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Thread: Bending Cherry Sides

  1. #1
    Registered User Tom Haywood's Avatar
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    Default Bending Cherry Sides

    Experience? Advice? I plan to use a hot pipe to get a gentle bend for bouzouki sides, but I have never bent cherry. Using "American Cherry" from LMII. Thickness around .09". I wonder if it benefits more from being slightly wet or soaked, and if a back strap is necessary. I don't have an extra piece to practice with. My research indicates that cherry wood is very inconsistent. Some say it's a dream to work with, others say it's a nightmare. Any advice on bending it?
    Tom

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    Registered User sunburst's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Cherry is usually easy to bend, no soaking needed. Sometimes certain pieces are more of a challenge, and .090" might be a little thick for tight bends (like points and scrolls), but you should not have any problems with it.

  3. #3
    I may be old but I'm ugly billhay4's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    .09 is a bit thick, I think.
    Bill

  4. #4

    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I have bent a lot of cherry for OM guitars and fiddles. I have never had a problem. I wet it and bend immediately. It will scorch if you pause in one spot, if your pipe is too hot. Just go slow. The thickest that I have bent is .080". Just take your time. Pals, Vic.

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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I took an old towel and cut it into 3 inch strips about 16 inches long and take a spray bottle with warm water, wet the strips of towel in a pan of water and lay the strips over the hot pipe and the steam from the wet rags helps. I mist the sides constantly keeping it wet, and take your time. This method was from a member here and I'm just passing it along, it works very well for me.

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  7. #6

    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Hi Tom
    I have a cherry mandolin that was my last build. The sides were .060 or .065 and sprayed water and bent it slow. Had no problems with it. I will be making another one soon. My cherry mandolin is on this site.
    Good Luck
    Charlie

  8. #7
    Registered User David Houchens's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I built a wild cherry A mandolin. The sides bent really well at around .080 thick. But watch out,Click image for larger version. 

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ID:	96333 the wonderful smell while carving the back, you might just carve all the way through. I love the smell of fresh cut wild cherry.

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    Resonate globally Pete Jenner's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I love the luxury deep pile bench.
    The more I learn, the less I know.

    Peter Jenner
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  12. #9
    Registered User Tom Haywood's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Thanks everybody. I will make the sides thinner. I have only worked with cherry doing some small furniture repair a few years ago and whittling plungers for china berry guns when I was a kid. I thought it was wonderful to work with and I love the smell, but I dulled a chain saw cutting three small trees out of a horse pasture.
    Tom

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  13. #10
    Registered User Wilbur Tabacsko's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    The description "American Cherry" leaves me befuddled. Here in the Keystone we have mainly Black Cherry. Is that what they are selling? I have used it for backs, sides, and necks. Wonderful wood to work with.

  14. #11
    Registered User Tom Haywood's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I forgot to ask. My guess is Black Cherry if it is American.
    Tom

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    Registered User sunburst's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    In the lumber selling business there are so many terms like "eastern maple", "SPF" (spruce/pine/fir), "southern yellow pine" and so forth, I assume "American cherry" means they mix all the cherry lumber together and call it that so that they don't have to differentiate and try to sell it as individual species. Black cherry is the main source of American cherry lumber though.

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  17. #13
    Registered User Tom Haywood's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Update: Bouzouki sides. The cherry really is a dream to work with. It's very hard, so everything takes a little longer. I thicknessed the sides on a belt sander to around .090". Sprayed the pieces on both sides and the pipe to get good steam. After three or four minutes the wood became very elastic and was a true pleasure to bend. Thought I was getting some scorching, but when it dried there was none. Perfect combination of rigidity and springiness coming out of the bending form. Speaking of hard, the sander grabbed a piece and threw it across the room pretty hard into a pile of tools. The only damage was a 1 inch split along the center grain. This repaired fine with CA and it bent with no problem. Thanks for all the advice from you guys.

  18. #14
    Registered User Rodney Riley's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    This was on our Facebook newsfeed. Thought it might be of interest to all the builders out there. Could be useful to someone just building his own on a budget.



    Boat Paddle Ukulele Co.


    I got a new curling iron at Target a few weeks ago. Not using it for my hair (most of it fell out a long time ago), but it makes a dandy bending iron. The last one I had was a Revlon 5000 (woo-hoo) that lasted about 6 years. The new one is a Conair with ceramic heater that gets up to 400 degrees in just 90 seconds. It's great for tight bends like Kayak uke sides and sound hole rosettes. At just $35 it can't be beat!

    https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphot...71746891_n.jpg

    https://www.facebook.com/pages/Boat-...21559551254083

  19. #15
    Registered User Tom Haywood's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Started putting it together today and had a decent picture of the bent sides. It took about five minutes yesterday to set up the pipe and bend the one piece a little more at the end to hug the tail block better.

    Click image for larger version. 

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    Tom

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  20. #16
    Registered User John Bertotti's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I have two pet peeves being to redundant, turning into my dad telling the same stories over and over, or resurrecting a very old thread and yet here I go. Anywho, I am curious about anything else people might want to add to this thread. I ordered 300 bdft of Cherry 4/4 and 100 bdft of 8/4 for some kitchen shelving table and benches. I expect to have some left over for a build. In this thread it seems you all liked working with it in a different venue guys were saying it was a pain to bend but I can't help but wonder if it isn't more to do with thicknesses because they were not building instruments. Just curious at the pitfalls I may run into. Do you find it more suited to a particular body style like A or F or sound hole configuration F vs oval? Maybe silly questions but I have noticed that some wood just seem brighter than others but never thought much beyond that. Maybe the timber of the wood would dictate one style or body shape over another, I don't know? I figured if anyone did though it would be someone here. Thanks and apologies for becoming a thread necromancer. Oh and one last question Anything I have done in the past has been with wood that sat in my basement it isn't a humid basement but relative to the rest of the house in SD so humid summer dry winters, into the low teens sometimes in the winters and 45 50% in the summers in the house. Outside low teens and highs high humidity like Mn. I close to the border of MN and IA. Now this wood I have coming is kiln tired to furniture grade with is pretty low. Is that to low for an instrument? Perhaps I will have to let the pieces for any prospective instrument build equilibrate in my house a year or two?
    Thanks everyone!
    My avatar is of my OldWave Oval A

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  21. #17
    Barn Cat Mandolins Bob Clark's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Hi John,

    Bear in mind that I am new to building instruments, but I have no trouble at all bending cherry. In fact, other than black walnut, cherry is my favorite wood to work. I have worked with cherry that sat in my barn untouched for about 35 years, and cherry from a very small local mill where it was dried and rough cut. In either situation, I do my own re-sawing. I find it a joy to work with and bending generally hasn't been a problem. The only issue I have found is that some pieces have small linear sap pockets running parallel to the grain. I try to avoid these as they can crack open when bending. It's usually pretty easy to work around them, though, so they aren't a big deal. Good luck, and please let us know how you make out with it.

    Best wishes,

    Bob
    Purr more, hiss less. Barn Cat Mandolins Photo Album

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  23. #18
    Registered User John Bertotti's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Quote Originally Posted by Bob Clark View Post
    Hi John,

    Bear in mind that I am new to building instruments, but I have no trouble at all bending cherry. In fact, other than black walnut, cherry is my favorite wood to work. I have worked with cherry that sat in my barn untouched for about 35 years, and cherry from a very small local mill where it was dried and rough cut. In either situation, I do my own re-sawing. I find it a joy to work with and bending generally hasn't been a problem. The only issue I have found is that some pieces have small linear sap pockets running parallel to the grain. I try to avoid these as they can crack open when bending. It's usually pretty easy to work around them, though, so they aren't a big deal. Good luck, and please let us know how you make out with it.

    Best wishes,

    Bob

    I am impatiently waiting. I was hoping to get a remodel done with this wood but there are several other purchases ahead of me for the kiln time. I own't get the 4/4 for at least another 4-6 and no idea how long after that for the 8/4. But as I get on I will let you know. I love black walnut also. Grew up with it and love to eat it, not the wood obviously. Black Walnut ice cream, cookies, brownies and I'm currently on Keto so we will stop right there!
    My avatar is of my OldWave Oval A

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    Registered User tree's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I have to flatten and true my work with hand planes, cherry isn't the easiest wood I've ever tried to flatten. Almost any grain runout results in areas of tearout for me. I can minimize it by changing the direction I'm planing, but often it does result in small areas that I must deal with some other way (like sanding, ugh).

    Walnut is hands down my favorite wood to work, it seems very forgiving to my poor technique.
    Clark Beavans

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  26. #20
    Registered User John Bertotti's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Have you tried a toothed plane? I believe they were designed for finicky curly grain but I haven't seen one for a larger plane. I imagine one could be made though.
    My avatar is of my OldWave Oval A

    Creativity is just doing something wierd and finding out others like it.

  27. #21
    Registered User Mike Conner's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Built a 16" archtop guitar with a cherry body and Englemann front. As stated above, the cherry was well behaved in bending. I will confirm that the cherry I worked with was very hard, and as a consequence carving the arched back plate was a real workout, especially compared to red maple or walnut. The cherry was only mildly figured so grain runout or splitting during bending was not a problem (as compared to curly maple). The guitar sounded fantastic. Build details are in a FB album - let me know if you want a link.
    //mike

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  29. #22
    Registered User John Bertotti's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I would love to see it but I'm not on FB. Thanks for the information!
    My avatar is of my OldWave Oval A

    Creativity is just doing something wierd and finding out others like it.

  30. #23

    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    I've worked with cherry before and enjoyed it, but it didn't involve bending. My mistake was using highly-figured cherry, and the figured areas would snap just looking at them. I started bending at 0.08" and finally was able to get it done at 0.05". I used a spray bottle and a steel backing plate. I had 6" of side material left when I finally got it to work.

    [IMG]Untitled by Gary Davis, on Flickr[/IMG]

    It can be done but the agony is real.

    [IMG]Untitled by Gary Davis, on Flickr[/IMG]

    The figure on the back wasn't an issue. It was just the bending.

    [IMG]Untitled by Gary Davis, on Flickr[/IMG]

    Lesson learned - figured wood doesn't like to bend.

    Good luck - Gary

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  32. #24
    Registered User Mike Conner's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Quote Originally Posted by John Bertotti View Post
    I would love to see it but I'm not on FB. Thanks for the information!
    I looked into my saved info from 2015 and I did compile a video slide show with music played on the same guitar. Was a wonderful project for Bridget, the daughter of some dear friends. Attempting to attach the link it here:


    Let me know if it works for you!
    (Edit: seems to work full screen, but resolution is poor due to the FB conversion. Let me know if you want an emailed copy of the higher resolution file)
    //mike

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  34. #25
    Registered User John Bertotti's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bending Cherry Sides

    Those pictures are great you guys! Mike that video slide show has a slight glitch it only shows the top quarter of the vid. In the thumbnail but if you go full screen it is all there. Look sleek she really loved it. Does she still play it? I hope it wasn't a passing fancy. nice song also and who ever has that living room must be pretty cool they seem to have my chair!
    My avatar is of my OldWave Oval A

    Creativity is just doing something wierd and finding out others like it.

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