Gretsch Inspired Carved Top.

[guitarnut]

I've been on a Strat kick for the last few months and it's time for something different. This is a build I started in Oct last year. The posta are being copied from another site so my references of time passage, work schedules and holidays is meaningless at this point...I didn't feel like editing it all out.

It's inspired by the Gretsch Duo Jet and is made of Honduras mahogany with a carved flame maple top and w/b/w binding. The set neck is Honduras mahogany with Peruvian rosewood board and overlay with white binding.

I did a quick mock up. I just feel like it needs to be orange. I don't currently own an orange guitar and it is, after all, the hallmark of Gretsch. My attempt at highlighting the carve didn't come out too well but it's a mock up, right?

I have this slab of mahogany that I've been saving for something special. I think this qualifies. It's currently 13.125" wide and 3.5" thick with rough edges. Not quite wide enough for a Jet but plenty thick for resaw and bookmatching the back set. If I'm careful and rip it with a narrow resaw blade, I can get the Jet and 3 other BM 1.5" thick blanks.

As luck would have it, only one of the tops I have glued up is wide enough. It's flamey, but it's .750" thick and not bookmatched. So, I'm going to cut into another little jewel I've been saving...might as well go all in. It's 9.250" wide by 2.500" thick. I'll have plenty left after the top.

I'll cut a .500" bookmatch set. My plan being to leave the bridge flat at .500" and carve down the edges to .250" all around.

[guitarnut]

Thinking ahead on this one, I decided to take a look at the chambering.

This pic of the Gretsch chanbering is all I have to go on..

I loaded it up in Photoshop along with the Duo Jet PDF and sized it to fit. I had to do some serious perspective correction to get it to fit but it's real close...close enough for me anyway.

Then I loaded it up in Illustrator to make sure it was done to scale. No problems there. The two pics look pretty much the same.

Then, I just traced it out, turned off the guitar layer and visually balanced everything out. I also tweaked some points to the center line since the pic is not staright on to the camera.

[guitarnut]

Here's our victim. On the surface this billet looks like a fine piece of maple. But there are a few thing that trouble me about it. It has great flame on one edge and if I were doing faux binding I would want this on the outside of my bookmatch. But since I'm using plastic binding on this build, I want make sure I have the best possible bookmatch and not worry about the edges.

The edge alos has some sapwood showing. This will be significantly brighter than the rest of the maple. I have to cut 2.50" off of the billet so I can resaw it. My saw will take 6.75" max. I'm going to gamble and cut away the flamey edge with sapwood.

The finished billet, ready for resaw. I'm happy so far.

I mark the edge so I can line the pieces back up later.

The check the piece under the guides and square up the table to the blade.

[bob123]

That is a NICE hunk of wood!!! How much did that freakin cost? O.o

[guitarnut]

After the first resaw, some of the white wood is still there. I placed the bookmatch backwards here to show it. This would be down the center of the guitar...not good.

After a clean up pass thru the planer, and the bookmatch laid out properly, I can see the gamble paid off. The white wood on the edges will cut away.

After resawing the second half, I cleaned them up in the planer and laid out the template. All good.

After taking them just a touch over .500", I glued it up. It's damp here from glue clean up. It's gonna be a pretty one.

[guitarnut]

I wrestled this monster up onto the bench and blocked it up so I could clamps under it. It's far too heavy to feed thru the band saw so I have to cut it to length first. After marking my cut line, I clamped a straight edge 1" from the line...distance between my saw blade and the edge of the saw's fence.

In about 1/2" passes, I cut the line to the extent the saw would go.

Then I braced the slab on it's side and clamped it to the table with both sides of the joint supported and finished the cut with a hand saw...good old fashioned mucsle power. It only took a few minutes of steady cutting. Had it been anything but mahogany, I would have cut the second side with the circ saw.

[guitarnut]

My band saw table isn't wide enough to cut the 6.750" that I need so I had to screw some supports to the table and move the fence onto them. Fortunately I had countersunk holes from when I used the table as a router table.

That lead to this...

...which lead to these...

...which lead to this...

...which gave me these after thicknessing to a shade over 1.500".

One more pass on the jointer and ready to glue up.

[guitarnut]

I have the body out of the clamps and ready to profile. I went thru the usual steps...

Traced it out.

Rough cut it on the band saw.

Sanded it to the line on the ROSS..

Sanded both sides with 80 grit to clean up the glue joint and level out a bit of planer snipe. And I blocked out the edges to get rid of any waves from the ROSS.

Then I used the body as a template to start the template for the chambers.

[guitarnut]

Made a little marking gauge to get an even spacing around the edge.

Then I set up the Shopsmith in drill press mode. I love this machine! I can drop everything done and sit on a comfy stool while I work.

I seem to be developing some wood allergies so I'm being very cautious with dust collection these days...always have been with MDF.

All hogged out with a Forstner bit.

And cleaned up on the ROSS.

[guitarnut]

Here are the plans for my approach on the neck, scale and PU position.

They also show the body outline and chambering pattern.

[guitarnut]

I started this morning with the neck blanks. Here are two pieces of Honduran mahogany. They're almost 1" thick. I ran them thru the planer just to clean them up.

They're wide enough that I'll get four blanks total. And they're long enough that I can cut 8" or so off the ends for heel blocks. After ripping them, I cut the blocks on the chop saw.

Then after running one side and one edge over the jointer, I took the blank down to .750". I left the blocks at .925". My total thickness at the heel will be 1.625".

Here's one of them in the scarf joint jig. Made a note to myself about marking them.

And then there were 3. One of the blanks had some nasty worm holes that opened up during planing. I'll use it in the future for heel blocks.

[guitarnut]

I glued up the heel blocks but didn't take any pics. Nothing special there.

This shows the setup I use for gluing the scarf joints. I clamp the black edge down on the bench...

Clamp a stop on the joint end, set the joint length and tighten the clamp. This keeps the joint from separating when I apply clamp pressure to the scarf. Add glues, cauls and c-clamps.

Joint? What joint? Where? Oh, there's a flash back. :twisted:

Then, while the necks are setting up, I moved on to the body chambers. I slotted the template according to the updated chambering drawing I did. Then screwed it in place.

I took 2 shallow passes around the template, then decided I wanted to try hogging out the bulk of the wood with a Forstner bit. It worked. Not any faster than just routing it out but I guess it saves some strain on the router...not that you need to.

Imade a few more shallow passes until I hit the bottom of the bit cuts. Then I had to change to a more aggressive router bit. I didn't see any need in taking the wire path any deeper so I blocked it with some maple scrap.

I made a quick temp plate for my small Makita router. I gives full support all the way across the chamber. The stock plate fell off the edges.

It worked great. Very stable throughout the whole route.

Last thing I did was rough cut the top. Maybe, I'll have time this evening to get it glued up for morning trimming.

[guitarnut]

Most of the carve is obvious but I'm still unsure of how the neck and carve come together. I've seen a few pics of the fretboard extension...if you want to call it that...it's more of a negative ramp up away from the top.

So, I've come up with two scenarios for the carve.

One that maintains the bell shape as it slopes toward the neck pocket....

And one that maintains a flatter top as it slopes from the bridge down to the neck pocket.

I've also been looking at the current tenon design. As it is, the truss rod will be partially set in the tenon. My plan for cutting the tenon, not having a CNC mill, was to cut free the section of wood in the tenon area, narrow it down, angle the bottom, and glue it back in place. With the thin reveal, I was planning to glue up the fretboard for extra support, but that would mean the truss rod would in the way of the cut. Another option would be to chisel out what I don't need but all of the surrounding areas are finished edges. I doubt my chisel skills would prove useful there.

So, I'm toying with the idea of a hybrid tenon. It would have the mass and length of the the Gretsch design, and the simplicity of the PRS design. The one thing very different from a PRS tenon is there would be no tongue under the neck PU route. With the length of the tenon and neck pocket, it's not needed.

[guitarnut]

]Clampzilla!!!

The top is out of the clamps. I'm going to let it set up for a few more hours before I work it.

So, on to the neck. Here's the blank all glued up and the side trued up on the jointer.

The heel is within .011" of the .625" I wanted.

Then I marked out the heel...end of the fretboard, start and stop of the heel and the .125" reveal above the guitar top. As I was laying all of this out, I started second guessing my design...se latest drawing above. So, some of these pics, like this one, are a bit off track but they lead to the final design.

[guitarnut]

Then after slotting a rosewood fretboard blank, I set up my tapering jig. I tapered it to width minus the binding that will be added later.

I keep a strip of 80 grit on the jig so I can dress the sides and tweak the board to final width.

Then I flipped the taper jig over and use it's fence to route the truss rod channel.

I decided to add a rosewood filler strip. I haven't done this in the past but I see more and more builders...mostly of acoustics...who do this. I guess it's far more critical on acoustics that the truss rod not rattle or resonate with sympathetic vibration.

Then I trimmed it flush with a hand plane and scraper. There's probably only .0625" left but it's enough to lock down the rod once the fretboard is in place.

Then I lined up the fretboard and glued it down.

[guitarnut]

While the fretboard is setting up, I got back to the body. I gave it one more pass on the ROSS to smooth it out before the binding channel was routed.

In this shot the binding channel is almost done. I just have the last pass on one side to do. I took the channel about 1/32" into the mahogany to ensure I have the entire joint covered with the binding and it will give me just a bit more of a carve on top.

Binding channel all finished up.

Using the binding as a guide, I marked the edge in several places so when I tier the top with the saw dust generator, I'll have a good visual guide for setting the maximum carve depth.

[guitarnut]

I few more details worked out. I decided to make use of the bits, bearings, bindings and inlays I have on hand,,,a fair amount after usually buying the price break quantities.

So, that included white and black bindings at .090", .060" and .040", plus .060" and .090" bearings for the binding bit and lots of black and pearl dots. After trying this and that I settled on pearl dots...I'll leave the edge inlaid markers to Mac and Glenn on their Gretsch builds.

The neck and headstock will get .040" white binding...just taped in place for this pic.

And the body will get a .040" black inside with a .060" white on the outside in a .090" channel. This will give me .010" or so to scrape them flush. EDIT: I eventually changed this to w/b/w.

[guitarnut]

I made a little bit of progress last night...not quite as much as I had on my somewhat ambitious list.

I put a 12° radius on the fretboard with 80 grit and a radius block. Then using a fret saw with a depth stop, I took the fret slots to final depth and gave them a radius that follows the top of the board. Then I sanded up to 800 grit to get a smooth, shiny surface.

I realized that I hadn't thinned out the headstock which is usually done earlier in the process, So, I had to punt.

Keeping the face of the headstock flat against a fence wasn't going to happen since the fretboard was already in place. So, I taped a flat block to the headstock, tucking it tight against the end of the fretboard.

This gives me a flat surface to run through the saw and takes the fretboard out of the equation.

The cut was easy and straight.

I finished it of with a pull cut saw being very careful not to over cut into the remaining headstock back.

Then, after cutting it to rough size, I glued up the headstock veneer.

[guitarnut]

Some of the steps may seem a bit backwards but bear with me. It should make sense in the end.

I unclamped the HS veneer this morning. Looks good so far.

The next step in this build was to get the binding on the fretboard. Since the bottom of the binding will be supported by the neck, I want to trim everything after it's installed.

To get good clamping pressure at this angle would be tough with binding tape, so I used small ringshank nails...those little jewels bite and stay put.

When the binding had set up for an hour or so, I rough cut the neck profile. For you other Gretsch builders, I have an updated headstock drawing that I'll send your way.

While the binding was still unscraped, I ran the router around the edge of the neck. The binding is tall enough that the router clears the fretboard giving me a flat surface to run the baseplate on.

I set the bit so it left just a shave of wood below the binding. This ensured that the cutter wouldn't touch the plastic.

After a few minutes with 120 and a small sanding block everything leveled out. The rest is just carving at this point.

[guitarnut]

I decide to go ahead and flush trim the rest of the tenon with the router to ensure it would have straight sides.

So, while I thought about it, I flush trimmed the rest of the neck and did some clean up work on the ROSS.

[guitarnut]

I moved on to something I enjoy very much...carving. Nothing special here just roughed out with a gouge, cleaned up with a rasp and filed & sanded to shape.

Then I set the thickness at the nut and heel and rough carved it with an Ibex plane.

Sanded to 120 grit. I still have some final shaping to do but it's close.

I'm in a happy place again.

[guitarnut]

Frets installed. All that's left on them is a level/crown and dress the ends.

I've been doing the chicken or the egg thing on the neck/pocket for about a week now. Do I cut the pocket first? Trim the tenon first? Maybe carve the top, cut the pocket then trim the tenon. It started to become spiraling thoughts so I had to jump in.

I figured a neck pocket template would be in order so I started there. Simple process using straight edges around the neck to mark the template, route it out, done. Note that I made the template full length of the tenon even though it will be trimmed back. It was just easier than working under a fretboard extension.

I knew the neck tenon was going to be trimmed one way or the other so that was next.

I marked lines from the 16th fret down each side of the tenon and connected them across the bottom. Then went forward 2.750" as I laid out in the plan. I set the reveal between the top and fretboard at just over .125". Then connected the dots with a fret saw. The cut off will be used to shim the pocket template during routing.

It fits nicely. I'm thinking I'll angle the neck pocket instead of the tenon...that way, but for a little clean up on the end of the tenon, I'm done with the neck! We'll see. I may change my mind later.

[guitarnut]

Getting back to the body. I set up a router sled to cut the ski slope. This time around, instead of angling the body on the table, I angled the rails. I didn't get the reach that I did the other way around so I'll have to finish up the slope by hand plane. Currently, it starts about half way between the PUs. But, I'll take care of that after I rough in the carve.

Cut to just above the binding channel at the end of the body.

After some clean up with a block plane. This sets a flat plane for the next step...the neck pocket.

I used calipers to set a mark for the back of the pocket. My neck tenon is 2.750" and the binding channel is .100"...so, to measure from the edge of the channel, I set the caliper at 2.650".

I measured and found the PU route locations so I could screw the template flat to the ski slope. I started with the screw closest to the neck. This sets the template flat on the slope. Then I set a small scrap of wood under the template for support and screwed down the back of the template.

I need a longer router bit so I'll have to wait on actually routing the pocket. Hopefully I'll get it done this evening.

[guitarnut]

After spending the day spraying my Strat builds, I had a little time to work on this one. I checked around for a longer bit that would reach the depth of the pocket but I wasn't in the market for a $50 router bit. It's always good to buy the right tool, it's not always in the budget.

So, I decided to make a thinner template to get the reach out of my current bit inventory. I found an old Tele neck pocket template that I screwed up years ago...I never throw this stuff out. It will be repurposed at some point.

My goal was to make a template that was slightly wider all the way around the current pocket route. The template is going to serve as support for the router and the pocket route will be the "routing template".

I used the thicker template as a routing guide, then widened the opening with a rasp. The alder block on bottom is just to give me some clearance and sandwich everything together.

Here it is screwed in place with the same holes as the thicker template..

And after a few passes with the router and squaring off the corners with a chisel.

It's a nice, snug fit and I have plenty of overhang for carving. The top will come down a bit more during the carve so I'll have to bring the tenon down as well. I'll bring it down enough that the fretboard extension is just kissing the top. I'll do this on a flat sanding block, last thing before gluing it in. The extra meat on the tenon will also let me adjust the angle if needed.

[guitarnut]

I set up the SDG last night so I could do the pre-carve this morning. It went pretty smoothly. I don't use that thing enough to have a good technique with it so it's like learning all over again each time. I'll get started on the carve this week.