Day 190: Roasting Maple for Fun and Profit

Before diving into a post to honor Jack Peters, I thought I'd take a moment to talk about remaking the keyboard - why and how I intend to do it.

Why do I need to remake the keyboard? Well, as you know, I have followed Ernie Miller's Harpsichord Project eBook pretty religiously - until now. As I explained in my last post, meeting and working under the tutelage of Owen Daly has fundamentally changed how I view the instrument and its construction. At first, all I wanted was to build a single instrument I could keep in my little music studio to play for myself. After meeting Owen, building became something different, something to take far more seriously, especially with regard to first principles.

In the previous post, I explained how Jack Peters observed the registers and keys were a bit wonky. This was not by design. Mr. Miller's eBook is flawless with regard to plans and spacing and building techniques, yet I managed to somehow screw up the register hole spacing to the point where it's quite noticeable and now embarrassing. Since Owen guided me to shift away from completing the Hubbard spinet kit and back to completing this little instrument, I became increasingly unhappy with the quality of my work on the keyboard, hence the decision to make a new one.

When discussing the remake with Owen (who I'm pretty sure has come to question my mental stability), he mentioned that the materials I should use are as follows: basswood for the keyblank, cherry for the sharp bodies with bone of some sort for the tops, and ebony for the natural tops. It turns out I do have some ebony, yet I also have a significant cache of African blackwood I purchased years ago from Gilmer Wood Company, which I prefer to use. I used it on the initial keyboard, which is the best part of that monster. It ain't broke, so I'm sticking with it.

What I'm not necessarily sticking with is making the keyblank out of tulip poplar. I also happen to have several hundred board feet of poplar I picked up in a weird sale downtown Portland. I've never had it twist or warp over time. In fact, it's the wood specified by Mr. Miller for the project keyboard. I once emailed Ernie to ask him why the slices are only 4" when joining the board for the blank and he replied that it was to prevent warping, cupping, or twisting by using small pieces, which made complete sense to me. The keys have been solid over the years, yet I ignore Owen's advice at my own peril. I'll be heading down to Crosscut Hardwoods in Portland to acquire the basswood necessary to start the keyboard soon.

Just a couple of days ago, Owen told me about a technique that sounded familiar: Roasting wood to caramelize its lignin, both externally and internally. Roasting is a technique that has become popular lately for woods of all kinds. Roasted maple electric guitar necks are all the rage right now because it makes the wood a beautiful dark golden brown as it cooks. This technique is also used in "Torrefied tonewoods" for acoustical guitar tops (I acknowledge Owen's aversion to the use of the term "tonewood," yet this is how it's used in the guitar lutherie world) to provide a crisper, brighter tone. Does it work? Frankly, I'm not sure, but companies that supply luthiers offer them on the regular.

Owen suggested I start with maple. Later, he admitted that he misremembered the technique and that I should have used cherry because it results in a darker final product. He says that it also smells better during roasting, which would have made my wife much happier with my cooking efforts two nights ago. Because I cooked some sample cuts at 460F in our kitchen oven, the house ended up smelling like a campfire for a couple of hours, which is not really as great as it sounds. The photos below illustrate the original state of the maple cuts, how I prepared them for roasting, and the final products.

In the first photo are some maple slices I cut at different sizes to see how they would perform under heat. The second simply demonstrates how I covered them with aluminum foil in a roasting pan and the last shows the final products - a rich, deep brown that permeates the wood. Really beautiful stuff.

This intial test, even though it was the "wrong" material, was very encouraging. I can't wait to get some cherry sharps into the little toaster oven I picked up (photo below) so I can roast in the shop or the courtyard between the house and the shop.

I found this thing on the FB Marketplace for $25. It's never been used - they list for $75 - and it goes up to 450F, which should be fine for my purposes. Whether the heat in such a small space is too intense for this operation remains to be seen. I'll be testing again tonight with this new little gadget and I'll share the results in a subsequent post.

In the meantime, I'll share an interesting resource that comes recommended from Stevie Sorlie, an FB acquaintance. It's a company, RM Exports, that offers camel bone harpsichord sharp keytop slips. Yes, camel bone. I did a little research and it seems camel bone is denser than bovine, which is perfect for this application. I not only want the cosmetic benefit of nicely bleached bone, I want it to be durable enough to outlast me, which is not a heavy lift, but still. Sure, I can purchase entire bleached camel bones and process them myself, but who has time for that? The slips will take a little processing, but that's not a big deal. I've ordered 110 and they are, as they say, in the mail.

In my next post on this topic, I'll provide details about the next roasting test using cherry in the new toaster, as well as my adventures in procuring basswood for the jointed keyblank.

Until next time...

UPDATE: Still working with the toaster oven. It may be a silly idea, but I had to try. Getting it to come up to temp and stay there seems to be a particular challenge. This may result in procuring a more robust oven and selling this one on the FB Marketplace. More to come...

Update: My Apprenticeship

Over the course of the last few years, several readers, friends, and family have asked me why I've still not finished this instrument, including Ernie Miller, creator of The Harpsichord Project eBook. This is a legitimate question that I'd like to address briefly now. First of all, I was only ever a player of the instrument when I found Ernie's eBook on the Interwebs. Granted, I had worked wood since I was 12 years old, yet making a harpsichord was not something I had ever pursued in my youth or adulthood. Boy howdy, am I glad I took it up and, over the years, it has turned into more than woodworking for me.

Let me explain: While I deeply appreciate the kickstart Ernie gave me with his wonderful book, I ended up meeting Owen Daly in one of the FB harpsichord groups. When I noticed his shop was located in Salem, Oregon, I immediately requested a visit and Owen was kind enough to accommodate me. That's when things got serious. Owen is a masterful builder of harpsichord-class instruments and boasts a 40+ year history of making instruments that are sublime and eminently playable. It was an honor to make his acquaintance and having him guide me through rethinking making and playing has been one of the best long-term experiences of my life.

As most of you know, I do not have my own long history of making these wonderful instruments. I did not apprentice in a famous shop or even build one from a kit before I started this project. Like most things I do, I jumped in with both feet in a kind of ready-fire-aim approach that has not necessarily served me well over the years, yet that's how I roll. I'm working on it, but I ain't no spring chicken, so no guarantees. At first, I was an organist studying with Dr. Lee Garrett at Lewis and Clark College in the early 80s. Part of my education there afforded me opportunities to become familiar with world-class players and instruments, including a beautiful Flemish double (a Will?) at the school.

But, really, that was it for many years. Granted, I had owned a red-and-black-metal-and-plexi Baldwin debacle in the mid-80s and played harpsichord if and when I could find one. The organ was my primary instrument - and still is - yet this wonderful stringed instrument has worked its way into my heart. As you can imagine, dear reader, it's one heckuva lot easier for a singular guy like myself to make a harpsichord in his own shop than to put together a pipe organ, so here we are.

So...what I'm saying is I consider the last few years to be my apprenticeship. I've met wonderful players and builders over the years, including Owen, Paul Irvin, Jack Peters, and a few masters on FB, all of whom have been kind and generous with their support and assistance. I am fortunate to have them at the end of a telephone call or email just about any time and I have always enjoyed my firehose visits with them. And I'm starting to get it. I see now where my faults with this instrument lie and I am taking measures to remedy at least one of them (see below). Regardless, harpsichord making is now a Thing in my life, one that will never dwindle or disappear. I know I will never be a great builder, but I sure as hell have and will continue to put in the time and effort to become a good one, if that's even possible.

The change I will be making to this instrument is a 100% remake of the keyboard. In Mr. Miller's book, it's the first task completed and I think I know why. When one completes something so beautiful, it is quite motivating. It allows for a slower introduction to the instrument and, as we will see, also allows some flexibility with regard to completely remaking it if the desire should manifest. And manifest it has. Years ago, Jack Peters visited my shop in Vancouver, Washington and asked me why the registers were not evenly spaced. My response: "Because I don't know what I'm doing." Rather than mocking me or insisting I remake them, Jack simply nodded and we moved on to the next topic.

Speaking of Jack, as some of you may know, he has retired from the building game and has completely liquidated his stock of instruments, woods, and carcasses. I became one of the beneficiaries of this liquidation and will be giving the experience a post of its own because there's just too much to say here about Jack, how generous he was to me and others over the years, and the cache I ended up acquiring from him. More on this later.

You, dear reader, may not know this, but I have an incredibly bad back to the point where I'm in pain nearly every waking second, and it affects the quality of my sleep nightly. It has also affected the quantity and speed of my production, yet I've taken measures in the shop to reduce the amount of time I spend standing on cement by purchasing what are really robust foam pads meant for professional kitchen work. I've placed them strategically throughout the shop and they seem to help, yet the pain is always there. I'm mentioning this only to set context for the speed at which the Tortuga works. Know that there are reasons for my lack of production and some of them are less than wonderful.

When circumstances mitigate against speedy production, nearly constant motivation becomes necessary. I motivate myself by posting here, which provides some accountability, and by planning and attempting to improve my workflows in the shop. I also interact with the master builders, as well as people on various FB forums, though I've cut down considerably on that for reasons I shall not describe here. One unexpected motivation came recently from someone who appeared in my life quite unexpectedly.

One day a couple of months ago, my wife, son, and I were enjoying a coffee in the Starbucks in downtown Vancouver (an extremely rare occurrence now that we've relocated to Longview, Washington) when a person approached me and said, "Excuse me, are you Darin Molnar?" My first thought was, "Oh, boy, I'm being served by someone." To my great relief, he started talking about this very blog. It turns out I was speaking with a frequent reader (I do not yet have permission to share his name) of my infrequent posts. And get this - he's from Minnesota and was here visiting his parents! It was a most fortuitous meeting that has resulted in fruitful suggestions from him for building out the shop that I have taken to heart. And I'm now motivated to redouble my efforts here, so watch for more posts over the next few days and weeks.

Be assured, dear reader, I will be posting more frequently as a means of catching you up. The Jack Peters cache, the new keyboard, progress on the new shop - all will be covered at length over the ensuing weeks.

Until next time...

Update: Back to Work

Our beloved and esteemed building mentor, Owen Daily, has insisted that work be resumed on the 1640 Ruckers single, so...we set aside the Hubbard spinet and resume work where directed. I trust Owen more than anyone else in the world when it comes to building, so there you go.

More to come as work progresses...