration (looking at it from the peghead) in black on the front, and a complimentary view looking at the mandolin from the back of the instrument on the back of the shirt. My compliments to the chefs! You'll find these shirts featured further on in this newsletter.

Lastly, a warm thanks for your continued interest in our products and services. We enjoy working and communicating with you, and hearing about your luthierie successes.

We use a few different instruments for measuring the tapped tone when we are tap tuning. These include a mechanical (spinning wheel) strobetuner as well as StroboSoft - a computer driven tuner that provides incredible accuracy. During our Luthierie Camps I usually select an Conn ST-11 strobetuner from our stash of strobetuners because it has a large dial and is easily visible to me and to Campers who are working with me at the bench.

The ST-11 has a selector knob that sets the unit to one of the 12 notes of the octave. When I begin tap tuning, the first job is to find the note of the part I'm tuning; treble bar, bass bar, or backboard. And, of course, the note can be any of the 12 notes - or any note in between - and this means knowing just where to set the strobetuner's knob.

One method for setting the tuner is to have one of my assistants turn the knob through its 12 positions as I tap on the part. As the knob is turned, we watch the wheel for the most vivid image. This process works well, but it is somewhat time consuming, and if an assistant is not available when I'm tuning in the shop, I have to stop, set the knob to the next, note, and tap again. It's just not an efficient use of time.

To facilitate tuning, I use a small portable electric keyboard (the one we have in the shop is a Casio SA-75) that has about 30 settings for different instrument tones. On the Casio, the #47 harp sound is most similar to the quick peak and decay of a tapped tone and has a similar overtone series. So, to find the starting note, I tap on the part, listen to its tone, and then try to find a similar note on the keyboard. Hearing similar tones makes it very easy to detect the correct note (compared to taping on a soundboard and trying for find the note on a piano, for example).
 
Once I hear the equivalent (or similar) sound on the keyboard, it's a simple task to turn the strobetuner's dial to the note I discovered on the keyboard. The keyboard aids the process greatly and turns what could be a 10 minute hunt-and-peck process into a 10 second find-the-note process.

There are several similar electric keyboards on the market. If you are serious about tap tuning, having one of these keyboards on your bench is a must. They are inexpensive, well worth the investment, and greatly simplify the task of tap tuning.

Binding a fretboard can be a tedious and sometimes frustrating task. The tight curves, the need to keep the binding flush to the bottom of the fretboard, and the single mitered corner presents the luthier with some perplexing problems.

We've found that elastic bands can really simplfy the process. Here's how:

After bending the binding to the correct shape, we secure the fretboard in a vise with protected jaws (some of our vises are fitted with nylon cauls and others with oak cauls to protect the part that is being clamped from damage). We use masking tape to hold the long straight sides of the binding in place, ensuring that the bottom edge of the binding is flush with the bottom of the fretboard. This is especially important with binding that has the black line on the side (like our #409 ivoroid/black/ivoroid binding) because we want that black line to be perfectly parallel with the bottom of the fretboard. (Duco cement is our choice for an adhesive when working with ivoroid binding.)

For binding the body, we use binding tape rather than masking tape. (See our body binding tape in the products section of this newsletter.) Masking tape can lift the wood's fibers - especially on spruce soundboards - whereas the binding tape is a non-sticky fabric that simply secures the binding in place. But the fretboard is too small to bind efficiently with binding tape, and regular masking tape works quickly, and will not lift the fibers of the ebony fretboards.
 
With the long sides quickly taped in place, we grab a bunch of elastic bands and work them around the fretboard extension. We begin with going the long way, around the end of the fretboard extension and out to the nut-end of the fretboard. Then we go around the extension with several twists and wraps and also run some rubber bands from the indented curve back to the nut end of the fretboard. We have to work fast because the Duco sets up quickly. The elastic bands pull the binding into the curves in a way that tape just cannot do.

After one side of the fretboard binding is attached, we remove whatever elastic bands are in the way, and then prepare the mitered joint where the two pieces of binding come together. This is a tricky joint because it occurs right at the end of the two tight curves. Preparing the miters is best done with single-edge razor blades and it is important to put a support directly under the binding when cutting to make sure that you do not push the binding away from the fretboard. Shave away small slivers of binding as you continue to fit the joint. The edge of the celluloid binding shaves easily with a single-edge razor (compared to the difficulty of cutting through a solid piece of binding further in from the edge).

After the miters are prepared, attach the other piece of binding in the same fashion, gluing and taping the long edge first and then drawing the curves and mitered joint together with elastic bands. (Elastic bands are cheap and it is better to toss them after each use rather than trying to re-use them.)

Q: I've seen Titebond II in the stores. Isn't the higher number glue better than the regular Titebond you recommend in your book?

A: Franklin's Titebond® II is a waterproof aliphatic-resin glue that is intended primarily for outdoor use. Joints glued with Titebond II are highly resistant to water, and the glue's flexibility provides an "indestructible" but somewhat pliable joint that can move as the wood warps and changes shape over time. While Titebond II is waterproof, and regular Titebond is not, Titebond II actually does not dry as hard (rigid) as Titebond Regular Glue. What we want in musical instrument joints and seams is a very hard connection of the parts as opposed to one that damps energy. Also, Titebond II dries quite a bit darker -- something you don't want in soundboard and backboard center seams.

Franklin also produces Titebond III that is waterproof, dries lighter in color, and is harder (less pliable) than Titebond II, but also designed for the rigors of outdoor use.

While hot hide glue and hard fish glue are the premium selections for luthierie adhesives, Titebond Regular Glue (the red label) is the ideal second choice for luthiere. It has a very fast closed clamp time allowing clamps to be removed in 15 minutes (the bond cures over the next 12-14 hours) and the joint can be taken apart when heated to about 160°.

While on the subject, some folks use Titebond sparingly. It is important to understand that the moisture (water) in the adhesive plays an important role in helping to set up the adhesive "film." Since some of the water gets immediately absorbed into the wood, using too little Titebond means that the remaining moisture will evaporate more quickly than if more adhesive is used, and this could result in "chalking" where the adhesive turns white (and the joint, as a result, is poor). To make a long story short (and to make better joints) use a sufficient amount of Titebond; any "squeeze out" (excess glue that oozes out of the joint) can be easily cleaned up.

Have a question? Be sure to send it in and we'll answer it in an upcoming issue. Remember, we won't post your name, and chances are, if you have a question, someone else probably needs the same answer!