Serial Number 003

First Steel String Build

Started build in September 2022: completed on November 6, 2022

*edited on February 27, 2025

003 was my first attempt on building an Orchestra Model guitar and also the first guitar that has a cutaway on it. I used a Ramirez body so it is going to be a little different in sound and obviously, in size. The bodies were similar enough in size so I figured it was worth trying. I did receive the Orchestra Model mould and body template during the construction of the body. S/N 004 will be another OM/000 guitar and will be made with the correct body.

A classical and acoustic guitar have their differences in the build so the new things took a bit to figure out and accomplish. A big difference with this guitar is that I didn’t have to build jigs and set them up as I went like the first two guitars.

I find that building the body is actually easy: it is some of the fine, precision wood working that I still need to improve on but I’m sure I will level up soon.

When I was at my course in April, we discussed torrefied wood: Jeremy’s personal experience with it is that it’s brittle to work with and I definitely found that out first-hand.

I thought I had a full body set for torrefied tonewood but it turned out that the torrefied Sitka Spruce wasn’t wide enough for the body size. The body is made of a combination of torrefied Khaya African Mahogany for the back and torrefied Sapele for the sides.

Mahogany and Sapele naturally have a pearl kind of sheen to them. It is almost like a figured pattern as opposed being through the whole surface – kind of like tiger/flame Maple. With the back and sides French polished, I would say you can still kind of see that in the Khaya African Mahogany back but the Sapele doesn’t seem to have it – the Sapele just seems to sparkle.

The guitar has Indian Rosewood for the back strip and binding to give some contrast to the back and sides and a piece of torrefied Khaya African Mahogany for the truss rod cover.

Eventually, the neck was taken off and sanded down to refinish with Tru-Oil. I tried to use up my boiled linseed oil thinking the finished result would be similar to Tru-Oil.

You can also see that string 5 and string 2 are against the post of string 6 and 1: I’m not sure how this happened with having a template to use and mark for the headstock. This will be something I will need to figure out.

The neck is just one piece Khaya African Mahogany. I did want to laminate something in the middle but because this was new model build. I didn’t want to use up the material in case this guitar didn’t turn out well.

An acoustic bridge is a different build than the classical bridge but they aren’t really THAT different besides some minor things. I did watch some of the demonstrations for acoustic guitar builds when it was going on during my course so it wasn’t a big transition from what I learned. I also keep some bridges as reference pieces which really helps.

I would like to design a custom bridge and head stock for future guitars – something to make the guitars unique to my brand.

Starting in January of 2025, previously built guitars will go through a revamp. One thing I seem to struggle on is the shape of the heel and some guitars need tweaking on the neck angle and left/right alignment. Some guitars have other things that need to be looked at as well.

S/N 003 had the neck reworked as well as the neck angle and the left/right alignment. Strings have been changed from EJ16 to EJ26.

*I have played this guitar side by side with a Takamine GF30CE-NAT (close to grand concert proportions) and this guitar is slightly louder.

SPECS

Body Ramirez Body with cutaway

Scale 25.34″

Top Sitka Spruce

Back torrefied Khaya African Mahogany

Sides torrefied Sapele

Neck Khaya African Mahogany

Fingerboard Rosewood

Bridge Rosewood

Tuning Machines Gotoh 381

Strings D’Addario EJ26