An "Aha" Moment

At 3:30 in the morning, as I lay in bed fretting about frets, it occurred to me that I might have misunderstood what the manual was trying to communicate. Tapping "toward the bass" could mean one of two things:

• the bass of the instrument, which would be to the left/west 
• the bass of the bridge, which would be to the south.

As I was visualizing the strung instrument, I was trying to figure out how in the heck pins would prevent the strings from riding up if they were bent toward the bass end of the instrument. In addition, by tapping in that direction, I was tapping along the grain of the wood and encouraging that crack.

If my musings were correct, instead of left-leaning pins, I should have been trying to create southbound pins, thus tapping against the grain and not encouraging the cracking. After all, the instrument is strung east-west, not north-south like a harpsichord! Doh! I should realize that if I can't make sense of something, it's probably because it's wrong.

A response from the manual's author confirmed all my suspicions.  So now I'll try tapping the pins again, this time in the correct direction and, hopefully, with better success.

The Bridge and Its Pins

This morning I glued the bridge to the soundboard, and it couldn't have gone any more smoothly.  That should have tipped me off on what was to come!  Every winter, we experience the shock of static electricity in the dry air almost every day.  But that's not enough to convince me that my soundboard is dry enough.  Having built my first harpsichord in the humid summer air of Chicago and seeing what a dry winter in Albuquerque's desert climes could do to it, I was taking no chances.  I parked my little soundboard in front of my oven door while I prepared to glue the bridge to it.  I have to say, I got the perfect amount of glue on the bridge, and the little guide holes with their padded nails went right into position without a single slip or misstep.  I nailed the bridge securely to the soundboard, using the bottom of the case as my sturdy work surface and observed the exact amount of glue squeeze I expected to see.  After allowing it to dry to a gummy state, I neatly scraped up the squeeze.  No problemo!  Looks like a million bucks!  

After allowing the bridge to dry about six hours, I tapped in the pins and ran my file across the tops of them to even them up a bit more.  Then the fun began.  The manual says to put a nail set or screwdriver against each pin and give it a tap toward the bass to create a 5-degree bend in each pin.  Huh?  Five degrees is barely a blip on the radar, so how on earth am I to know if I've been successful?  Plus, when I got to the mid-range of the pins, I saw the bridge threatening a hairline crack.  Well, crap.  I took some glue and worked it over the bridge between the pins where I saw trouble brewing.

I set the board aside and proceeded to scour the Internet for a close-up shot of a clavichord bridge.  Nothing helpful showed itself, so I googled the manual's author and dashed off a quick email to him.  I asked for clarification on where and how this bend is supposed to be.  I hope he answers.  

On the next run, I would suggest a decent picture of the bridge with its pins bent appropriately instead of one of the distant shots of a finished instrument where little of any use is seen.  Even a picture of a bridge pin all by itself with its little bend in it would be good.  I am a visual person.  

Tomorrow, I'll forge on ahead with the soundboard ribs.

Why be boring when you can have pizazz?

Happy Valentine's Day!  After the obligatory evening celebrations, complete with flowers, wine, and a little Cherry Garcia,  we settled into a comfortable evening at home.  Such is the cozy life of two people who have loved each other for over 25 years.  Since Harry's Law was the only thing I felt deserved my attention on the television, I concentrated on carving a little curve on the base end of the bridge in the hours leading up to the show.  The little flourish on the bridge was accomplished with the aid of some diamond drill bits from Harbor Freight, my Dremel, and an X-Acto knife.  First, I drew the intended shape with a pencil on the side of the bridge.  Next, I whittled a little dip in the wood, and when I had removed a sufficient amount, I used various diamond drill bits to get down to the intended shape.  Having never carved wood before, I approached this task with more than a little trepidation, but after thoughtfully gazing at the bridge from time to time throughout the day, I finally felt ready to give it the old college try.  The nice thing about the diamond bits and the Dremel is that one does not have to worry about aggressive action from the tools. They are gentle.  Nevertheless, in no time, the feat was accomplished.

I sanded the entire bridge with a fine sandpaper sponge and pronounced it finished.  I won't earn any awards for creativity in design, but I'm a simple girl, and this simple curve suits me just fine.

The Bridge

What a pain in the neck this is!  Well, part of it.  For starters, I positioned the soundboard under the blueprint, and made little cuts in the paper at the four corners so I could line everything up properly.  I then positioned the bridge on top of the blueprint as accurately as possible and drilled five holes with my #57 drill bit in my Dremel.  I drilled through the bridge, the blueprint, and the soundboard clear through to my work surface, taking care to avoid places where the future bridge pin holes would be drilled.  I managed to do well with two of them.  Three of them are pretty close to where bridge pins would go, so they will get filled later and then drilled to accommodate the bridge pins.  I drove five 3/4x18 nails through the holes. This would allow me to reposition the bridge in the exact same place, sans blueprint, later on.  I then took it all apart and, after placing a layer of Scotch tape across the blueprint where the bridge is drawn, placed the blueprint on top of the bridge and used the nail holes to hold the paper down.  My husband and I smoothed the drawing down, creasing it along the sides of the bridge.  Making a little tap with a nail, I marked the 56 places where I would drill holes for the bridge pins. This is the part of the task that's a pain.  The marks on the blueprint are small, the paper is large and cumbersome and not three dimensional like the bridge, and the area being marked is very narrow.  Tedious is a word that comes to mind.  After that was done, we rigged up the Dremel's drill press so I could drill 56 perfectly straight holes into the bridge at the precise depth needed.  I was doubly careful and also marked the bit with a little strip of masking tape. 

 

Yeah, overkill.  But I don't like to leave anything to chance.  When that was done I called it a day.