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There were a couple of discussions last year about side purfling methods. I mentioned this technique but didn’t have a guitar in progress at the time where I could show it. Today, I did one, so I made a video.

https://youtu.be/G_wRyosM2dY?si=rj_8d79_nZdVEQ6F

In the video, I mistakenly attributed the technique to Michael Greven. I believe it was actually John Greven who showed it in a long past issue of the Guild of American Luthiers Journal. My apologies to him if I got that wrong.

The smoke in the video shows that the bit needs some maintenance. I will clean it and attempt to sharpen it, but, in the end, I will probably replace it.

The process really is a simple as it looks. I will need to clean out the corners with a small chisel. I will miter the corners the usual way. When I glue in the purfling, I will probably use some slightly diluted Titebond applied in the channel with a syringe, but sometimes I use HHG.

All of the mess you see with the bindings will disappear when I scrape them.

I hope this helps someone.

That's pretty cool Bob. What are the advantages of having the purfling glued as part of the binding prior to install?

Some folks prefer to have the purfling glued prior. I feel that method is more difficult. This method allows the purfling channel to cover any gaps that might be left after gluing the binding. It makes the mitering at the corners pretty easy because you only have to deal with the width of the purfling and you know exactly where the miter will be. And, this method doesn’t require any special clamping to join the purfling to the binding.

I went back later today and installed all of the purfling in the channels in about a half hour. I usually use diluted Titebond for that (diluted to minimize the surface tension problems of getting it into the channel). After I used the first load in the syringe (about 1.5 ml got me a quarter of the job), I noticed I had some Titebond Extend and tried that straight. It didn’t have the surface tension issues. If I remember, that’s what I will probably use in the future.

With the purfling installed.