That's retarded. That guy needs to go back to his job at Chipotle.

If you were ambidextrous and could play both right and left, you could do an electric and flip it back and forth to demonstrate your skills, but unless you have 3 or more arms, you can't do anything but clang open strings to augment what you're doing with the other guitar. It's more art than instrument.

They'll need another final pass, but the slots are mostly done on this one.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...9bdb914a52.jpg

I'm waiting for the templates to arrive, so I might as well do a few of these fret boards while I've got the jig out and my skills are improving.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...6baaddc4b3.jpg

That's 4 necks and 4 finger boards. 2 more finger boards and one neck out in the shop. I need body blanks. I've only got 2

I just toured the Martin guitar factory this afternoon. Pretty thorough tour.

Gluing up the front and back panels by hand. They use this press that clamps multiple panels at once.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...598e005721.jpg

Stacking them as them come out of the clamps.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...08a306bf67.jpg

Candling the panels to check for knots before they lay out the front and back for the cnc machine.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...49eb071b7e.jpg

Cnc machine cutting out the fronts and backs.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...f016b683a7.jpg

The neck is roughed out by cnc and finished up by hand.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...89f5bd477f.jpg

I took a ton of pictures, but not of every step.

Here's a laser ingraving machine for the name and serial number.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...07fd3cf5be.jpg

This is a robot finish buffing machine
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...dbddcbaf46.jpg

And a bunch of assembled bodies, unfinished. There were hundreds of these all over the place.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...e5f23464c2.jpg
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...fd6d32dd47.jpg
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...9fbd3c4aa3.jpg

Racks full of necks.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...ef49cc2331.jpg
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...dc82e0600d.jpg
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...7e7786d7b6.jpg

When they cut out the front and back, they leave these tabs on them to help index all the other work they do each step of the way.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...79c0237408.jpg
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...9578f53caa.jpg

The index holes come in handy when gluing in the braces and clamping them to dry

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...10d72c3360.jpg

Sorry to hijack the thread but thought this would be a good spot for these pics. It was a very cool tour, and I recommend it.

And they are hiring. They mentioned that several times.

Good one! I'm pretty sure I can't afford that tour

There's a hard sell at the end and we dropped almost $100 on just t-shirts.

They give you a piece of a Martin as a souvenir of the tour. They do a very fast print laser engraving of the sound hole cutout to each person who takes the tour.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...fc81399fcc.jpg

I'm thinking my entry fee would be around $1200 :D

Wow. That is damn cool. Hiring you say...

So cool. And thanks for dropping it here.

Did having seen what I did help you get a sense of what they were doing at all? I can't believe I've never gone there. But then I've never toured the Harley plant either.

Good stuff