New Parts

I received the back and sides today in the mail. Hibdon Hardwoods kindly threw in a complementary matching Cocobolo bridge blank and headstock overlay set!!! Talk about good service, I'll definitely buy from them on future builds. Here are the two pieces, as well as a drawing for the bridge. The light in my apartment is really bad, and my flash is giving me problems so it is hard to make out the design. Unfortunately the bridge blank isn't large enough to do a one-piece with this design, however I have a couple ideas for working with this. Like I was told as a kid, "Never look a gift horse in the mouth." As a side note, I'm hoping to get a borrow a couple of my Grandpa's old hand planes to use on the build. They probably need a little polishing up, but should hopefully work well.

Specs

Here are my initial specs, subject of course to change. I'm still debating scale length (700 vs. 750 mm), trapeze vs. standard bridge etc., but here is a start:

Baritone Guitar Specs

Top: Curly Redwood
B&S: Cocobolo Rosewood
Body: Jumbo (w/ deeper body than standard)
Binding: Curly Koa
Neck: Honduran Mahogany
Neck Width: 1 7/8"
Fingerboard: Ebony (Alt. Ziricote)

Misc.: BWB Purfling, abalone heastock inlay, Ziplflex blue paua body binding, no fret inlays, gold frets, gold waverly tuners w/ ebony buttons, flamed koa end wedge and back graft, ebony headstock overlay, African blackwood and abalone rosette, ebony bridge, ebony pins w/abalone dots, bone nut and saddle, scalloped x-braced top, ladder braced back, oval shoulder soundport

Here are a couple photos, first a concept drawing for the headstock (the "M" inlay has been scrapped, still working on something for that) and the second is of my drafting gear

Step One

Official first post! This is my first build, and will probably take some time to complete. I now have the top and back and sides, but pretty much nothing else. Over the next couple months I'm going to collect the rest of the necessary supplies and tools. I'm going to be building this in my apartment, with no access to a wood shop (unless something changes in the intervening time). A couple of resources I will be using are http://acousticguitarbuild.blogspot.com, as well as William Cumpiano's guitar building bible (also see his site, http://www.cumpiano.com). Both sets of wood I purchased after surfing several sites for a while, and when I saw these sets come available I knew I had to snatch them up, as I had a gut feeling I wouldn't see the same beautiful sets again for a while.

Here is the top, Curly Redwood which I got from RC Tonewoods & Sons



Here are the back and sides, amazing "cloud figure" Cocobolo Rosewood I got from Hibdon Hardwood



Well enough for now, I'll post again once I've started to collect some more tools and parts.