Brian Timmons's Bench

[Brian in Texas]

Hello, everyone. I'll avoid pasting my life story here again, but here it is. I share not for the sake of self aggrandization, but because as rank amateur, perhaps my experience will resonate with an aspiring maker or two. I'll begin by sharing some older videos leading up to the present day. This build has been going on for longer than I care to admit. I've made more than my fair share of ludicrous amateur mistakes, but they've all been teachable moments.

 

[Brian in Texas]

So yeah, teachable moments! Like the fact that in hindsight, I now know that I shouldn't have cut the outline and started on the front plate until after I had attached linings and glued the back plate in place. As a result, now that I glued the front plate on last night, my overhang on the front is all jacked up and many spots don't overhang nearly as much as they should. Live and learn.

 

[Brian in Texas]

My friend Joshua was in my shop filming as I (sloppily) installed the purfling on the back plate. I quite enjoy our banter and thought that it made my normally solo video presentation a bit more enjoyable.

 

[Brian in Texas]

This is one of the first videos I posted on Tiktok that went kinda big. Right now it's sitting at over 150,000 views, which is way more eyeballs than I thought would tune into this subject! Here I changed my format from a slow presentation to a more attention grabbing, engaging style. So many people got a kick out of my opening line "Because I'm a lunatic..." that I kinda turned it into my online catchphrase.

 

[Brian in Texas]

In which I explain to a commenter how violins are carved, and when you can and can't bend wood for what application. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Why it's possible to use CNC for violinmaking, and conversely, why I'll never use it myself. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Being friends with a bladesmith is pretty great when you're a woodworker. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Work continues on the plates, and I'm forced to fix some more mistakes. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Fitting the bass bar, I felt forced to resort to unorthodox methods. I couldn't quite get the traditional chalk fit method to work for the life of me. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Did I mention fixing screw-ups? Turns out I made a neck and scroll (albeit unfinished) in the wrong damn size. Because like an idiot, I somehow just trusted that a template had printed at the correct size instead of verifying it! 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Scroll redo part 2, with an assist from Vivaldi. 

And a shameless victory lap. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

My sloppy f-hole cutting. My arsenal of knives hadn't expanded yet to include the ones I helped to make in the forging video above. I guess I'm sharing things a bit out of order, alas. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

And to bring it up to present day, last night I attached my top to the corpus. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Next up, glue sizing and fine fitting.

[Brian in Texas]

No guts, no glory.

[Brian in Texas]

Neck is glued in place! Now to craft a UV box and give it a nice suntan.

[Brian in Texas]

Story time! I'm reconnecting with a maker local to me that inspired me way back when. Fair warning, I get rambly and long winded, but skip to the end for a gorgeous cello duet. My editing skills failed me a bit here and things got a little jumbled.

 

[Brian in Texas]

I'm waiting to visit my local contact that inspired me towards violinmaking back in the day. That may happen this weekend, we'll see. He has a UV box that he's letting go for cheap, and my first violin needs a good suntan before varnishing. So I'm kind of in a holding pattern there.

But meanwhile, soon work will be starting on a viola for my friend! It's going to be based off the Mahler Strad, and I'm unreasonably excited about it. This build will use spruce and curly poplar, just like the original.

Keep in mind, my usual audience for this stuff is people that don't know much about how instruments are made, but what I'm saying here is very likely not new information for anyone browsing MaestroNet.

 

I've already banged out the mold, too! Folks on the Pegbox helped me figure out my block sizes, correcting for how overly large I drew them on the tracing paper at first. So now, I'm just waiting for the wood to show up from Slovakia. And once that happens, I'll have to let it sit out and acclimate to my shop for a little while before I cut or plane it. So that means more waiting. ARGH.

 

[Brian in Texas]

The ingredients for the viola just arrived. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Annoying update on the viola. Not every update can be a success at my current skill level. 

 

[Brian in Texas]

Everyone loves this part, right? First of two coats, using a 3 pound cut of homemade shellac. This will be followed by a traditional oil varnish to build up additional color. 

 

[MikeC]

Looks good so far! 

I have some varnish sample in the sun today,  hopefully they dry well.   

[Brian in Texas]

1 hour ago, MikeC said:

Looks good so far! 

I have some varnish sample in the sun today,  hopefully they dry well.   

Cool. If things are still giving you a lot of difficulty over the next few days, I might end up trying to source some varnish on the Luthier Exchange forum. I don't want you feeling pressured on my behalf.

[MikeC]

No problem,   This is my first time trying and I was hoping it would turn out good.    I'm not going to stop trying though! 

 If you are ready for varnish before I get confident in this batch, there are some good varnishes available.   We have a resident professional varnish maker  Joe Robson.      And there are other commercial varnishes as well.   

I thought about buying some but I just like to make things myself.   

[Brian in Texas]

I really want to achieve a darker color, and subsequent coats should help in that regard. Of course, I didn't see this crack until after I brushed on the first coat of varnish. I believe it's a drying check from being in the UV box and possibly overheating. Whatever caused the crack, it doesn't seem to be too bad. There's no buzzing when I tap the violin, hopefully it's just superficial. I really, really, REALLY don't want to remove the back (again!) for a repair, so I'm just proceeding as is. If that's a mistake, oh well, chalk it off to experience. Wouldn't be the only fatal flaw this instrument has, what's one more at this point?