Jim Bress

Always nice when you get to see your efforts being appreciated. Glad you're feeling better. -Jim

I was taught that the meaning of Kung-Fu was skill developed from knowledge and practice over time, and is applicable to any discipline. I'm sure the literal definition of the chinese characters are somewhat different. So yes, there's some good kung-fu in the film, and on MN.

The Wood Database (https://www.wood-database.com/) is a good site to look up wood properties. With the stated goal of destroying the wood, I have no idea what properties might be important to you for achieving the same result as cedar or redwood. care to expand on what you're doing?

I suggest buying middle grade tonewood. The wood will be substantially cheaper than top shelf wood and will increase the likelihood (SWAG) of having a playable violin at the end.

Aren’t all violins distressed? First we kill the tree(s), then cut them up, ignore them for an unpredictable amount of time, followed by inflicting innumerable ever smaller cuts, eventually sending the violin into the world to work for free for possibly hundreds of years. The least we can do is make them pretty first. Joking aside, I like David Beard’s answer. It’s all aesthetics and the approach you take to making an instrument attractive to the eye. Which of course is dependent on the maker’s ability to make that approach work.

I only make straight instruments, but that's not really being honest with myself. If I was truly making straight fiddles, I wouldn't pretreat the wood to get more color, or use UV lights any more than was necessary to cure the varnish, or work so hard to make a transparent dark varnish. I guess I make unworn fiddles. -Jim

Thanks for the links!

Maybe cutting cross grain. I did use quotes. I’d like to see a video of this method being done.

That’s pretty fast! Do find the method dictates the shape at all compared to “standard” method?

Fred, No Not at all. I know luthiers, amatuers (like myself) and professionals, want to know why and how something works. My goal was to give you suggestions to help you produce a paper that would fulfill your intended purpose. I agreed with everything Rue wrote, and decided to somewhat give you the same advise viewed from a different angle (metaphorically speaking). The tricky part with advice over the internet is knowing when information should be filtered out, and when it should be followed, or at least attempted. Cheers, Jim

Fred, I think your efforts to help your peers and colleagues is commendable. However, your paper should be completely revised in order to be helpful to your intended audience. You are not a scientist. From what you have written, you are a luthier, and should write from the perspective of a luthier concerning COVID-19, and the solution(s) you found to be both feasible and effective. Then provide details on how to go about decontaminating instruments and surfaces that you and your customers may be exposed to COVID-19 through contact. Include logistic constraints and precautions needed to keep people and instruments safe during the decontamination process. I would start by writing an abstract for your COVID-19 decontamination paper (guide?). I start every research project, report, memorandum, or white paper with an abstract. Even if I won't be using an abstract in the final document. Why? because it helps to focus my thoughts and put them in a logical order that is easy for readers to follow. Here's the basic framework I use: 1. Develop a title that's descriptive and eye catching. Rue's suggestion is a good example. 2. List Authors and affiliations. It is difficult to be both credible and anonymous. 3. Introduction sentence(s). What are you working on? 4. Following sentence(s). Why is this important? 5. Procedural sentence(s). What did you do? 6. Results sentence(s). What did you find? 7. Wrap up sentence. Where are going from here? Next, write your introduction and how-to sections that include citations from credible sources. Hyperlinks to full text articles would be the most helpful so that readers that are interested can take a deep dive into the technical details, while maintaining a paper short enough that folks that just want to know how to go about setting up and using the decontamination method you are recommending will take the time to read it. You can conclude with a discussion section at the end. -Jim

Looking forward to it.

That will change when you see how fluorescence glue is before varnishing.

That is a sexy beast! Fantastic! Can you tell us about the neck construction. I see the black line running down the middle which makes me think a two piece neck, or maybe three if the line is a thin layer of another material. Unless a line is just a line. Thanks, Jim

Not really. Temperature should be considered an ingredient, and application method makes a huge difference. Both will vary within maker over time, and more so among makers using the same recipe. Let alone all personal tweaks to the recipe that are inevitable.