jishnudg Posted June 1, 2014 Report Share Posted June 1, 2014 Hey! Just thought I'd put in an informal introduction - - I've been playing for a while now, always wanted to make my own guitar, and have been saving up for that...this year I finally decided to stop procrastinating and dive headfirst into this project - - Found this amazing site, and the quality of work is really breathtaking! Of course I'm starting completely from scratch, so there's a long way to go, but I want to make sure I do everything perfectly; have waited a long time for this so no way I'll rush this build - - - I guess I'll have a lot of questions along the way and pick everyone's brains here, and apologies for that in advance Here's a sketch of what I'm planning to do... https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwMVia471c4SS2lDZHk4YTFjaFk/edit?usp=sharing basically a mix of all the guitars I've fallen in love with over the years...I guess the first bit of advice I'll get is to start with something basic,like a stratocaster build - - and although I agree with that in principle, this is probably the only build I'll be doing, atleast within the next few years (day job, other limitations), so I really want it to be something special. So how does one go about making something like this? I guess I should talk a little bit about the ideas I've been having about this guitar to give it a bit more clarity.. - its an 8 string electric and a 6 string bass, double neck - I'd love to make them both headless, but I've never seen a pack of double ball end strings where I stay (New Delhi, India) and it might be an inconvenience.however, if there are any really innovative solutions to this (seen some amazing creative use of steinberger tuners on Klien-esque guitars to make them headless...on this site called "Building The Ergonomic Guitar") I'd love to try them out - The body shape is half Klien, half Strandberg - - just trying to marry the lovely armrest of the Klien with the lower half of the Strandberg. - In terms of wood, I'm open to all suggestions - - -New Delhi has a really extreme, fluctuating climate, and I just want wood that is very resistant to warp, and has really good sustain, and hopefully not too heavy. There are some local woods here that luthiers have used to make excellent instruments, including Indian Cedar, Indian Rosewood, Indian Laurel, even Mango (!) wood. I've also heard of tactics like getting old,seasoned wood out of demolished buildings etc, has anyone here tried that? - What can I do to make the wood I use more stable...are there any ways to treat it prior to the build? - I have access to a CNC machine (a friends) so will use it if this is suggested to be a better method...I have some experience with CAD/CAM so the software shouldn't be an issue. - A neck through (rather,two necks through) would be nice, right? - Carbon fiber? Is there any way this can be attempted? Know a guy who works at one of those car modification places, so may be able to attempt it, if I know what I'm doing - Want to mount a few circuits of my own in the electronics , a bandpass filter, maybe an onboard preamp, simple things like that. Have done these on other peoples instruments so this shouldn't be an issue.. - so many more questions.... Basically I'm scared to death of messing up during the build process, and want to go through this step by step. I really hope all the amazing luthiers and hobbyists here can help point me in the right direction Thanks, all, Regards, J. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProjectGuitar.com Posted June 2, 2014 Report Share Posted June 2, 2014 Hi, and welcome onboard! This is a relatively new section so less members frequent it than others in case you wondered why it was so quiet. An ambitious project. I think that for woods that are resistant to movement, you might want to investigate "baked Maple", sometimes called "toasted Maple" or in non-guitar marketing parlance, "thermotreated wood". Essentially I think that the wood is baked above its combustion point in a non-oxygenated kiln. This alters the wood cells themselves so that they no longer retain moisture from the local environment. If you need a reference on whether it is good or not, Guthrie Govan uses it exclusively in his guitar necks because he travels around the world so much. Alternatively you can laminate the neck(s) from stiffer woods and orient the grain strategically to minimise potential for movement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jishnudg Posted June 10, 2014 Author Report Share Posted June 10, 2014 Thanks! I'll definitely look up thermotreated wood - - - I'm still far off from making it, of course, drafting it right now with some 2D CAD software...so just have some basic doubts in that area.. 1. What should the thickness of this guitar be? (considering its an 8 string bass/guitar double neck) Rather, how thin can I go...? 2. How does on calculate string spacing for a bass? Theres a really nifty tool for this in the downloads section, for guitar, but how can I adapt this to bass? 3. Does scale length mean the distance from the nut to the centreline of the bridge, or the edge of the bridge,or...? having some trouble drafting the nut and the bridge ends...not really sure what I'll go for. What do the folks here use when it comes to 8 string headless bridges (almost sure I'll go headless on this one - - seems to be too heavy to have a headstock...) and nut ? I'm pretty sure double ball end strings are not an option for me,so.... 4.I'm planning to draw this out as accurately as possible,then try to CNC as much as I can - - is this a good strategy,or am I expecting too much? 5. Seen some wonderful graphite neck instruments here...what's a good place to source these necks from? Sorry for the late reply - - jobs been rather demanding lately.. Thanks again! J. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RestorationAD Posted June 11, 2014 Report Share Posted June 11, 2014 Guitar thickness is dependent on the parts. Using a hipshot bridge and really shallow pickups one can get a guitar pretty thin. Building your own pickups you can get it even thinner since you can control the depth.In general I find that going thinner than 31mm is hard to manage. 34mm is much more forgiving for hardware and such.On any guitar that has the same scale for all strings the rule of thumb is that the smallest string sets the scale. Usually I figure out the fullest extension of the high E string saddle and use that contact point as my starting point. You know that as the string gauge increases that the scale length is going to get longer so it is pretty safe to go this route.For multiscale guitars I use the same theory but on each individual string.Hipshot is working on an 8 string headless system. If you are in EU it would should be easy to contact ETS or ABM as they have single tuning bridges available.In general (non custom options) string spacing on a Bass is usually a reflection of the bridge you are using and how many strings you have. A 4 string P Bass usually has a 19mm string spacing while most 5 strings move to 18mm and most 6 strings move to 17mm. This is really a playing style preference type of thing. Guys that do a lot of slap popping tend to prefer larger spacings...Hipshot has PDFs of all there bass bridges and the different spacing they offer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prostheta Posted June 11, 2014 Report Share Posted June 11, 2014 Additionally, our own SwedishLuthier uploaded a crapload of CAD plans for various ABM components to the Downloads section. Very useful for configuring a specific build. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jishnudg Posted June 25, 2014 Author Report Share Posted June 25, 2014 Thank you, Prostheta and RestorationAD - - In the meantime I've been taking classes in woodworking - - no matter how much I CNC, I'm sure I'll need high competency in manual woodworking to pull this off. I had a question about hardware...has anyone on this forum tried to machine their own bridges or tuners...? I've seen an interesting headless bridge/tuner design that someone posted on a site called buildingtheergonomicguitar - - is this an isolated case or do many professional luthiers machine their own hardware? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SwedishLuthier Posted June 25, 2014 Report Share Posted June 25, 2014 Ola Strandberg, a fellow Swede and the master mind behind "building the ergonomic guitar" and Strandberg Guitars, has the integrated single string tuner/bridge he designed and now manufactures up for sale here: http://guitarworks.thestrandbergs.com/products/purchase-page/ As I'm about to build a custom order headless 8-string based on Ola's hardware I have already completed CAD plans for those and I'm about to post those too, any day now... These tuners/bridges take standard strings. However the maximum string gauge is .080 and I'm not sure that the bigger end ball of bass strings will fit. However it is possible to get custom ordered bass strings with guitar ball ends and tapered end/beginnings that might work. In the end; to much effort if you ask me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jishnudg Posted June 27, 2014 Author Report Share Posted June 27, 2014 Thanks! Strandbergs stuff is insane So I made some progress in terms of finding some good local thermotreated Ash - - however it's only available in a 22mm thickness - - is it a good idea to glue two 22mm blanks together? Also, my recent woodworking classes have given me some amount of confidence to try and make a fanned fret neck - - but I'm really not sure what the mathematics would be - - I have a fret distance calculator spreadsheet, can I use that, input different scale lengths and plot a fretboard accordingly? Or should I input a minimum and maximum scale length and work from there? On a side note, has anyone tried using Ukelele tuners on a guitar? they look suspiciously similar to Steinberger tuners... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prostheta Posted June 27, 2014 Report Share Posted June 27, 2014 I can't see why not. I presume that this is for the body? Thermotreated wood seems to take most advantage of being in the neck due to the environmental stability aspect. Not that big on Ash necks myself and I know a few people recommend against it. Seen it done more than once without specific complaint being made so it might be a case of "suck it and see". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jishnudg Posted June 27, 2014 Author Report Share Posted June 27, 2014 well... they also have thermotreated Itauba - - - has anyone used that? http://www.ecoastlumber.com/brazilian%20hardwood/itauba.htm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SwedishLuthier Posted June 28, 2014 Report Share Posted June 28, 2014 Ukulele tuners are often friction tuners without gears. Stay away fem those. Have a look at geared banjo tuners instead. However I'm not sure that they will be either cheeper of better than the Steinbergs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prostheta Posted June 28, 2014 Report Share Posted June 28, 2014 The use of planetary gearing in the Steinbergers is nothing short of amazing. Despite the weight (from what I recall, they are heavy) they are a different ball game to worm-geared tuners. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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