Claro Walnut/Redwood OM - New Home Required!

This guitar is still looking for a new home.

My skills as a player are sadly lacking, perhaps because I spend so much time building guitars at the expense of time I could be practising, but I've uploaded a short clip to YouTube anyway to give some idea of what can be expected.

For those interested, I recorded the clip using my Zoom H4n recorder - adequate, but not ideal, I know. I have a pair of good quality condenser mics on order, so I'll provide a better quality and more comprehensive sound sample as soon as I'm able. I guess this will force me to brush the rust off some fingerstyle pieces that I've neglected for ages, so time away from the workbench is going to be a necessity. I'm placing my trust in the resilience of my muscle  memory!

Please contact me with any questions you may have, or to arrange an inspection. Visitors are always welcome.

Price in Australian dollars is $4,200 and includes a brand new Hiscox Pro II hard case. The purchaser is responsible for any shipping costs.

Cheers, Pete.

For Sale: East Indian Rosewood/Engelmann Spruce 00

Despite its relatively small body, this guitar has surprising presence in the bass register, while notes played on the treble strings are round and sweet. The shorter scale length is inherently helpful where playability is concerned, and this instrument is indeed very pleasant to play.

• Back and sides: East Indian rosewood
• Soundboard: Engelmann spruce
• Neck: Honduras mahogany
• Fretboard: Maccasar ebony
• Bridge: Maccasar ebony
• Rosette: zebrano and Macassar ebony
• Headstock overlay: Maccasar ebony
• Neck join: 12th fret
• Body finish: pre-catalysed lacquer
• Neck finish: hardwax oil
• Soundhole diameter: 95mm
• Lower bout width: 14.5"
• Depth at tail: 4.25"
• Scale length: 24.9"
• Nut width: 45mm

Please contact me with any questions you may have, or to arrange an inspection.

Price in Australian dollars is $4,050 and includes a brand new hard case. The purchaser is responsible for any shipping costs.

Cheers, Pete.

For Sale: Claro Walnut/Port Orford Cedar OM

The lighting in my workshop is a stand-out feature I notice and appreciate every day. Banks of LED strip lights supplement the natural light illuminating the workshop through several large windows, making woodworking a much more pleasant pursuit and reducing my propensity to screw things up from time to time.

One downside is that photographing my work is frustrating to say the least, with reflections on glossy finished instruments very hard to eliminate entirely. A pair of LED movie lights is on my wish list therefore, and I'm confident that with the flexibility they'll provide in terms of placement and the ability to dial in colour temperature, I'll be able to avoid these lighting issues to a large extent.

In the meantime, here are some shots of a recently completed guitar, complete with unwanted reflections and questionable colours. Even with my high quality Canon camera, whose colour rendition reviewers often applaud, I struggle to accurately capture the colour of the various woods I use; the redwood-topped guitar I featured in a recent post is a case in point. Aside from acquiring the movie lights I mentioned above, more practice is obviously required!

The individual growth rings on this Port Orford cedar top are so closely spaced that they're almost impossible to distinguish; several centuries of growth must surely have contributed to its creation and, as its construction proceeded, I've frequently reminded myself that I have an obligation to put precious material such as this to good use. Having successfully completed this guitar, I have no doubt that it will outlive me, and my hope is that it will provide decades of pleasure for its eventual owner/s.

Contact me for pricing and details.

Cheers, Pete

For Sale: Claro Walnut/Redwood OM

It's taken such a long time to complete this guitar that it features a body shape I've long since modified. The shape of the heel is very traditional, and the fretboard end is also from a bygone era where my guitar building exploits are concerned. After some initial indecision, I've decided to reduce the price a little.

I'm loving the oil finished neck, which feels super smooth and will be very easy to maintain as the years inevitably take their toll.

Contact me for pricing and details.

Cheers, Pete.

For Sale: Manchinga/Engelmann Spruce OM

With this - the first of a batch of five guitars - now strung up, I can begin to relax a little and allow myself a moment to enjoy the sense of achievement at having completed an instrument; for various reasons, it's been a while!

There's always a sense of nervous anticipation when I first install strings on a new guitar, but even after hearing the first notes ring out I know better than to pass judgement immediately; it would seem too much like anticipating a toddler's potential as an Olympic sprinter after witnessing their first steps! Instead, I let it sit undisturbed for a week tuned to concert pitch, knowing even then that only the passage of time will reveal its true character. After this initial settling in period, I fine-tune the action, saddle height and intonation - it's only then that I can derive some sense of its sonic potential. I certainly have expectations where tone is concerned, but they're somewhat nebulous and hard to describe. In terms of aesthetics, I'm very pleased with this instrument, but I'm anything but an accomplished player, so I look forward to receiving feedback from someone more proficient than I am where ergonomics and tone are concerned.

While the woodworking and finishing aspects of my guitars seem to improve incrementally with each instrument, and are relatively easy to assess, the complex and all-important tonal characteristics are more difficult to evaluate. Describing what I'm  hearing is difficult enough, and formulating an approach that will render sonic improvements from one guitar to the next is very challenging. I've generated Chladni patterns on my unattached soundboards in the past, hoping for some "light bulb" moments to reveal themselves, but as interesting as they are, manipulating those patterns or translating my findings into tangible gains is a puzzle I'm solving all too slowly. For the time being, the best I can hope for is that I'll come to judge in some subjective sense that I've made improvements over earlier instruments and have been able to establish a new benchmark from which I can implement refinements on future instruments.

Contact me for pricing and details.

Cheers, Pete