Build Your Own Acoustic Guitar: Complete Instructions and Full-Size Plans [Paperback]

Jonathan Kinkead (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2004

Every guitarist dreams of owning a handmade instrument, but for most, the cost is likely to be prohibitive. The alternative - building your own fine guitar - is not as difficult as you might imagine, given some skill, patience, and the expert guidance of a master luthier. Every step of construction is fully covered, from choice, selection, and preparation of woods, to consideration of size, bracing, and tonal qualities. Each step of the building sequence is clearly photographed in color, with variations to the standard design shown to enable you to personalize your instrument as you make it. Briston, England-based Jonathan Kinkead has been building guitars for nearly 30 years. His craft is born out of experience and intuition rather than a strict following of technical detail. The resulting beauty of form and distinctive tone have earned him his reputation as one of the world's most respected independent luthiers.

Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Hal Leonard; 1St Edition edition (February 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0634054635
• ISBN-13: 978-0634054631
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #117,022 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best first guide?, January 12, 2005

By 

Anachronus "Anachronus" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Build Your Own Acoustic Guitar: Complete Instructions and Full-Size Plans (Paperback)

Having done some reading previously, this book was a pleasant discovery. The aforementioned Cumpiano and others certainly get high marks for exploring the intricacies of the craft but always made it seem formidible. This one in contrast isn't quite as complete, but manages to cut the project down to size to a considerable degree.

Some things to like:
* It has all color illustrations, pretty, but also useful for comparing wood and inlay types.
* Since classical and steel strings differ quite a bit in design and methods, it sensibly doesn't try to deliver both in the same book.
* Very well organized in steps from start to finish.
* The best guide to power tools and their use that I've seen.
* Includes detailed 1:1 blueprint style plans for a pleasing OM style instrument. (Much preferable to having to sketch out your own design on graph paper!)

On the minus side, it only gives a basic list of materials suppliers, not many suggestions for other reading or websites, and, if you want to build something other than the OM, you're kind of on your own. ("Guitarmaking" is still a good idea as others have said; also the web, magazines, catalogs...)

Still, it's more than enough for one book and will give you the confidence to actually build your own beautiful instrument with success.

31 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars three and a half stars, March 5, 2005

By 

Alexanderplatz (Kentucky) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Build Your Own Acoustic Guitar: Complete Instructions and Full-Size Plans (Paperback)

The best things about this recent book on guitarmaking are the extensive use of color photography to document the steps, and the exploration of multiple ways to accomplish a given task, such as making a mold or attaching the neck to the body. Readers who are more visually-oriented would likely find this to be a helpful adjunct to Cumpiano's and Nattleson's seminal book GUITARMAKING: TRADITION AND TECHNOLOGY.

While a book on lutherie, like a cookbook, is primarily judged on its ability to help the reader successfully accomplish the task in question, I must take the author to task here for his shameless self-promotion throughout the work. The author's name conspicuously appears on almost every single page. For example, helpful tips in an aside are titled "Kinkead Tips," and in almost every photo featuring a luthier at work [presumably the author himself], he is wearing a T shirt bearing the words KINKEAD GUITARS, with the logo strategically placed to be in full view. It is distracting, tiresome and even a little insulting to endure this narcissistic self-promotion page after page. Every book on lutherie is a sort of calling card for the luthier-author, and the quality of the book should speak of the quality of the luthier's own work. Kinkead would score more points with discerning guitarmakers and guitarists with a little more discretion, instead of coming off as something of a carnival barker.

That said, the book is nevertheless useful for the above-mentioned reasons, but I doubt that it will ever be a beloved book that I enjoy leafing through over and over like some of my other favorite books on guitarmaking.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book for the experienced woodworker!!, December 28, 2004

By 

Luigi "Ping" (Aridzona) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Build Your Own Acoustic Guitar: Complete Instructions and Full-Size Plans (Paperback)

I've had the opportunity to look at quite a few books on the construction of acoustic guitars. If I had to choose one book to build my first acoustic guitar, it would be "Guitarmaking: Tradition and Technology" by Campiano/Natelson. However, like any book it has its limitations. I found Jonathan Kinkead's book, "Build Your Own Acoustic Guitar", an **outstanding** compliment to Campiano's book. Kinkead's book is clear, logical, and contains a very generous amount of visually informative high quality photos (vs. Campiano's somewhat low rez b/w photos). When questions arose with one book, I was generally able to find the answer in the other. With only 6 months of serious woodworking experience behind me (building primarily dressers), I was able to use these two books to successfully (and proudly) build two steel string acoustic guitars with a minimal amount of outside assistance.