Practical channel cutting

[Mungo Park]

Im a trying to build a guitar in my woodworking garage guy. Most likely manage one guitar a year. I have been slowly moving along making the guitar and various jigs needed to do a build. I am looking ahead and thinking of how I can cut the channel for binding.
Any practical ideas of how I can do this.

[Skarsaune]

If you prefer power tools, a router. StewMac (and others) sell bits with a variety of bearings of different diameters for different depths of cut (ie, different thickness of binding).

There is a whole raft of different jigs that a) hold the body b) keep the router square to the sides. The radiusing on a normal top or back will cause a router to tip in or out, if you just let the router ride on the top/back.


Hand tools - a gramil. basically a marking gage with a small blade.

[warfrat73]

There are some jigs you can make and buy, some are fairly elaborate.

But one of the cheaper/simpler ways is one of these attachments for your dremel. As long as your sides are square, your binding channels should be. I have the older version... the biggest weakness of the older ones was that the bearing that ran on the sides was too short and that made it hard to keep the cutting blade square, the updated version addresses that with a much longer bearing:

https://www.stewmac.com/luthier-tool...g-router-guide



There are also some knockoff versions of it out there.

[Alan Carruth]

As has been pointed out, the top and back surfaces of a 'flat top' guitar are not either flat, or perpendicular to the sides at the edges. The back, in particular, can slope fairly steeply toward the neck above the waist, and the Dremel type setup will make a rabbet that is significantly undercut there.

A marking gauge ('gramil'), sharp chisel, and some files (especially a 'riffler' for the inside cut at the waist) will enable you to do the job, but it's slow and painstaking work, especially before you've built up some tool chops.

OTOH, the old saying is that you can make mistakes with hand tools, but real destruction calls for a power tool. When the router works it's fast and precise; when it doesn't it's fast and doesn't care what it's eating. In either case taking your time and using sharp tools makes a world of difference.

[Fathand]

I use a trim router. I buy a set of flush cut bits like this
https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0886924L5/...v_ov_lig_dp_ii

I put the bearing from the 3/8" bit on the 1/2" bit and it will cut a 1/16" binding notch. The 5/16" bearing on the 3/8" bit will cut 1/32" notch.

[Mungo Park]

Thanks for the help, this will give me some ideas to work on.