braces

Master luthier John Hamlett was nice enough to give me suggested steps for fitting x braces. I could find no directions anywhere and had various questions. Today I followed John's suggestions and I think it worked really well. Although I had bought some new brace stock, it turned out that I could re-use the tone bars that came with the kit.


I designed the X such that the bridge will wind up sitting over the braces and be located about 1 inch below the crossing point. Fitting was the most time-consuming part. I used tracing or "transfer" paper (from a craft store) and used the "dentist method" of rubbing the item to be fitted and finding the high spots. I then used a scraper and sandpaper to make the adjustments.

It took a while but this is an important step so I took my time. After fitting the two braces independently, I cut the notches and tried to get them such that the two pieces of wood would meet exactly at the same time as the wood got flush with the top of the mandolin. I used a set of jeweler's files to adjust and clean up the notches - Very useful tools for this!


Finally I glued the braces to the top with Titebond and secured them with as many clamps as I could fit.

The next step will likely be carving the braces.

Like many others, I am constantly amazed by the generosity of people on the Internet and their willingness to help and offer advice.