{"id":391,"date":"2017-05-04T13:30:00","date_gmt":"2017-05-04T17:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/?p=391"},"modified":"2017-05-04T13:30:00","modified_gmt":"2017-05-04T17:30:00","slug":"carbon-fiber-guitar-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/2017\/05\/04\/carbon-fiber-guitar-project\/","title":{"rendered":"Carbon Fiber Guitar Project"},"content":{"rendered":"

This project began at the beginning of last year, when our teacher gave us the task to build something; it didn’t matter what, as long as we learned something from it we could build anything. \u00a0I decided to build a guitar because I had never built a musical instrument before, and I had always wanted to learn to play guitar. \u00a0While researching, I became fascinated with carbon fiber instruments; they were gorgeous, durable, and easy to make. \u00a0I did research on the process of making a carbon fiber mold, and began work. \u00a0This process works by forcing marine grade epoxy through carbon fiber woven cloth. \u00a0As the epoxy hardens, the carbon fiber acts as the structure for the epoxy to hold on to, making everything very stiff and strong.<\/p>\n

First, I took a 3d model of a small-body acoustic guitar and rounded the shape of the back to eliminate sharp corners. \u00a0After this, we sliced the model into interlocking pieces, and cut out those pieces on our laser cutter.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After all the pieces were cut, I began to assemble all the pieces using hot glue.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After assembling the guitar, I had this skeleton of a guitar. \u00a0In order to fill in the gaps, I wrapped the entire guitar in saran\u00a0wrap. \u00a0This also gives the carbon fiber something to rest on, but it does not allow the epoxy to adhere to it, so I can remove the mold later.<\/p>\n

\"\" \"\" \"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Next I laid the first layer of carbon fiber across the mold, allowing it to sit overnight. \u00a0This allowed the cloth to conform to all of the edges of the mold. \u00a0Eventually I applied 3 layers of carbon fiber and 2 layers of transparent fiberglass. \u00a0The fiberglass smoothed out imperfections and added a little bit of rigidity. \u00a0I only have pictures of the first layer because I had to work fast. \u00a0Each layer of epoxy had to be applied within 12 hours of each other in order to form a chemical bond between layers.<\/p>\n

\"\" \"\" \"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After everything dried, I took the guitar out of its mold, very roughly trimmed off the excess fabric.<\/p>\n

\"\" \"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After more trimming, I worked to get the guitar body to the proper thickness, as well as making it perfectly level. \u00a0After achieving this, I had to strengthen the neck. \u00a0I used epoxy-soaked coremat to achieve this; coremat acts like a sponge, giving the epoxy a 3 dimensional structure to hold on to. \u00a0I cue long strips and tan them down the neck and around the body.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After reinforcing the body, I sanded the inside down: it was filled with small bits of plastic wrap, air bubbles, and fiberglass splinters. \u00a0Below is a picture of the inside before I sanded everything down.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

While there are many mathematical equations available to create the perfect soundboard in order to achieve the best sound, I just took some thin plywood and drew what i thought looked pretty. \u00a0Below is a mockup of what the soundboard will look like, with the acoustic hole pencilled out.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Next I trimmed the end of the fretboard and the sound hole out, and I tried to make an inlay out of rosewood. \u00a0I decided against the inlay, since I couldn’t get it perfectly right, and i thought it looked pretty without it.<\/p>\n

\"\" \"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Afterwards, I assembled the soundboard, and prepared to place it on the guitar.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I will update this soon, as soon as the project is finished.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This project began at the beginning of last year, when our teacher gave us the task to build something; it didn’t matter what, as long […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=391"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":522,"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391\/revisions\/522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fabplay.hawken.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}