First thing after varnishing is to refit the fingerboard. It may look like the fingerboard that was fitted for temporary set-up, but it has now been modified to reduce it's weight. The scooped area on the undersurface of the overhang has been extended and the thickness reduced.

I am now fitting a set of ebony Hill pattern pegs using the tool previously described in "Temporary Set-up". When they are fitted with the correct projection on the thumb grip side they stick out beyond the pegbox on the other side. They are reduced to be almost flush with the pegbox wall before being rounded and polished. I make tiny pin pricks to identify the pegs so that they can be replaced in the correct holes if they are removed at any time e.g. for string changing, peg lubrication etc. (I picked up this tip from the late Wilf Saunders). For the photo I have emphasised the pin pricks with fine chalk dust and they can be seen on the "E" and "A" pegs in the right hand picture.

The final touches have now been added - an Aubert bridge, a handmade ebony tailpiece from Bois d'Harmonie and an ebony chinrest. The player of course has to be happy with the instrument before finally purchasing it, so Conor has been "road testing" the fiddle around some of the traditional musical venues of Belfast (mostly pubs!). This has given him the opportunity to get to know it and also to let others play it so that he can hear it as a listener, rather than "under the ear". I am glad to say that he is very pleased with it and tomorrow is heading off with it for a three-gig tour in Switzerland with the Irish traditional music band Craobh Rua.

Here I have removed the fingerboard and replaced it with a thin piece of wood to avoid damage to the delicate edges of the neck. The primer (Imprimatura Dorata from Magister) has been applied.

If I lived in Italy I would now hang the violin in the sun for a few days! In this climate I resort to my UV box to enhance the colour of the wood and primer. (The box noramlly has the lid closed. For obvious reasons I took this photo with my eyes closed!!)

In the next stage I will be rubbing a paste of pumice onto the wood. Pumice is a porous volcanic rock which is available in powder form and I start by mixing it with clear varnish and mulling it to ensure fine particle size and to suspend it evenly in the varnish. After scooping it into a jar with a palette knife I apply it by using a cloth "rubber".

Another mulling session - this time I am using the pigment Cinquasia Gold. This will be added to the varnish (plus some Gilsonite) to colour the varnish in subsequent steps.

Several coats of varnish have now been applied. After each coat dries it is rubbed down with very fine micromesh abrasive lubricated with water and Marseilles soap.

The pilot holes for the pegs were drilled at an earlier stage and now I am using a tapered reamer to open the holes ready for fitting the pegs.

The pegs are now shaved down using a tool like a pencil sharpener. It puts a taper on the pegs that matches the taper in the peg hole. I am putting these old pegs in as a temporary measure to allow me to set the violin up "in the white". I will fit the final pegs when the player has chosen them.

The pegs have been fitted, the soundpost installed and the instrument has been strung up with a temporary bridge and tailpiece. The player will now have the opportunity to check out the "feel" of the violin and small adjustments to properties such as the neck profile can be made at this stage.

I generally set the neck width at the nut at 24mm. This is a fairly standard measurement but some players like it a bit narrower. Conor has checked the violin with its temporary set-up and would prefer the neck width slightly reduced. I will take the neck width down to give a nut width of about 23mm and the instrument will then be stripped down, the fingerboard removed and preparations for varnishing will begin.

The bevels are then merged to form the rounded edge.

The mortice is cut and ready to receive the neck. It is deliberately undersized and at theis stage the neck will not slip fully home into the body (see next photo).

At this stage the neck does not fit fully into the body but by gradually enlarging the mortice it will slip into place. During this process there are a number of important measurements and relationships which must be maintained. These include the distance from nut to edge of body (130mm) the overstand of the neck where it meets the body (6.0-6.5mm) and the angle at which the fingerboard projects on the bridge. In addition, the fingerboard must be orientated precisely along the central axis and there must be no lateral rotation of the neck.

When all of the above criteria have been fulfilled the neck can be glued in position using strong freshly made hide glue. It is clamped securely using a G-clamp and and a leather-lined wooden block shaped to conform to the curvature of the fingerboard.

I am beginning to form the button and to shape the shoulder of the neck using a chisel followed by a knife. Final shaping will involve rasps and scrapers.

The fingerboard is glued onto the neck. It will be removed later before varnishing so I use just three dabs of fairly weak hide glue.

It is now time to remove the excess wood from the sides of the block. I make a series of saw cuts stopping just short of the fingerboard. I use a Japanese saw for most sawing operations. Unlike European saws it cuts on the "pull" stroke rather than the "push" and it can therefore be made much thinner.

The excess wood can then be removed between the saw cuts with a chisel, cutting away from the fingerboard to avoid the risk of damaging the ebony. An engineer's type vice is really useful when working with the neck/scroll - a couple of pieces of cork are lightly glued inside the jaws.

I have started shaping the neck by rasping off corners. Rasp and files will be used to continue the shaping.

Planing the sides of the neck root which will be morticed into the violin body.

Marking out the neck root. "A" is the overstand above the front. "B" is the thickness of the front and "C" is the rib depth at the point of insertion of the neck. These marks will be used as guidesd when fitting the neck. The hatched area will be gradually removed as the neck is fitted.

The neck and heel of the pegbox are almost finshed and will be finalized when the neck is attached to the body. Shaping of the neck root will also be carried out at that time.

I am cutting out the shape, keeping the bandsaw blade just outside the line (and my thumb well away from the blade).

The scroll, pegbox and neck have been released from the block. The pegholes have also been drilled and will be taken to their final size with a reamer at a later stage. I will use rasps and files to bring the shape down to the final outline.

Apologies for the focus! I have marked the outline of the neck, pegbox and scroll and will now stat to develop the shape using gouges and chisels.

The sides of the pegbox have now been established using chisels and gouges around the curved heel. Next step will be to rough out the spiral curves of the volute.

Careful sawcuts (I use a Japanese "pull" saw) are made at a tangent to the scroll curves and down to the line marking the edge of the scroll. Waste wood is taken off with a chisel to leave a a square enclosing the first turn of the volute. The reamining excess wood is taken off with gouges which fit the curve as closely as possible.

By continuing the same process as in the previous picture I have arrived at this stage. Its still pretty rough, but its beginning to look like a scroll and it will be considerably refined later.

These are the gouges that have been used in taking the scroll to this stage.

Hollowing out the pegbox using a gouge sharpened on the inside of the curve and pushing it forward with a rotatory motion. Final finishing will be with riffler files and chisels. The pencil line is the the depth that I must not exceed!!

The chamfer has been put on the edge of the scroll and pegbox and I am starting to to form the fluting. I make two initial gouge tracks on each side which will then be merged before finishing with scrapers.

Fluting is completed and now I just need to tidy up the whole scroll and pegbox with scrapers.

These are the scrapers I have used in finishing the scroll and pegbox. The next step will be fitting the fingerboard and shaping the neck.

Here I have used a program called CoolEdit to record and analyse three taps placed so as to elicit mode #2. I have selected an area (white bar) and analysed the frequencies present in the sound. You can see in the insert that there is a major peak followed by a series of lesser peaks of decreasing amplitude and increasing frequency. Mode #2 of this front is 137Hz. I make a note of this figure together wih the values for #1 and #5 for future reference. I also record the weight of the front (65gm).

The front is glued on using thinner hide glue than was used for the back.

The body is now complete and only needs a bit of refinement of the edges. Next step the scroll/pegbox/neck.

For fitting, the front is clamped into a frame which holds it without distortion. The bas bar will run along the bass side of the front, running under the position of the bridge foot almost but not quite parallel to the centre join. It is important to get really good contact between the lower surface of the bar and the belly. Using the unshaped bar as a guide a series of little blocks is glued in place so that the bar can always be placed in the same position as I begin to shape it. This is done by chalk fitting. The area where the bar is to be sited is chalked and when the rough bar is put in place and very slightly moved longitudinally. Where the bar is touching it will be marked with the chalk and these high points are removed by knife or small plane. This process is repeated and gradually more and more of the bar is chalked. Finally when the whole bar is marked (and therefore in good contact) you breathe a sigh of relief, open a can and heat up the glue! For me at least bass bar fitting is not one of the most exciting episodes in making a violin!

The bar has been glued in position and left overnight. After removing the locating blocks the bar is ready to be taken to its final shape.

The bar has now arrived at its final shape using a small plane and scraper. It is now 270mm long, 13mm at the high point, tapering down to 3mm at the ends. In cross section it is tapered from the 5.5mm base to give an arch-shaped profile.

I have now used a couple of special tools to cut the finials at each end of the f-holes. These cutting tools remove little wooden discs as seen in the picture. The pencil lines seen on the inside of the front are guides for placement of the f-holes.

I have now drawn the f-holes on the outside using a cardboard template, with the holes as guides.

Using a fret saw with a very fine blade I have cut out the body of the f-holes keeping well clear of the guide lines.

Geting to the final outline of the f-holes with a fine-bladed knife used from the inside.

The f-holes have now been completed. The poster behind the front is a photograph of the origninal Guarneri instrument on which my violin is based.

The first stage of joining these pieces is to plane the jointing surfaces absolutely flat and at 90 degrees to the lower surface. For this I use my Lie-Nielsen plane and a "shooting board". It is very enjoyable to work with a good plane and a well-honed iron - the long ribbons of shavings roll off the wood as thin and transparent as onion skin! It is vital that these two pieces of wood will meet perfectly along the whole length and width of the joint. In the finished violin the wood will be less than 3mm thick along the length of the join, so any tiny gaps could obviously have disastrous consequences.

The jointing method that I employ is centuries old and is known as a "rubbed joint". One piece of the front is held in a vice and freshly made hot hide glue is brushed over the surface. The second piece is set carefully on top and slid firmly lengthwise back and forward. After a few seconds you can feel an increased resistance as the glue begins to "grab". This is the time to stop and leave it overnight.

After jointing I planed down both surfaces and came across a resin pocket. Theyt are not uncommon and there is no way of suspecting their presence. At any rate they are not a problem and often they disppear during subsequent carving. Sometimes they persist but they are easily removed and repaired without tonal or aesthetic detriment. Stradivari found one when he was making his celebrated "Messiah" violin and if you look carefully at photographs (or the original in the Ashmolean Museum) you can see his repair on the upper treble bout of the front. In the present case the pocket is less than 1cm long and not very deep so it will probably disappear as I arch the front.

My bandsaw has fairly narrow "throat" so I have to se a sort of "jigsaw" technique to saw the outline of the front.