Garden Planters Build Part 2

I almost forgot to do my completion article on the planters but here it is.
The planters frames were completed and then given three coats of general Finishes Exterior 450. I sealed the end grain of the legs with 2 part epoxy using West Systems Epoxy.

Small planter without cladding

Large planter without cladding

Like any furniture job clamps and a workbench
are essential

Then I started to clad the outside with western
red cedar tongue and groove boards. I fastened them
on with stainless steel 18G nails.

The final part of the construction was the mitred face frame around the top perimeter fixed with some stainless steel screws. I then cut some pond liner material to size and pushed it into the each box. I made slits in the bottom so excess water could drain out and then filled with compost. Once it was around 3/4 full I fitted some more red cedar cleats to hold the pond line in place and then trimmed off the excess. The boxes have considerable weight in them now so I was glad I had moved them into position before doing the last jobs.

Then all that remained was to plant up the boxes, install the self watering system and enjoy them. I hope you like them.

Happy woodworking

Terry

Face frame fitted and a few plants installed

3 of the boxes in situ.
The other box is somewhere else in the yard.

Baritone Guitar Build Part 4 - The body slab and imbuya cap

The main slab of the body is African mahogany with a book matched imbuya cap. Bill Quinn over at ToneTech Luthier Supplies showed me a nice piece of South American imbuya that he'd had resawn to book match it. I pondered over it for 30 seconds and just had to have it.

The imbuya boards on my
kitchen countertop

Drilling the pickup cavities

The next thing I did after hand planing the mahogany board flat was print out my plan full size and glue it onto a piece of hardboard (masonite). Then I cut it out on the bandsaw using a spokeshave and sandpaper to blend in the curves.

Baritone Guitar Build Part 3 - The neck and fretting

The neck

The neck is laminated from quartersawn sapele
and 5mm thick rock maple.

 It is roughly cut to shape in side profile with a 10 degree headstock. I glued some sapele blocks to get the full width. The truss rod channel was routed out, two way truss rod installed and the fretboard glued on. The picture above shows the fretboard prior to the inlays being glued in.
Some luthiers scarf joint the headstock to minimise on stock use but I normally use 8/4 stock (2" thick) quarter-sawn boards and am able to get two necks out of one board with a 10 degree headstock.

Baritone Guitar Build Part 2 - The fret board

I opted for using ebony for the fretboard and nickel silver frets. I also wanted to inlay the board with some nice red abalone I had. First of all I chose a nice theme for the inlay and this was an Arabesque pattern I saw a few years ago.
Using a jewellers saw and some fine blades along with a simple piece of softwood with a slot and a hole I broke several blades but ended up with a nice set of inlays.

Then I run the ebony through the jointer to flatten one side and then ran it through the thicknesser to get it around 7mm (9/32") thick.

The next task was to put the radius onto the board. I used a 12" radius aluminium fret levelling beam from StewMac with some self adhesive sand paper of 80 grit to do the initial shaping.

Essentially the aluminium beam has a concave radius of 12" machined into one face. You stick the sandpaper onto this face.
Then with the board fixed to the bench with some double-sided tape you transfer the concave radius to the board by moving the beam back and forth sanding a convex radius onto the board.

I then cut the board edges slightly larger than finished size on the band saw.