Wood binding

[Ward Elliott]

Wow! I love that look! As long as there’s enough contrast between the body color and the binding I think it’s a great look. A friend tried using tortoise binding, no purfling, on a mando very similar in color to your mandola, but the colors were so closely matched that you could hardly tell there was binding on it. That’s beautiful John!

[Mandobart]

That's what I've done any time I used wood binding on a mandolin/mandola, not necessarily with purfling.
Here's an example:

Love the look of that one John!

[Rob Roy]

On the five mandos I built I stuck with the traditional plastic binding and haven't tried wood, but it occurs to me that the same scraping technique used with plastic may be workable with wood. I like having that white racing stripe around the perimeter of my bursted tops so I included a BWB purfling inside the binding. Having that inner black purfling strip against the bursted top gives a little more grace in the intersection of the dyed top and the binding when scraping.

I would think that if you install the wood binding and purfling and flush them to the top and then give them a couple of coats of clear finish before bursting the top you should come out OK. You can then scrap the binding/purfling with the blade angled down a degree or two and your thumb for fence and sneak up on that inner black line. If your rims are dyed too then it's same process, just wider. There are plenty of videos on the web for this process.

The disadvantage of scraping is that you may have to go back infill the binding with clear finish before topcoating the whole instrument. Auto paint suppliers also sell a pinstriping tape in narrow widths. The blue stuff stretches to conform to curves and works pretty well. With dye you can still expect to get some bleed under the edge in a few places unless you're spraying it.

Binding is a lot of meticulous handwork (with magnifiers for me) no matter how you do it. Once you go through the process, you see why some of the big builders have eliminated binding on even $2-3k instruments. Because I bursted rims as well as backs, on a couple of instruments I simplified and just used a black ABS binding on the back. The dark edge of the burst just blended into the black binding, no fuss at all and under finish you can't tell what it is. Not as elegant as ebony, but I tried bending ebony binding on the hot pipe once and decided my patience wasn't sufficient.

[j. condino]

Ummmm . . .

Not always do-able.
Some examples of former builders who you could not or should not to business with-- names left out to protect the not-so-innocent:

1. A former mandolin, banjo, and dobro builder who has dropped off the face of the earth who has accepted repairs but has not returned some instruments to the owners [probably sold off to support his bad habits].

2. A former guitar builder who had some emotional problems who has dropped off the face of the earth. Fortunately he only built a few instruments.

3. A former well-known guitar builder who refuses to respond to any inquiries concerning his instruments.

4. A still active well-known builder who will charge exhorbitant fees to fix manufacturing defects that should be covered under warranty.

I could extend the list, but I'll stop here.

Those may well be true, but none of that means that it should be my responsibility to clean up their mess! I'm not here to save all of the worlds injured butterflies with broken wings. About 40% of my business is repair work. They need to be reasonable, a solid candidate for the effort, financially worth it for both of us, and I'm not going to be a punching bag for your own personal frustrations.( I bite back!)

Half assed work from other living builders has a PREMIUM surcharge (i.e. dumb a$$ tax)!!! If you want a Condino setup or voice, then buy a Condino.

The best thing I ever did as a repair person was learn to politely say, " No thank you. I was not the one who broke it and I'm not the one who is going to repair it. "

[MikeEdgerton]

..The best thing I ever did as a repair person was learn to politely say, " No thank you. I was not the one who broke it and I'm not the one who is going to repair it. "

I think one of the hardest things to do when one is in any business is to learn to to just turn down business. Most of us learned that the hard way.

[sliebers]

I think one of the hardest things to do when one is in any business is to learn to to just turn down business. Most of us learned that the hard way.

I'm still learning what to say no to. It takes getting burned on a few jobs before you can figure out what to charge, or to simply say no.

[John Bertotti]

I've never used plastic binding for any of my mandolins; all 136 have been wood. It matters to me.

If it is a light colored wood, like curly maple, before any staining the maple gets painted with shellac using a magnifying glass and a small brush- usually a couple of times. It is tedious, but that seals the wood so no stain comes in from the top. If you are overly aggressive with the stain, it can bleed in from the sides, so be gentle.

Binding an A5 in curly maple is pretty simple. Binding an F5 in curly maple sucks!

There is a nice article in American Lutherie from a few years back detailing a workshop I gave at the Tacoma convention on handrubbing sunburst finishes.

I have some finger planes but non of them are that beautiful! Where or where did you get that? That is one beautiful instrument as well! Seems that with such an instrument you need to use a beautiful finger plane.

[Charles E.]

See post #9.

[John Bertotti]

Ooopps! I saw and immediately replied! I will need to doctor up my Ibex now as well! Thanks and apologies for being repetitive!

[Tavy]

But have you tried it?
There are many myths out there that need to be sorted out.
Wood glue may not bond ideally on smooth finished surfaces but lightly sealed surface that is cleaned with a pass of sandpaper still may offer enough fibers for wood glue to grab sufficiently. Just like Frank Ford glues removed plastic bindings or pickguards back with white glue.
One myth is that hide glue or Titebond won't hold on PVA/Titebond coated or contaminated surfaces (like open joints). It will... and quite well. I tested it.

Very interesting digression here.

My experience is that most glues will bind to shellac extremely well, BUT, the shellac itself has zero strength, so if you try and glue to say a shellac finish, all that will happen is the joint falls apart with a thin layer of shellac left stuck to each surface (and yes, I've tried that - just the once!!). BUT, if you're gluing to a surface that's been minimally sealed with shellac, then I would say that's not much different in texture to the bare wood, and the shellac is pretty much "down in the wood" anyway in this case so there's nothing much to shear off. So.... sitting in my armchair, and not having done the experiments Adrian has, but none the less, my strictly armchair opinion would be an expectation that wood lightly sealed with shellac would stick to wood a lot better than wood to plastic.

BTW, lets not also forget that binding was originally intended to be at least somewhat disposable: A dropped instrument that lands on plastic binding may do a lot of superficial damage (binding loose, finish all fractured), but it's way easier to fix than similar damage to wood. And yes, I've had one of my guitars come back to me after it was dropped face down onto rough concrete.... it looked shocking, but once you got down to it, it was just a case of fixing the faux-tortoishell binding and doing some touch-up. I dread to think what would have happened if it had had hardwood binding - probably would have either cracked the top or else knocked it right off the rim. Which is not to say I don't like hardwood binding, it looks lovely, just don't drop them guys...

[j. condino]

Excellent point about glues binding to the shellac but then the shellac is a weak binder to the wood!

I'm a firm believer that binding also serves a structural purpose.

I string up my instruments several times during the build process and I build many different types and sizes. On the classical guitars in particular, with no binding, the instrument lacks focus and power. When the wooden binding is added, the whole instrument changes. Purfling channels in violin family instruments also change the voicing.

In the end, we do what works for us that may well be different from our peers. Dissecting the instrument into many micro sized parts is all well and good, but often times the small variations don't couple with the aggregate. It is the total package that we want to couple together and work best.

[peter.coombe]

Why is fixing damage to a plastic binding easier than fixing damage to a wood binding? Many of my instruments have been dropped, in fact I have dropped a few myself. What has happened is the binding has dented, and in most cases that can be easily fixed. What airliners do to music instruments is another matter, and plastic or wooden bindings won't stop that sort of damage. I can't see that it makes any difference, having wooden bindings does not mean more damage is likely to occur.

[Tavy]

Why is fixing damage to a plastic binding easier than fixing damage to a wood binding? Many of my instruments have been dropped, in fact I have dropped a few myself. What has happened is the binding has dented, and in most cases that can be easily fixed. What airliners do to music instruments is another matter, and plastic or wooden bindings won't stop that sort of damage. I can't see that it makes any difference, having wooden bindings does not mean more damage is likely to occur.

Fair point Peter, it may be better to say that the damage is different: plastic binding tends to be pliable, wood more rigid. The plastic is good at adsorbing larger shocks (which is what I was alluding to before), but prone to coming loose, and fracturing the finish if it moves. Wood may well better protect against smaller knocks, is better glued on, and less likely to move and fracture the finish. But also provides less shock protection from a really big impact.

But look, don't drop your instruments folks

[Dave Cohen]

Some photos of an F mandolin (in the white) bound in wood. The fretboard is single-bound in 0.060" curly maple. The headstock and pick guard are single-bound in 0.040" curly maple. The body is triple-bound in curly maple/katalox/curly maple. Inside to out, the curly maple and katalox are 0.030", and the outer layer of curly maple is 0.040". I'll echo what a few others in this thread have posted. Pre-bending the maple for the really tight curves is very difficult at 0.060" thickness, but much easier at 0.040" or 0.030". So my advice is that multiple-layer binding is actually easier than binding with a thicker single layer, so make it easier on yourself and use multiple layers of binding. I use a little soldering iron with an inexpensive temperature controller for the really tight bends.

If you want to do curly maple binding AND a sunburst or otherwise dyed mandolin, make it easier on yourself by putting a narrow strip of dark binding against the area(s) to be dyed. The easiest way to do that is to route for and install a thin layer of dark binding, then rout again for the remaining binding, leaving only a thin strip of the dark binding against the surface to be dyed. Plan and arrange your binding layers so that dark binding layers are always against each wood surface that will be dyed.

One note about binding scrolls: I found that wood binding does not easily bend in two directions; it wanted to buckle a bit when I tried that. My solution was to make the outer layer of binding flare out wider around the scroll. That also has the advantage of covering ALL of the end grain around the scroll.

[Bill McCall]

Very nice.

[telemaestro]

I've never built a mandolin, but many guitars. I always applied a dark purfling between the top/back, and the binding, or next layer of light purfling. Then I sealed the binding with several coats of shellac, applied the stain color, and then scraped back as necessary. It's more work than plastic binding, but certainly not particularly hard. You need to make sure with certain figured maples especially that they are very well sealed, as the capillary action is quite aggressive and will drink up the color. I never liked taping off the bindings, as I felt it made me work more sloppily that otherwise.

[telemaestro]

Some photos of an F mandolin (in the white) bound in wood.

Beautiful! The figured walnut is lovely, and will be even more so under finish!