Hello

[Craig Regan]

The back is now attached to the ribs! It was a very difficult operation and I am glad its over. Here is some highlights of the glue up procedure:

I made a special glue up bench from an old restaurant table. This new bass holder allowed me easy access to the bass carcass during the glue up (saw horses would have been way too cumbersome for this stage).

Had to make 44 spool clamps which took up most of the weekend.

The back has a 25 degree bend, so it needed special cauls to keep the clamps from slipping.

It took about 20 hrs of preparation and staging for a 15 minute glue up.

Now it is time to clean up the glue, and start planning the top.

[Craig Regan]

This is how the ribs came to be:

10/07 - Mould for Panormo Bass.
10/07 - First Rib.
11/07 - More ribs with corner.
12/07 - the linings.

[Craig Regan]

2/08 - Carving the back profile from a Cherry blank.
2/08 - More carving.
3/08 - Outside of back nearing completion.
4/08, 5/08 - wasting away the inside.
6/08 - The bend.

The back took a long time to make.

[Craig Regan]

Over the summer I got started on the top plate.

1) Spruce Billets before glue up. This was a big chunk of lumber.
2) Clamping.
3) My helper with our future bass top ready for carving.

[Craig Regan]

First thing to do was joining a flat side on the blank. Hand tools worked the best since the top is so large and the spruce is easy to work.

Next up: Leveling the front edges of the rib structure and tracing the bass outline to the spruce top.

[ed hauser]

i find the building of these things fascinating so keep up the good work and keep posting the pics!

[Craig Regan]

Originally Posted by ed hauser

i find the building of these things fascinating so keep up the good work and keep posting the pics!

I am glad you like it Ed, and I appreciate the encouragement.

Digital photography is amazing; Thanks to Ken's Corner and the internet, I can snap a picture in my barn and within minutes have it seen world wide. This is what I did yesterday:

No power carvers on hand, so I used an sharp adze to "roughly" reduced the top thickness at the edges. Looks crude, but it worked just fine.

Next up; the jig saw will cut out the shape of the top.