And, so it begins.

This project is a re-top of the two 5741 parlor guitars seen below.

The one on the right is Jonmark's and the one on the left is mine.

His will get torrefied Adirondack and mine will get torrefied Englemann. Both will be A-braced with torrefied Adi spruce.

Both will get shell purfling, his probably abalone and mine maybe black MOP. His will have tortoise-shell binding and I'm leaning toward black on mine. I was originally going to do cream, but I think the black will compliment the black MOP better.

His will have the standard 5741 rosette. Mine will have an inlaid Custom Balladeer rosette. Both are seen below.

Lastly, I'm thinking about glossing my neck/head stock. His will remain stock.

Neither will be sunburst.

Well this should be fun to watch! Whoever gave you the idea to work on parlors.

I started by removing the tops from both guitars.

That's when the fun began.

Ovation installed the purfling/binding in a non-standard way. Here's what the binding/purfling off these guitars looks like.

The problem is that they routed a slot that's deep enough for both the purfling and the binding. This leaves a full-depth groove in the body that's .125" (1/8") deep. The routed groove should only be .0625" (1/16") deep.

Here's what a standard binding/purfling groove should look like. The purfling is normally 1/2 the height of the binding, so a stair-step groove needs to be routed. As I noted above, the problem is that Ovation made the purfling the same height as the binding so the groove left behind is twice as deep as it needs to be. Ugh!

The simplest fix will be to glue some .060" thick purfling to raise up the inner portion of the groove so that it's level with the lining. Once these are glued and leveled, I'll be able to glue the top to the body which will overlap the filler purfling. This will allow me to route the top correctly later on.

Thanks for sharing this new project. The approach os using same height binding and purfling seems to be much simples than the stepped approach with extra groove and different heights. Why not simply use purfling of the same height as binding? Or if that's not available why not glue a strip of flexible dummy material behind the binding under the purfling?

Yeah, it's simpler for them to do when building the guitar from scratch. But, it's non-standard, even for Ovation and makes the re-topping process much more difficult because there are no off-the-shelf components that can duplicate the process originally used on these guitars. (read: cheap-out)

Purfling is only available in heights of just over 1/8" (.125")

What you suggest is not possible because both of these guitars are going to get shell purfling, which requires an upper groove of almost 1/4" deep. So, there would need to be filler pieces that deep. Any sort of filler piece would also need to be 1/4" deep.

Here's a pick of the deep upper groove required for the shell purfling.

Gluing the purfling now to act as a filler means that the top will be glued to it and the lining. Once that's done the normal grooves can be routed and the purfling/binding can be glued in the standard way.

I jointed both tops, routed them for the rosettes and glued the rosettes in yesterday. These are now ready to take to the wood shop and have them thickness sanded.

I still need to route the sound hole in my top. I didn't do it yet because I need to round the inner hole and I want to do that after the top is leveled.

I had to route out the hole on Jonmark's guitar because of how the rosette is glued to the top. Basically, it rests on a shelf instead of sitting in a groove like mine is, and like most guitar rosettes are inlaid.

It would have been extremely difficult to route out the sound hole after the rosette was glued in. In the pic below you can see the under side of the sound hole. The stock sound hole in the top is a little smaller than mine, but since the inner edge of the rosette is what defines the size of the sound hole, it won't alter the tone.



One of the tasks that needed addressing is the way these bodies were routed for binding/purfling. I talked about that about above so I won't belabor it here.

I glued the binding filler pieces today. Here's Jonmark's bowl with the filler pieces being glued into place.

Here's mine, all ready to have the top gluing surface sanded level.

This filler piece extends the glueing surface for the top and leaves a .060" shelf for the binding and purfling.

I got Jonmark's parlor top sanded, fit to the bowl and bridge located.

I got my parlor top sanded, fit to the bowl and bridge located. Unfortunately, I over-sanded the front of the top and burned through part of the rosette. Actually, all of the rosette, but the only part that is obliterated is the part next to the bass side of the fret board. Live and learn. Luckily, I sanded Jonmark's top second, so I knew to stop while I was ahead.

My top getting braced.

I'll pull this out of the gobar deck tomorrow, then epoxy on the aluminum reinforcement strips. I'll also glue down the braces to Jonmark's top and will be ready to start gluing tops Monday or Tuesday.

Jonmark,

On my guitar I'm moving the upper bout strap button from the bass bout to the treble bout. I've found it makes the guitar easier to play when standing up with a strap. Would you like me to move yours at the same time?

I'm planning to pull the old molly out and seal the old hole with epoxy. Then, drill a new hole on the treble bout and install a new molly. I'll texture the old hole during the finishing process.

Sounds good Dan. Played with that strap arrangement for many years.

Projects are looking great.

My top at bat and Jonmark's on deck, pardon the pun...

Thanks for sharing another exciting BFLG Project with the Master, Dan! Are you going to be tapering the tops for these; do you think torrefication negates the need for tapering?

As an aside, I thought folks might like to see the RC model airplane kits I used to sell.

I recently re-activated my old site for historical/archival purposes, so they are available online once again.

See: Savage Light Industries - Radio Control Model Airplanes

Enjoy!

Nice to see the ol' Flanker again. I wish it was still around. At least I still have my F-4.

I got the guitars routed and carved for the binding and purfling.

I know what you mean Moody. I felt the same way, and mine was a parlor to boot!

These are looking nice Dan! It's a shame we're 3000 miles apart from a parlor comparison session.

(Would that be cool or what?! )

Here's a nostalgia pic for you. Su-27P Flanker & Su-27IB Platypus on the tarmac.

Those parlors are looking very pretty. I'm sure they're going to sound as good as they look!

I got the purfling glued down to both guitars. Mine has black pearl and Jonmark's has abalone.

Purfling scraped down level with the tops.

Binding sized and glued into place. Mine has black and Jonmark's has tortoise shell.

I'll scrape these down tomorrow after the glue has dried. After that, I'll touch up the bowls, and then it's finishing time. (Yay!)

I mentioned to Dan it was hard to tell the difference between the abalone and black pearl binding in his earlier photos. Dan said it was because of the flash. He texted this flash-free photo. Youza!

Dueling Parlors they are!

The abalone does have a lot of sparkle compared to the black pearl.

Interestingly, the tortoise shell binding of this thickness is almost black. Here's a couple of pics that show what I mean. You can see a few light brown spots, but mostly it's a very dark brown, almost black.

Both guitars' bowls are touched up, tops and necks are masked and ready for finish.

I'll be spraying the first coats in the morning.

First coats of clear are on the tops.

The biggest take-away is the different personalities that are emerging.

Jonmark's top has really strong silking, which is surprising for Adirondack spruce. The top has as much sparkle as the abalone purfling. The rosette is brighter and bolder in person than what shows in the photo. This is definitely a stage guitar. It'll be very flashy.

Because of the close grain on my top its silking is much more delicate and subtle, which fits in with the subtle nature of the rosette and purfling.

Here's a crude diagram that shows the medullary rays.

The losing instrument gets "trebucheted"...

Here's the Q&D photo.

All done.

Jonmark's guitar gets tortoise shell tuner buttons to go with the tortoise shell binding.

My guitar gets real black MOP tuner buttons to match the black MOP purfling.

It hasn't even shipped yet and I'm waiting by the door.

Just a little excited.

I found this pearl of a guitar under my tree Christmas morning. Lucky me!

I've renamed it Black Pearl Parlor. Dan and I played together with his Black Pearl guitar. They sound great together. Sadly, no video/audio; you have to take our word for it.

It was fun modifying the 8117 shallow bowl guitar case to fit this guitar.