First guitar build

[Megaton_900]

A little update.
Im still pretty well busy, but in about a month i get a whole lot more free time.
I have made myself a bit of a better plan.
it turns out i got a little overzealous when i was buying guitar hardware before, so i have enough components for 3 full guitars (all 6's however )

1) les paul/tele hybrid, ye olde' styling (open back tuners, brass highlights ect), an old rocker.
2) Iceman(or fireman), veneer top, possibly trial run at binding, tom wraparound bridge, a "suit" guitar.
3) RG shape, EVH pickup ect, however a fixed bridge, a different kind of flame guitar (explained later)
I also decided since the hardware was kinda the majority of the cost, i upgraded my timber a bit.
To make it a bit more... fancy?

Thats the padauk there on the right, up top (from a prev post).
Its sitting on a lump of fiji mahogany, enough for another 2 bodies easy, 3 if im cram them in.

top to bottom:
Fiji Mahogany (body)
Tasmanian Blackwood (2 necks)
Tasmanian Blackwood also, this just has been planed already (neck)
US Maple (fretboard, seenn previously)
Sheoak lace (fretboard)
Gabon Ebony (fretboard, seen previously)

Here is what blackwood looks like once its finished.
That's the other 1/2 of the planed piece, i used it to make a nixie clock.

nice veneers i aquired.

The RG, assuming i dont ruin anything again

I have the number of a furniture maker nearby who may be able to pass the mahog/padauk over a jointer ,to make the bodies, which will be a great help.
I cant wait to get started again

 

[XxJoshxX]

You may not want to try binding an Iceman on your first attempt, its just much more difficult than a more conventional shape. Not trying to discourage you, just try to practice first.

 

[Megaton_900]

Back to work finally.

Got some outlines printed for 2 of them, i've been looking around online for inspiration, so a few things changed. Still undecided on a shape for the 3rd (or if ill do it at all).

(i changed my mind on the slight multiscale, now just a 650mm scale [~25.5"])

I took the mahogany & blackwood to that furniture shop, and had them thickness & straighten the edges.
Much easier.

cut to length

On the others I had some baking paper hiding under the plywood, to stop the glue oozing out from sticking. Worked really well.

(i drew over the join with a pencil, its really tight vs what i had lasttime round )

 

[foreright]

Good job - wish I had a friendly furniture shop around where I lived to do thicknessing / squaring of blanks... would make a lot of things much easier!

 

[Megaton_900]

I would like to rout neck pocket, pickups ect before i cut the body shape out, so next in line is a neck.
Starting with some jigs.

10' and 13' cut from some spare pine.
I gave them both the same bottom edge with a pass of the router.

A bigger router base. Training wheels i guess
Quite happy with this.
Its 10mm acrylic.
Thanks to DistinguishedPapyrus for the idea.

Now a scarf joints.

Accurate hand-sawing
No matter, this is longer than itd need to be for a neck thru (but not enough for 2 necks).

Jig works ok, its a little wobbly (i think that causes those snail lines?).
I was thinking of buying some 40x40mm alu extrusions to stiffen it up a little, and double up for thicknessing.

The marks disappear in seconds with a little sandpaper on a flat surface.
I realised i had also forgotten to screw the headstock part onto the neck section for the prev step, so i did it before sanding.

New holes, for gluing up.

That was the last few days, now up to date again.
Today was a day of sanding.

Was a little over excited bringing all that outside at once, i only managed to get thru 2 parts (a macacauba fretboard and a maple one)

A quick mock-up of the fretboard, and pickguard.
I fretboard-oiled a little bit of the end there to see some color, didnt really do anything (this wasnt the parts i finished sanding).
Both pieces are from a ukulele set i bought.
I was intending just for top to be the pickguard, but sides make a good fretboard, and just thick enough at 5mm.

Seems a little large for a uke however
Only has a top too, no back. Little confusing.
Oh well.

I have also made a little progress on the speaker cab.
In the bottom right of that uke picture there is hiding a test print (in white ABS) of a protective corner for it.
I mite make a thread on its own for that, once its done.

 

[A_Alexandrov]

You are very persistent and your gluing skills have improved.

My advice, since is your first guitar/s. Buy a pre slotted fretboard or cnc cut or mark the frets, or use fretting template. Make sure you glue the fretboard well with enough clamps and then have the fretwork done by professional. Be carefull with bridge positioning and allignment. In this way you will have an accurate playable guitar. Wood work, wood selection and design will improve in time.

 

[Megaton_900]

Good job - wish I had a friendly furniture shop around where I lived to do thicknessing / squaring of blanks... would make a lot of things much easier!

I found them from asking at the place i bought the (current) timber, maybe your local lumber yard will know someone?

You are very persistent and your gluing skills have improved.

My advice, since is your first guitar/s. Buy a pre slotted fretboard or cnc cut or mark the frets, or use fretting template. Make sure you glue the fretboard well with enough clamps and then have the fretwork done by professional. Be carefull with bridge positioning and allignment. In this way you will have an accurate playable guitar. Wood work, wood selection and design will improve in time.

Thanks, it has been lots of fun so far.

I already have some fretboards i wanted to use, so unless i ruin them i think ill try cutting them myself.
I was planning on gluing on a template, printed off fretfind2d and setting up a little mitre box (i think the name is?) to keep it square to the table & to a constant depth.
Hopefully that, and taking my time, will be ok?

Fretwork is i think a bit beyond me at this stage.
I had an old strat junker i tried to re-fret, didnt go so well

Thanks for the comments guys

A little side note, would epoxy be best to glue brass to timber?

 

[dankarghh]

I'm in AUS too, i'd love to know where you got those veneers/tops from? I've had a really hard time finding decent stuff. Build looks exciting!

 

[Megaton_900]

I'm in AUS too, i'd love to know where you got those veneers/tops from? I've had a really hard time finding decent stuff. Build looks exciting!

The veneers all came from here on thebay, i bought a few so they could combine shipping.
They get new things in often, by the looks.
Really friendly too, so send them an email before ordering international.
They sell Aus timber veneers, so i wonder where the local supplier is?

The Blackheart sassafras was from the melbourne woodworking show, back in October.
I forget what the company name was, but they had a bunch of mostly tasmanian stuff, all looked pretty nice.
I almost bought some sassafras for a drop top there. (hmm... blackheart sassafras )
If you were after some drop tops instead of veneers, Big sky timber (also at the show) had some really nice stuff, but was a little out of my price range.
They are up near Daylesford.

Fiji Mahogany & Blackwood are both from mathews timber, who have also been nice and helpful.
They dont have any figured wood and such however.

Another i have purchased from so far is Australian tonewoods, from WA.
I got the lace she oak fretboard there.
Tim is also a friendly guy, responds to emails quickly.
He might have a few tops/veneers in stock, that haven't made it online yet?

 

[skeels]

I love watching this! Keep on having fun and learning, man- you're hooked now!

 

[dankarghh]

Super helpful reply. Thanks heaps. I can't find much in my local area and it's not really something you can easily buy online from a timber yard. This makes life easier.

 

[Obstsalat]

what kind of wood is the second one from the right?
the flame is so nice!

 

[Megaton_900]

what kind of wood is the second one from the right?
the flame is so nice!

In order left to right:
African etimoe
Ovangkol
Queensland walnut
Bubinga

 

[Obstsalat]

Man that walnut looks insane...i am so jealous right now

 

[Megaton_900]

I got around to making the 2nd scarf joint.

I don't really have a plan for the 3rd one yet, so i'm not want to start cutting anything until i do.
I was thinking that bubinga veneer top, bleached (to remove the reds) then stained light blue, with a maple fretboard. And.. hmm...
No idea about body shape.
I was originally thinking flat top strat (Ibanez RG ish), but im a little over that shape. Most of my guitars all have the same basic shape...
The other 2 i have all the details nailed down, and they all fit together, in my mind.

I also tried my luck at thicknessing with a router

That was a test run with one of the macacauba spares.
I think i pushed my leg into the bit hanging off the edge and it lifted up

Next peice was double-sided taped into place

This is for the pickguard & controll cover, cut it down to ~3mm, and worked much better this time.
Still needed a little touch up with some sandpaper, but saved tons of time.

The maple offcut i found was hiding a little flame!
I liked the look of it before that already, so this will hopefully find its way onto something sooner or later.

Cut out a negative template to see how the pickguard would look.

Im having a tough time deciding where to cut it from, but i kinda like the knot.
Thoughts?
Plan atm is to laminate a 1mm brass plate underneath that macacauba, so when it gets chamfered it will have a thin brass outline around it.



If it stops raining i might try drilling some tuner holes and thicknessing the headstock to 15mm (and somehow leaving material for a volute).

 

[jwade]

I'd be curious to see what it'd look like with the knot dead-center.

 

[BlackMastodon]

Always always double-sided tape your piece that you are routing if you can't clamp it down. Accidents happen a lot more often when the piece isn't secured.

As for the pickguard, I vote for 3 or 4 since you like the knot. And for the record I like the look of the knot, too, and since it is just a pickguard it doesn't have to really be structurally sound. And you can just fill it with epoxy to make sure it's mostly stable.

 

[Megaton_900]

After several days of bad weather, i had planed out where i want my volutes & mark outlines on things.

Finally a bit of sun.
I started thicknessing the headstocks.

I set up the following jig, which worked pretty well. Just 2 pavers underneath some 18mm plywood.
The neck was propped up to stop it tipping.
The extra large router base helps heaps.

This couldn't quite cut deep enough, with the router as low as it could go, so i got rid of the plywood.

Worked great, aside from scratching the crap out of my shiny router base.
Really wish i had thought to put a piece of paper or something smooth in between.
Oh well, it wouldn't stay clean forever and its still totally functional.

The results, and after a light bit of sanding.
The little nick on both of them is outside of the part i need, happily.

After this, i was catching up on a few other projects while waiting for some parts in the mail.

These are some carbon fiber beams i bought.
The reason i bought these was
a) not sure how stable the necks will be since they are flat sawn (forgot to check when i was buying timber)
b) I have a 10mm router bit, and 2 c.f. strips and the truss rod are exactly 10mm wide

Lining them up.

The setup.
I bought an aluminium L bar, which is nice an straight and the perfect height for a depth stop for my fret saw.
Here it is doubling up as a straight edge to follow.
On one neck i lost concentration for 1 sec, and i wavered alittle.
Its fixable, it was only the first (less than 2mm) pass, and not very bad (shown in a later pic, on the red truss rod neck).

Cutting the bars to length (carefully).
The wet paper towel is to catch the dust (which is nasty stuff), also wear a mask.
The cuts i smoothed quickly on some 600grit paper, then wet the ends with superglue.

A few minutes later they were dry, and i installed them into the necks with a little gentle persuasion.

Definitely pleased with these necks so far!
Will be gluing on some fretboards soon.

 

[Megaton_900]

Gluing the fretboards.

I tried cutting the taper with the router (after roughing in shape with a hand saw).
I'm still not the best with a router.

The join on this one was not quite flush, a little glue line.
I hope i had enough clamps, as i glued both up the same way now.

 

[Megaton_900]

As seen here it bent in the middle a bit, where the clamps where.

I decided to make this one of those slim les paul necks.
It looks like if i take just a little off the gap will dissapear.

Smoothing out my dodgy routing.

Re-flattening the board.
The gap had to come from somewhere.
I was having trouble getting the sander right up to the nut, so i fixed that up here by hand too.

Considerably better, but still a slight gap.
I think i can fill that will a little super glue and blackwood dust.
Or even cover it with some binding, but id rather not.

Still rather pleased with this anyway.

Now i knew the routing didnt work so well for me, i did things different.

No more hand sawing

I cut the headstock-neck transition part too, for slightly more access to the sander.