Selecting Wood and Preparing Rib Stock

Before proceeding further, the wood for the instrument is chosen and the rib stock is prepared.  Gregg and I selected the following wood for my first instrument – on the left is the spruce block for the two piece top plate, in the middle is the maple block for the neck and scroll, and on the right is the two-piece maple back plate:

To prepare the rib stock, sheets of thin maple are sawn on the bandsaw to a thickness of approximately 1.4 mm.  Pictured here are several sheets:

These sheets are cut into 34mm wide strips, sanded to a thickness of approximately 1.2 mm on the drum sander, and then scraped to a final thickness of 1.0-1.1mm using a metal scraper.

Cutting and Gluing the Blocks

Its not a big step, but a step forward nonetheless.  In fact, the blocks are the first thing in the process that will actually be part of the finished violin (or at least part of them will be).  I cut the upper, lower, and corner blocks out of spruce and glued them to the form.  The grain runs straight out in the upper and lower blocks, and is angled out in the corner blocks.  The blocks are initially 34mm deep, which is well over the final rib height and will be tapered after the linings are installed.  The blocks are glued to the form with strips of paper in between to assist in removing them from the form later. 

With the blocks attached, its time to heat up the bending iron and bend the c-bout ribs.

Creating the Form and Templates

The next step is to use the outline that I have drawn to create the form and templates.  The form is constructed by gluing plywood to a maple veneer on both sides.  The veneer is primarily for appearance, and I have used a bookmatched flamed maple veneer that was leftover in the shop, which gives the form a striking appearance.  The wood form blank also received a coat of epoxy for protection.  Each of the two templates is made by gluing two sheets of Formica together for stability.  

The wood blank and the two Formica blanks are fastened together using double sided tape, the Mylar drawing of the outline is fastened to the top sheet of Formica using spray glue, holes are drilled for locator pins, and the rough outline is cut with a bandsaw:

The thickness of wood form has been tapered from 18mm on the lower bout side to 16mm on the upper bout side.  This later allows the installation of the linings to establish the rib taper by placing the lower edge of the linings flush with the surface of the form. 

So that the centerline of the mold remains perpendicular to a flat surface for purposes of cutting and sanding the outline (and thus, the edges of the mold remain perpendicular despite the 2mm taper), the mold and templates are attached to a tapered bottom block.

You can clearly see this taper, bottom block, and the “sandwich” of the form and templates here:

 

The purpose of using two templates (one for the C-bouts and one for the upper and lower bouts) is to ensure that the rib corners come out correctly.  Once the outline is sawn and sanded, the top Formica template is removed, and the C-bouts of the remaining template are scribed 3.6mm from the edge, which marks the edge of the mold outline and blocks for the C-bouts.  Then, one Formica template and the wood mold are cut and sanded to this line:

Then, the C-Bout template is removed from the form, the other template is again fastened to the form, and the upper and lower bouts are cut and sanded along the inside line of the outline, which is 3.6mm in from the edge.

This leaves three things: (1) a Formica template of the upper and lower bout outline, with the overhang for the C-bouts remaining; (2) a Formica template of the C-bout outline, with the overhand for the upper and lower bouts remaining; and (3) the wood mold, cut to the outline all around.

Thus, when put together, the two Formica templates form the outline of the instrument, 3.6mm from the form outline (which includes the 1.1mm rib thickness and the 2.5mm overhang):

The corners of the two Formica templates are then trimmed such that the end of the corner on the upper and lower bout template marks the end of the rib point, and the end of the corner on the c-bout template marks the end of the plate corner (note that this is not as accurate as I would like it to be in this, my first, attempt and will need to be adjusted somewhat later).

The final steps are to cut spaces for the blocks and drill clamping holes in the wood form and to give the wood form another coat of epoxy for protection.  Here is the finished form:

Drawing the Outline

The first step in violinmaking is to draw the outline of the instrument.  One can choose to make an exact copy of an existing instrument, make an instrument “based on” or “inspired by” an existing instrument, or make an instrument based on a personal design.  I have decided to build my first instrument based on Stradivari’s PG form, which was used for many of the instruments that Stradivari constructed during his Golden Period.

It is common for violinmakers to trace the outlines of instruments from photos, plans, posters, etc.  Alternatively, the outline can be determined based on tracing the purfling of an existing instrument – the theory being that although the edges become distorted through wear on antique instruments, the purfling remains an accurate representation of the outline. 

For my purposes, and to begin to develop my eye for outlines, I drew the outline of the Stradivari PG form using a pencil and compass using the theories of symmetry and proportion described in François Denis’s book Traité de Lutherie: The Violin and the Art of Measurement (http://www.traitedelutherie.com).

I have spent the last two months studying the Denis book and honing my compass skills.  I began by using the theories that I had learned in the Denis book to draw the first two examples in the book – violins by Andrea Amati and the Amati Brothers.  These drawings were made by using sections of the various magnitudes used in the violin instead of more standards units of measurement, such as millimeters.  As I drew these examples, I strove to not just blindly follow the instructions provided in the book, but to understand why I was doing each step.  I drew each of these examples numerous times, and each time I drew them, more questions were revealed, more research was done, and more answers were uncovered. 

Based on the knowledge that I gained drawing the two example outlines, I set out to draw the “hypothetical” Stradivari outline in the Denis book, which the author derived from the averages of the dimensions of the various Stradivari forms. The hypothetical Stradivari outline was also drawn using the Cremonese measurement of points (3.5mm per Point) instead of using sections of magnitudes as was done in the Andrea Amati and Amati Brothers outlines.  Drawing this hypothetical Stradivari outline led to several more rounds of questions and further research on the various Stradivari outlines.

I then set out to use the principles that I had learned to draw the Stradivari PG form that would be used for my first violin.  In doing so, I had the benefit of the photograph of the PG form in Stewart Pollens’s book The Violin Forms of Antonio Stradivari and the scan of the PG form that is included with the Denis book.  After several attempts, I drew the following outline that will be used for the form of my first violin:

  

Once the outline was completed, I transferred it to a transparent mylar film to be used to make the mold.  On the mylar, I also drew a rough outline of the outline of the instrument, although the overhang in these drawings is a bit too wide and the corners are unrefined at this point.  As you can see from the pictures below, my form outline, when placed over the Denis scan of the actual Stradivari PG form, is very accurate.

With the outline drawn, I will begin preparing the inside mold and related templates, which will be the subject of my next post.

Background

First, a bit about my background.   As with many violinists, my relationship with the violin runs deep.  I started playing the violin at age three through the Suzuki program – on a Cracker Jack box, covered with brown paper, with a ruler for a neck and a pencil for the bow.

By age 3 ½, I had graduated to a “real” instrument:

I continued to play the violin through high school.  Once I started college, however, my interests turned elsewhere, and the violin took a back seat to academics (although certainly the discipline and other skills that I learned as a violinist were largely responsible for my success in college).  After graduating from college, I attended law school in Chicago, where I graduated fifth in my class of over 150 students, was elected managing editor of the law review, and won a state moot court competition.  After law school, I accepted an associate position with a large and prestigious Chicago-based law firm, were I practiced law for five years.  

It was during this time that I realized that something was missing from my life.  For some time, I was unable to identify what exactly it was that I was missing and then, quite suddenly in my office one day, I realized that what I was missing was the violin.  Of course, having not played it for over 10 years at that point, my ability to build a career as a violinist was extremely limited (although I could make the argument that my ability to do this was always limited anyway).  Nonetheless, I recalled the luthier’s workshops that I frequented as a teenager and my fascination with the instruments in various stages of repair, restoration, and construction. I decided right then and there to build my own violin.

From that moment forward, I dedicated all of my spare time to reading books, acquiring tools, reading posts on Internet discussion boards, and talking to everyone who would listen about building my violin.  And, most importantly, I started to build my first violin, which I called “Beta 1” (because I wanted a test run before I built my first “real” violin).  Beta 1 was based on the plans in Henry Strobel’s book on violin making, which served as my introduction to the methods of a violin maker.  I was proud when I completed my first “beta” violin, although I knew that it was a very amateur job and that I needed more training if I wanted to make a better violin.  With this in mind, I began researching violin making schools and ultimately applied and was accepted to the Chicago School of Violin Making starting for the fall 2008 semester.

Before I had a chance to begin the semester, however, my partner Shelly had some unexpected news – she had been offered a job as a faculty member with the University of Michigan system.  We had to make a decision in a one week timeframe of whether we would move to Ann Arbor so that she could accept the position.  The answer, of course, was obvious, so instead of starting school in Chicago in the fall of 2008, I moved to Ann Arbor and started a job with a prominent law firm here and continued my violin making on an amateur basis.  

As you may know, for a relatively small city, Ann Arbor has a number of prominent violinmakers.  One afternoon, I sent an e-mail to violinmaker Gregg Alf on somewhat of a lark, explaining my situation, but not believing that he would actually reply to my e-mail.  To my surprise, he replied that afternoon and suggested that we meet so that he could “size me up” a bit.   We setup a lunch meeting at a local restaurant, where I sought Gregg’s recommendations on how to advance my violin making skills.  This lunch led to further communications and, eventually, to the opportunity of a lifetime for me – an offer to apprentice in Gregg’s studio.   To compliment Gregg’s offer, the law firm where I work in Ann Arbor generously allowed me to continue to work on a reduced hours schedule while I apprentice at Alf Studios. 

And so, the journey begins.  This blog will document the step by step construction of my first violin as an apprentice at Alf Studios.  It is intended for musicians, violinmakers, family, friends, and anyone else who is interested in the process of making a violin.  Perhaps we can learn something from each other.  I hope that you enjoy the journey as much as I expect to,  and I welcome your comments and questions on the blog, the violin, or anything else of interest.