The guitar is the most popular instrument in the world. As with any musical instrument, crafting one is no simple process because of the acoustic considerations. An online article from mlive.com tells the stories of two guitar craftsmen from Michigan. As evidenced by the stories of Stephen Ziegenfuss and Lance Kragenbrink, handcrafted guitar making is among increasingly popular woodwork projects and has a rewarding process.

Stephen Ziegenfuss and Lance Kragenbrink both make and sell electric and acoustic guitars in the Jackson, Michigan area. Ziegenfuss, 25, is a relative newcomer. A mechanical engineer by trade, he became interested in making his own guitar when he could not afford a bass guitar he wanted. His first effort fell flat, but he stuck with it and has now successfully made about ten guitars. Kragenbrink, who has sometimes served as Ziegenfuss’ mentor, has been making guitars since 1998. He has about twenty-five under his belt, most of which were made on commission. Like Ziegenfuss, he started when he wanted to make a guitar for himself that he could not afford. He now runs a website for guitar craftsmen called luthiersforum.com.

Kragenbrink claims that we are in a “golden age” of guitar making because of information about the process on the Internet. He claims that the age of cheaply made mass produced acoustic guitars is ending because of the emergence of so many small manufacturers with higher standards. He also claims that the bar for quality is rising higher and higher because of the sharing of information on the Internet.

The process of crafting a guitar begins with raw wood and ends with the reward of giving it to the customer. Ziegenfuss’ electric guitars start as thick planks of wood that are cut into individual pieces, glued back together, and then carved, sanded, and finished. He says that it is important for the wood not to have any blemishes because the customer cares as much for what it looks like as how it sounds. Kragenbrink says that the process is different with each guitar, some practically building themselves and others seeming to put up resistance at every step. He says that his main goal is to build an instrument with great sound quality. Both agree that the most rewarding part is to give the instrument to someone who can play it well and appreciate it.

These men are just two examples of guitar makers who claim that the craft is being helped by the Internet and is rewarding to complete. I think it is safe to say that there will always be a demand for the wildly popular instrument.

Technorati Tags: woodwork projects

Does your laminated kitchen countertop need to be redone? Maybe it has become scratched and scuffed or you just want a new color. According to an online article, this can be an easy furniture do-it-yourself project that can be done by getting the material, preparing the countertop and laminate pieces, using wood dowels to separate the new laminate and the countertop, and trimming the laminate when you are finished.

The first step is to get the laminate material. You may find it at a hardware store and place it directly over the old surface. Measure the countertop and get slightly larger pieces of laminate that you will trim later.

The next step is to prepare the surfaces. First, you will need to sand the gloss off of the old surface so that the new laminate will stick to it. After sanding, remove the dust with a vacuum and a wet sponge. Then apply contact cement to the underside of the laminate and to the sanded countertop. Follow the directions on the cement package and keep the two pieces apart for about ten minutes. The cement should then be somewhat sticky to the touch.

Then place the wooden dowels on top of the countertop and put the new laminate on top of them. The dowels should be cut wider than the countertop and placed every few inches apart. This is done to set the top in place more easily. Then slide the dowels out one at a time, pressing the laminate to the countertop. Use a roller to press it down hard and smooth out the surface.

Finally, you will need to trim the new laminate top. You can do this with a straight edge ruler and a utility blade, a router that has a bit meant for cutting laminate, or other specialized trimming tools. Any of these may do the job and provide a smooth finish. The materials may be borrowed rather than bought if necessary.

By following these easy furniture project steps you can refinish your laminated kitchen countertops. It is a low cost way of giving your kitchen a make-over and having the satisfaction of doing it yourself.

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How much time do you spend in your backyard? Most of us spend a fair amount of time there, but do not dedicate as much effort to organizing it as we do the inside of our homes. I read an online book review that pointed me to a resource for designing an attractive backyard space. The book Sean Conway’s Cultivating Life: 125 Projects for Backyard Living gives projects for improving your backyard space that include small crafts and larger woodworking.

Sean Conway, host of the popular show “Cultivating Life,” which airs on WGN America, has teamed up with the show’s director and producer, Lee Alan Buttala, to create a book that is meant to teach us how to transform our backyards into living spaces for entertaining friends and family. It gives step-by-step, easy to follow instructions for converting your backyard into a kitchen, living space, or relaxing oasis that you can build yourself or turn into a family project.

Some of the small craft projects include tablecloths, candles, and gardening. The tablecloth is done with a sun-print process. Another project involves putting a tea candle in a glass of heirloom beans to make a votive. The gardening projects include planting rain lilies, putting a stone border around a perennial flowerbed, and hanging weed baskets for placing uprooted weeds from the garden.

The woodworking projects are on a larger scale, but also include easy-to-follow instructions and color photographs. If you are looking for an easy furniture idea, the book has a porch swing project. Some of the other woodworking projects are a corncrib-style barn for storage, a potting bench made of cedar, a rose trellis, and a storage area for lawn chairs, cushions, or pool toys. Like the smaller projects, the woodwork projects are all nature-based.

Whether you want to create small projects for your backyard space of do larger woodwork projects, this book can help you. You might as well make your backyard a great place to spend time in.

Technorati Tags: easy furniture, woodwork projects

One of the many subsets of woodworking is woodturning, the process of turning wood on a lathe and carving it with various tools. Some woodworkers adopt it as their particular niche. A Virginia woodworker named Nick Aloisio became fascinated by woodturning and now creates products for the kitchen using the process.

Nick Aloisio is an Abingdon, Virginia-based wood turner and part-time electrician. He was first introduced to woodturning when he saw some projects that were created by the process in a woodworking book about ten years ago. He had no previous experience with woodturning or using a lathe, but was immediately interested and wanted to know more. He bought a lathe and worked on his own for a while, but it was when he took a class that he fell in love with the process. He says that watching the wood take shape as the instructor molded it as it spun on the lathe was such a graceful and beautiful sight that he knew it was what he wanted to do.

Aloisio was also fascinated by the history of woodturning. It is over three thousand years old, beginning with the Egyptians. They used a two-person lathe, in which one turned the wood using a rope and the other used a sharp tool to cut shapes into it. The Romans improved the design with the addition of a turning bow. A foot pedal had replaced the hand-turned lathe by the Middle Ages and a motorized lathe was developed in the Industrial Revolution.

Aloisio skillfully creates and sells different kitchen products by woodturning. He creates saltshakers, bowls, pepper mills and bottle stoppers. White oak, walnut, silver maple, chestnut, and cherry trees provide the best wood for woodturning. Aloisio uses only wood native to his area. Most of the woodturning process is done with wet wood. Bowls are rough-hewn and left to dry for several months before Aloisio goes back and does more shaping and sanding. When the shaping is complete, he applies food-safe walnut oil for shine. The result is usually a twelve or thirteen-inch bowl. He sells his products at the local farmers market.

Nick Aloisio has made woodturning kitchenwares his niche. It is an interesting form of woodworking.

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Do you ever wish you could have a place to show off your woodwork to the rest of the world? One place to do that is an online contest. Cabinet Makers Supply, an online supplier of woodworking and cabinet making supplies, is holding a woodworking contest on Facebook.

Cabinet Makers Supply is an online company that supplies all woodworking supplies except the wood itself. They have over five thousand products in stock and many product categories, including abrasives, fasteners, and solid surfacing. They claim to provide fast shipping and have an honest and liberal return policy, if you are interested in buying from them.

The contest will allow woodworkers to post a picture of a cabinet they have made and have Facebook users vote for a winner. It is open to woodworkers of all ages and skill levels. Entrants must join the Cabinet Makers Supply fan page on Facebook and post one picture with a description of the piece. Applicants are encouraged to be creative when posting the picture on the CMS webpage promoting the contest, but I am not sure whether they mean in taking the photo itself or in creating the cabinet piece. Facebook fans will vote for the winner from the page. Every entrant will receive a $5 gift certificate for any purchase over $25 from the site and the winner will receive a $250 gift certificate for the site and be featured in the next CMS newsletter.

Rules for the contest state that entrants must be a fan of Cabinet Makers Supply on Facebook, post only one photo on the fan page, and must have created the cabinet themselves or helped to create it. Joining the CMS fan page is easy to do. Directions on how to sign up are on the CMS website. Participants may only vote for one photo. The deadline for entries is July 6th and the voting will take place from July 7th to July 14th.

If you are interested, you should post a photo of your cabinet project in the CMS Facebook contest. It is one way to get your work out there.

Technorati Tags: woodworking competition