IceKelly build

[foreright]

Now I’m brainstorming as if this were my build, but what I’d you ended the fretboard at an angle, and just float it over the end of the neck?

Yes that would be good and would certainly look better with the angled pickup also however the fingerboard blank is not quite long enough to allow it unless I start playing around with the length of the neck. That would break my self imposed rule as to not making major design changes after I started cutting - learnt that the hard way!

 

[foreright]

Decided to go with the angled fretboard end and go to 27 frets instead of 29. Anyway - glued the fretboard last night and trimmed the edges today and started on the fingerboard to headstock transition - my first time attempting this with an angle like this - I think it kinda works although I might hit it with the normal 2" sanding drum instead of the 2.5" that I used to make the radius a little tighter. I do need to fill / redrill one of the tuner holes which is a little annoying but pretty please with it so far

 

[Omzig]

Nice love the mash up of styles, Did you put any reinforcement rods in the neck?

i had got a Flat top Ash loomis kelly all planed in CAD for the start of this new year myself but well as they say the best laid plans

 

[foreright]

Nice love the mash up of styles, Did you put any reinforcement rods in the neck?

i had got a Flat top Ash loomis kelly all planed in CAD for the start of this new year myself but well as they say the best laid plans

Yep there’s a LOT of carbon in the neck - I tend to like them with very little / no relief so I’m hoping that with pretty light strings it will be sufficient

 

[EarlWellington]

I thought it looked familiar. Waghorn used a similar headstock with his 8 string kelly build.

Searls guitars from Australia had a similar shape headstock as well

 

[foreright]

Did a little bit of experimenting with inlay dots today - these are 4mm OD brass tubes filled with glow powder and CA glue. Would go with 3mm tubes for side dots if I try this for real. The glow powder is really bright at first but doesn’t last as long as luminlay unfortunately - it is a hell of a lot cheaper though!

pics are of a purple heart offcut. Dots are sanded to 120 so pretty rough

 

[foreright]

Managed to get the fingerboard slotted and bound. Acetone is magic stuff

Side dots tomorrow - tried out some more luminous dots today but not satisfied with it. Will likely go with blue or similar which should be a decent contrast to the white binding.

 

[Hollowway]

Fuck you, man. That build is beautiful, and I’m jealous of your design AND craftsmanship skills.

But seriously, that FB with the bit of heartwood is glorious!

 

[foreright]

Little bit of progress today - side dots installed and sanded flush and body shape routed out. Had a little bit of tear out on the lower horn so had to make the point a little rounder but I’m pleased so far

The side dots especially are pretty cool - ended up using a sparkly purple-red-blue mica powder which doesn’t really seem to come out in photos. The stuff gets absolutely *everywhere* though. I made the mistake of touching my face with some on my hands and now have sparkly makeup on which is going to look great on the video conf call I have with work in 20 mins.

 

[foreright]

Looks a bit like a guitar now

 

[foreright]

Started neck shaping today - got a very rough carve going. Unfortunately kid duties stopped me finishing it today haha.

 

[KR250]

Looks great! Totally understand the kid duties, but that's still good progress. I'm lucky to get 4 hours a week for building until maybe I can start putting the kid to work on less critical tasks.

 

[foreright]

Little bit of progress - twins are at nursery and eldest at school so a bit of free time between meetings

So we have frets installed and body has a radius on the back. Also managed to route out the pocket for the jack. Test fitted the tuners too.

Decided to go with no controls except a kill switch. I rarely use volume or tone anyway and have never had a guitar with a kill switch. Built some custom arcade sticks for Street Fighter back in the day and have some Sanwa buttons left over. It means drilling a 24mm hole in the top though.

 

[Taylor]

That ash is looking N I C E! You going with a natural finish? Be a shame to cover up that gorgeous grain.

 

[foreright]

That ash is looking N I C E! You going with a natural finish? Be a shame to cover up that gorgeous grain.

I'll definitely be going natural for the back and sides and either some kind of stain (black or blue probably) for the top or I was thinking about trying a ceruse type finish - never tried that before though!

 

[foreright]

Got some laser cut templates in the post this morning for cavities and a slanted pickup base. I have a cheap 7 string Wilkinson pickup that I thought I’d try slanting- seems to have worked pretty well albeit it wasn’t the easiest to get apart!

 

[foreright]

Got the pickup cavity and 90% of the rear cavity routed before my router conked out and stopped I’m hopeful it’s just motor brushes or something relatively cheap and easy to get to! Annoying as I still have to route the cavity cover and I don’t fancy trying it with the dremel.

Was experimenting with stain today as well. This is 3 coats of Royal Blue on a surface I just scraped smooth and then cleaned up slightly with 320 grit paper. The colour varies pretty drastically depending on angle and lighting. Quite a nice colour though.

 

[foreright]

Decided to start with some sanding whilst I'm waiting for my router to be repaired. I only have the control cavity to finish routing now and then all major carving / routing is finished.

I forgot how much I *hate* sanding Ash endgrain Anyone have any tips? I'm doing it by hand right now - might get some finer sleeves for my drill press drum sander to do the interior curves but holy crap - getting all the scratches out of the endgrain is a pain in the butt.

 

[foreright]

Finally got around to doing some more - router bit for binding channels arrived this morning. Note: for people in the U.K., the Wealdon small rebate bit (https://www.wealdentool.com/acatalog/Online_Catalogue_Small_Series_212.html) is *significantly* cheaper than the Stewmac or other options - produced a very clean cut too being a down-shear bit.

I’ve done the easy bits of the binding - not 100% sure how I’m going to approach the inside on the lower horn as it’s a very tight radius - I guess I’ll try breaking out the wife’s hair dryer to bend the plastic but hmm... is there some easy trick to this??

 

[Bodes]

CLEAN!!!

I sure hope it will end up playing as awesomely as it looks!
(I don't really like blue guitars, but I am willing to make an exception here )