A central design goal was to have all Ridgewing guitar cases meet the airline carry-on spec of 20” maximum length. With the black leather “Biker” case, getting it on the flight is pretty easy as it looks more like a strange purse, and doesn’t shout out “TOO BIG”. However the guitar is not well protected in the leather case, which may or may not be a problem depending on the type of body inserts being used. Carbon fiber grills are somewhat fragile, while metal grills or solid wood inserts can be stood on and called bad names without harm. The solution was to start with a stock airline-compatible case measuring 20 in x 14 in x 6 in, which enclosed four 1 1/2 inch red-flocked foam layers. As the various prototype guitar components started popping into reality one by one, they were laid out on the foam like a big puzzle.

A second design goal was to have the case hold everything a player should have in the way of cables, accessories and spare parts. Finally, the bridge and headstock had to stay connected by the strings in such a way as to avoid the strings getting tangled, a condition known to every Ridgewing player as “Macramé Hell”, as it seems to happen to every Ridgewing beginner, but just once. After that, they start to take string management very seriously.

As the parts are laid out, it is highly desirable to have minimum distances between the various parts be on the order of an inch or so. When the cavities are cut out of the foam, if the walls are too thin they can get wrecked very easily, which looks bad for everyone. Here things are in process. The upper right cutout looks a bit too close to the upper bout, and the little triangle at the lower left marked “Battery Slots” is questioning its own existence because the Ridgewing doesn’t use external batteries requiring spare slots.

Once the component layout is settled, the next task is to cut out the cavities in the top layer of flocked foam that will hold them. There are three options for cutting. The quickest and easiest is to cut the foam out on a band saw, but then there will be “cut lines” where the blade sneaks from one cavity to the next. Another consideration is that a band saw blade, when cutting a tall thin island separating two cavities, can have the bad manners to suddenly catch a piece of the foam face and swallow it faster than a frog catching a fly.

A second method is to hand-cut the foam with a sharp serrated bread knife. With a steady hand and taking care to keep the blade vertical, the results can look pretty good. But, like the band saw method, errors are very difficult to hide.

The third method, and the one used here, is to join a local Hackerspace and use their programmable laser cutter. It is pretty easy to turn a line drawing of the desired final foam pattern into a control program, and the laser cuts quickly, silently and very smoothly. The only problem is that the smell of laser-burned foam is strong enough to have your Hackerspace membership canceled unilaterally. Then you have to drive home with it in your car, and even sealing it inside heavy duty construction trash bags seems to have little effect. But after a day or two left outside, the odor has subsided to an acceptable “new car smell”, and the case can be assembled.

When the parts have all been finished and put to bed in the new case, all these past depredations are forgiven and forgotten, as the eye now feasts on an extraordinary visual banquet. The fact that this display can be turned into a full-size playing guitar in a few seconds fills the mind to overflowing.

When the case is finally closed and latched, the guitar is safe and ready to go out into the world to astound and perplex airport security personnel and other curious folk.

The best part is that all such encounters inevitably end with big smiles all around.