Mike Atkins

Yeah it's really slow, my garden is exploding and I'm spending all of my spare time canning and preserving the harvest...it's a lot of work and takes a lot of time, but I'm doing what I can to keep after the violin. I'm not sure that the arch height will be something I can get an understanding of right away, there's so many factors like shape, height, wood properties, rib height, top and back shape and height....but we'll see.

So I've had very little time to work on the violin these days, but whenever I can squeeze it in I've been slowly but surely chipping away at the top arching. I still have a long way to go before it's done, but it's getting there. I'm not too sure how good the arching templates are, so I should probably make one of those pencil...marking things to finalize it. It's taking a while but I'm still working on it. The C's are challenging, it's hard to get the tools, even a finger plane into the scooped area... but eventually I'll get there. I did also probably sand too much off the ribs, they're not much taller than 30mm anywhere, so for this one I'm going to try about 16mm for the top arch height. Not sure if that's a good choice, but the second one I'll do lower and hopefully gain a little bit of understanding what difference the arch heights make.

So today I've started working on my arching templates. I traced the arching from the "1713 Huberman" poster, then flipped them over and traced the difference between the two sides...then I drew a third line splitting the difference to give me the final shape. I'm not sure if that's the right approach, but it will at least give me a reference for the basic arching profile. We'll see how it turns out. It looks like with the "corrected" arching (not that I really know what's correct), the top should be about 16mm high and the back about 15.5mm. I'm not sure I'll stick to that exactly, maybe I'll do it differently for each of the two P form instruments I'm working on. One with a higher back and lower top, and one the other way to see if there's much of a difference.

Well I don’t know if Mr Stradivari would have liked your corners or not, but even with my untrained eye I can see that your work is spectacular! As close to perfection as a person can get Your eye is definitely better and more refined than mine. I’ve begun to realize and notice a great more nuance and detail in violin shapes just by your suggestions, so I’m very grateful for that. And more so I’m beginning to understand that I need to be more careful in making the forms too, and blocks, ribs, everything… since they are the foundation of the violin outline. I have a great deal to learn, but someday I’ll build a good one, and then maybe even learn how to play it.

Very nice!

I do kind of like the corners on the Tuscano... maybe the lower corner could be a tad longer? I don't have the refined eye that you have though and certainly not the experience or knowledge either. And you're probably talking about very small differences in length like 1/2 a mm or less? Definitely I can make some adjustments though as I did what you suggested above ^

So per Mr. Sora's wise suggestion, this is the outline of my corners over the 1690 Tuscan and the 1709 Viotti to get a sense for how I'm doing. It looks like I have more work to do...they're not severely different but definitely I can see that improvements can be made. I'll have to dig out my Messie and Huberman poster and check those too. At least I can still remove wood and I haven't gone too small or too short! That's a relief.

I do have the 1690 book "Treasures of Italian Violin Making" and I do really love that instrument! I also think I agree with you that the Betts corners are a little long for my taste. I can definitely use the 1690 Tuscano as a reference, and there's also very little wear on that instrument.

Sorry, sometimes I read things too fast and miss details like this. This is an excellent suggestion and I think it could be useful regardless of the form used or even the wear, to get a sense for how closely it relates to known, well made instruments.

Thank you Mr. Sora, your insights are always valuable. Unfortunately I don't really have a reference for a P-Form instrument, I do have the Messie poster and the 1709 Viotti, but I think the Messie is forma PG? and the Viotti forma G? I do have the Huberman as well but that is a very worn out instrument. But you're right, I could collectively look at all of them and try to get a sense for the outline as a whole and how the corners work within that context. This is probably the drawback of starting from a form rather than an instrument reference like a poster. This is my 2nd, forma P attempt in progress with the right side done, and I do think it's looking pretty good...

So now I’m working on the plate outlines for the second violin, I feel like I’m starting to get a sense for how the corners should look… not that I’ve done them right, but they’re getting closer to looking right from what I can tell.

yeah it’s interesting how sometimes even with international shipping things can be cheaper…I do a lot of pricing research too. I think there also might be an f-hole template in the forms by Addie… maybe

You can find them here: https://www.tonewoodforviolin.com/produkt/f-hole-drill-set/ and here: https://www.internationalviolin.com/tools/miscellaneous-tools/t255-guardelli-f-hole-drill-w10-bits-violin--viola or you could just use a drill, or you could use the fret saw and a round file/sandpaper and a dowel to make them If you have a poster or something you could just measure them or use the information from here: http://www.makingtheviolin.com/Marking and fluting the F-holes http://www.makingtheviolin.com/Cutting the f-holes You're making nice progress and it's looking good!

So I finally finished the plate outlines. There is still some room for tweaking if necessary, but now it's time to make some arching templates and move on to that step.