Various sized dowels

I couldn’t decide whether to make this post about my inexhaustible need for various sized dowels, or my decades long love affair with my belt sander - decided to combine them into one. I use this sander for nearly everything. Once you grind a cutout in the steel bed (see pic four) and can gain access to the very edge of the sanding belt, the sky’s the limit 🚀. Before I got the CNC set up to rough out pyramid bridges, I used to make them completely by “hand” right at this little cut out on the sander 🤪. I still make custom size pearl dots by first grinding the shank end of a drillbit flush, and then supergluing a rough sawn piece of pearl onto that end, chuck it in the cordless drill and voilà, in a few seconds (if it doesn’t pop off 😬🤞🏼) you have a custom pearl dot!
I go back-and-forth about offering these custom wooden plugs (some tapered!) on my website. Somehow just can’t wrap my mind around charging for tiny pieces of wood. On the other hand, there were times that I would’ve paid a small fortune for one of these (ever have to plug an old tuner screw hole?!) tapered plugs. and of course, these are no ordinary dowels, since we luthier types, need them cut from the face of the board just like our tops, backs, sides etc. they are fragile and can be tricky to handle.
In case it’s not clear, here’s quickie video demo of the process. go easy on me, possibly the worst dowel demo ever.. once I got the lights, camera and Tripod set up it was of course exactly where I needed to be. 👨🏼‍🦯 💖

[@harpethguitar]

Brilliant!

[@jerrywigle7245]

Nice!