Day 99: Amateur Hour

I rushed home from the day job last night and pulled the bottom piece out of the gluing jig. I must say that it looked pretty good at that point.

Then, I broke out my Stanley #4 Bailey smoothing plane and went to town.

I then cut it to length (31 3/4") and all was well until I started to cut it to width (17 11/16").

Yep, I started cutting on the wrong side of the cut line.

This amateur bonehead moment is brought to you by Tortuga Early Instruments.

Fortunately, I had some Garrett Wade Gap Filling Glue handy. I learned about this stuff from master luthier Mark Roberts of Mark Roberts Guitars & Ukuleles. It's designed to fill in gaps, but I'm not sure it was intended for gaps this large. I use a think kerf blade on the table saw and I suppose it could have been worse. As it dries, it will contract, so I'll keep an eye on it and keep filling if and when necessary.

One thing I've learned in all my years is that mistakes are usually based on scientific miscalculations while recovery from them can be an art form. The bonehead move notwithstanding, I plan to start laying out and cutting the bottom boards that run lengthwise front-to-back using more of the clear pine I picked up at Home Depot. Viva l'arte!

Until next time...