Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi ...I hope have a go at  binding my guitar in the next week or so. I bought ebony bindings a while ago to do this. I have since been reading ( in preparation) that ebony can be difficult to bend. I just have my trusty hot pipe as my bending method.

Have I chosen a tough wood to bend  for a rookie. My only other guitar was bound in what I guess you would call " ebonoid"...wood fiber stuff I think it was...it went pretty easy...I didn't even have to pre bend it at all.........I liked the colour, so I thought this time I'd try the real thing...any secrets to making my attempt go smoothly( if that's possible)....it may be one of those weeks!!

Cheers...and thanks..

Irwin,

I just posted pics of my first guitar, and used ebony bindings.  Bending was ok - used a fox style bender.

Doug

My first four guitars all have ebony binding, so I've bent 16 pieces, broke one. All bent with light bulbs on a fox style bender, for dreadnaught guitars. I tape them together with blue masking tape and bend just like I bend the sides. Spritz with water lightly. Didn't seem hard to me, but I don't know about a pipe.

Ron

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OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

I've bent one set of ebony binding (4 pcs) and didn't have much trouble at all.
I soaked them in water for an hour or so (Mario-style sewer pipe) and wrapped them in foil.
OOO shape in a Fox/Doolin bender with heat blanket.

I also bent some ebony for binding around headstock curves, using a hot pipe-type electric iron.

I think that it may depend a lot on the stick that the bindings came from. Some ebony I've come across has been a bit splintery, but my bindings bent like (stiff) plastic when hot.

You have to get the shape exactly right as you won't be able to pull the bindings tight easily- they're stiff when 'set'. An iron is handy for touch-ups at the waist area.

Good luck!
Cheers

John

Well I don't remember exactly how many I broke trying to bend over a hot pipe but it was quite a few. Then someone suggested thinning to .060 and viola they bent pretty easy.
Now .060 may be on the thin side for some but just add a .020 black perfling on the inside and it now looks like a .080 binding. I use a fox bender now and they bend pretty easy at .080

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A wet rag is a good thing to have handy by the bending iron as well. Sometimes a good steaming is needed to get things loosened up.
It all depends on the stick, I think.
John