Whoa! I wonder if all Folklore guitars have a hole in the brace? Original X-brace like the one below, right?

Does it look like this bracing pattern? Note that there is no x-reinforcement and the ends of the x-braces aren't scalloped.

I can see how the simple brace pattern would make for a very responsive-sounding guitar. There's nothing there to impede the vibration of the top wood.

Just a quick update.

I put together my little spray booth using a voting booth I acquired a few years ago. I added a visqueen curtain to keep the overspray under control.

I taped down some balsa to keep the guitar from rolling around while it's being sprayed.

The nitrate dope has been applied and leveled. I'm ready to start applying the butyrate finish coats.

I applied the first couple of coats of butyrate tonight. I'll let that dry for a day or so to fully harden, then wet sand it with 320-grit and apply a couple more coats.

At that point I'll decide whether to go through another cycle of sanding/painting or to start the finish sanding process working up from 600-grit, to 1200-grit and 2000-grit and final polish.

Well, it's been over a month since my last post.

It took longer than I expected to spray the dope. I had planned to let it harden for a full two weeks. While the dope was hardening, I refurbished/rewired a pedal box project for a friend. That project ended up taking three weeks, so the dope hardened an extra week.

Here's what the finish looks like after cutting and polishing. Except for being a lot more shiny, it's not too different from the pics of the top with base shellac finish, but that was the plan. I knew the dope was, for the most part, optically clear, which is why I chose it.

What I didn't expect was the weird clouding in certain spots. I did my best to repair these areas, but in the end there wasn't too much I could do except sand the finish down to bare wood and start over. Ther was no way was I going to do that. I don't even know how it's going to sound with the new bracing pattern I used.

In the end I decided this was a learning experience and have decided to avoid using lacquer in the future. First, because it's a pretty tedius process having to spray on so many thin coats and secondly because if the lacquer happens to seep through the base shellac, the solvents in the lacquer melt plastic, as what happened with the bottom binding around the lower bout.

On to removing the bridge masking. First step is to remove the build-up of sanding dust and lacquer from the alignment holes.

Drop the bridge into place, then using a sharp #11 Xacto knife, score the finish around the bridge to ensure a clean separation line.

Peel the tape off, leaving the clean top wood ready for gluing the bridge using hide glue.

Right now I'm staining and sealing the bridge so it matches the TRC. Once that's done I'll glue it down.

"It seems all pics of the post have been deleted"

Thats what I thought too at the very beginning, but they were just slow to load

Astounding! I hope you realize how encouraging your posts are and what hobby shop carnage will ensue by those of us with a lot less patience and skill. It must be time to make some sawdust fly!

Mike, 

My thoughts exactly. John & Co. should be getting a lot of "clean up" jobs from those of us that are thinking "hell, piece of cake"