Case moldings: Gluing technique

Here's how the cheek molding was glued on:


The little clamping blocks look like this:


They attach to the underside of the baseboard with two nails. First, each block was positioned with the dowel about half an inch from the case edge, and the nail at the block's midpoint was driven in. With the cheek molding positioned correctly, the block was rotated until the dowel pressed firmly against the molding, and then the nail at the opposite end of the block was driven in to hold the pressure and keep everything in place.

This setup should serve well for all the other pieces, and for me is preferable to clamping the molding with padded nails, which would leave behind unsightly holes. There are still nail holes using my technique but at least they'll be underneath the harpsichord where they will rarely be seen.

I have another clamp design in mind for the bentside molding, which may need some firm pressure at the cheek corner to make sure the curve conforms at its sharpest point. More on that soon.

Case moldings: Baseboard level

Time at last to start applying moldings to the case. I'm starting with those around the perimeter of the case at baseboard level.

I made the moldings with one pass of a small router bit along both edges of the few remaining Alaska yellow cedar boards that I have left, then ripped strips about 17 mm wide off the boards. The width was chosen with two considerations in mind: first, this is about the maximum I could fit into my little miter box, which has a limited clearance between the business end of the saw blade and the bottom of the box; and second, the width has to be sufficient to hide all the screws that secure the bottom edges of the case to the baseboard.

Seen end-on, the molding has this profile:


Before applying the molding along the front of the instrument, I attached a filler strip in the keywell area so that the shelving on which the keyboard sits won't be visible. The strip also keeps the keyboard from sliding out of the instrument.


Although this strip looks like a solid chunk of yellow cedar, it's actually made of several thin pieces glued around a scrap of softwood. The molding will overlap it slightly and hide the brown baseboard edge completely.

I've prepared the first few pieces of molding in the rough: the cheek, bentside and tail moldings exist as over-length pieces, and the bentside piece has been steamed and is currently sitting in a bending form so that I won't have to wrestle it into the correct curve while trying to glue it down. In a day or two it will be ready to glue.

Keyboard: Completed

The keyboard is done.


After two coats of Danish oil, rubbed in between with extra-fine steel wool, and a light coat of wax, the keys have a lovely sheen and a silky-smooth feel under the fingers. The naturals have a golden glow and the sharps are dark and glossy. The scribe lines on the naturals have darkened and are more prominent now.

On to the case moldings now...