Guitar Building and Kumiko

There are ugly milky patches on the back, sides and neck of my Yamaha CG151S, so I decided to redo the finish, ie remove the polyurethane finish and replace with shellac using French polish. The sound board is not affected so I'm leaving it as it is. This is a picture of the milky patches on the back.  Removal method : the polyurethane layer is so thick that a chemical paint stripper has no effect. I had to resort to mechanical means using cabinet scrapers, planes and sand paper. The scraper is handy on curved surfaces on the neck. The plane is used on the headstock back and sides. The headstock top has a black plastic veneer, so it had to be sanded with sandpaper. Sandpaper is used extensively on the back and sides, starting with 80, then 120 and 400 grit. The polyurethane layer is very thick. It took a lot of sanding and elbow grease to remove it. Generated a lot of nasty sanded powder. The amount shown is from the patch on the guitar lower bout in the

Glue neck to soundboard. Cut sides to size and profile to heel wedge slots, glue and trim. Sized end block and glue. Trim side height flatness to match fit the back. Install top linings. Install back linings. Install side braces. Before boxing up. Trim sides to match fit the back and glue up with a combination of bicycle inner tubes and clamps. Install purflings, bindings and decorative strips. Here bicycle inner tubes does a good job of pressing and holding. Cut fret slots with a kataba saw and magnetic guide, and shape the fretboard to size. Glue fretboard to neck and soundboard, and sand flatten. Install frets, trim, flatten and file smooth. Sand surfaces to prepare for French polishing.

Bending the cypress sides with the hot iron. Bending the bindings. Cutting the top linings from sapele to form an acoustic impedence between the sound board and sides. Cutting and forming the side braces.