Bridge and some polishing

I said in the last post that I made the bridge for the soprano. I chose a piece of ipé from that floor board sample from Buenos Aires, and went to town on the wee table saw. 

Setting the distance with a wooden ruler clamped to the neck, then low tack masking tape at the front and back edge of the bridge. 

And with the ruler next to the fretboard edge I draw lines that will aid me in positioning the bridge sideways. 



I use a piece of guitar string through two miniscule holes through the saddle slot and the top to stop things from sliding out of position. I didn’t take a pic of shaping the bottom of the bridge to match the curvature of the top, but I did that with a scraper. 

Do keep in mind the lack lustre appearance of the mahogany so far, if you grab the opportunity to despair now you’ll get a bit of a rush at the end of this post. 



And here’s a pic of the gang after tvree or four coats of shellac. Those first coats I apply quite liberalky without oil, they’ll form the base for the polishing later. How much later? Well the next pic maybe. 

This morning I started polishing with oil. I use walnut oil because I read somewhere that it dries. My tests of its drying properties have bern inconclusive at best, but for lubricating the pad it works really well. The other obvious choice is olive oil and I know for sure that won’t dry. 

And here’s Li’s soprano. That mahogany is very special. Still from the boards my dad bought in the 1960’s.