Ibanez headstock shape ?

[ScottR]

13 minutes ago, Liquorice said:

By the way have you ever had to explain your compulsive behavior to yourself ? Like; I had to make these because they were looking at me.

Ummmm, yes.....from time to time.

SR

[Liquorice]

So, I was thinking again. Just thinking and not doing anything. About spool clamps that is.

I messed up one top with a bad glueline with too few clamps. There simply was not even enough pressure from clamps. Maybe It could have been easier to glue top and body together when they were still whole blanks ?! Then again rough shaping bodylines is easier with thinner pieces. How have you guys solved this simple task ?

I was thinking that spool clamps could give me more even pressure, and with my routing template on top It could be even better. But then again if there is thick plywood piece on top of guitar body, those screws in clamps would have to be super long. Are spool clamps strong enough to glue bodies evenly without any template bumpers ?

[curtisa]

3 hours ago, Liquorice said:

How have you guys solved this simple task ?

Clamps. And lots of them. No other way of doing it as a hobbyist IMHO.

You can spread the load a little by using cauls between the clamps and the body (ie, something large and flat to distribute the pressure being exerted by the clamps), but it won't reduce the clamping quota by a great deal.

Spool clamps I've never tried, but I suspect they will only help you at the extreme edges of the gluing surface. I'd imagine they only provide useful pressure within a centimetre or two from the edge of the body. Could be handy on the skinny parts of a body, such as a cutaway or the horns on a Strat-style shape, but you'll still need something with more squeeze for the bigger areas.

[ScottR]

I tried this after seeing @sdshirtman doing it. Worked quite well, but I agree you need pressure in the center areas as well.

SR

[Liquorice]

Ok thanks, maybe I´ll try spool clamps on horns and squeeze the rest of body with some kind of clamping cauls. I remember that those pieces really came super slippery when there was glue between them. Some kind of indexing pin system would be great also. We´ll see what happens.

I´m using my "shop time" now mainly on other building projects, such as a desktop for myself and other furniture. My favorite wood by far is birch and that my table is going to be made out of. Not the easiest to work with, but it´s so good looking in my eyes and pretty cheap in here too. I bought few pieces and few were own woods and best looking pieces I just had to reserve for other use (guitars).

Cutting it in two was a really exciting incident. It started to cup and squeeze table saw´s blade and wanted to jump off the table, That wood in my hands and saw blade inside it raised my heartbeat a little. But as a reward there was really nice tiger effect on those pieces.

 

[ScottR]

15 hours ago, Liquorice said:

I remember that those pieces really came super slippery when there was glue between them. Some kind of indexing pin system would be great also.

I like to locate where the pickup routes will be before gluing the top to the body and screw the pieces together there. Back the screws out, then spread the glue and screw them back together. No more sliding around while adding clamps. And later you'll route away the screw holes when you route out your pickup cavities.

You did find some very nice figure inside those boeards.

SR

[Liquorice]

15 hours ago, ScottR said:

I like to locate where the pickup routes will be before gluing the top to the body and screw the pieces together there. Back the screws out, then spread the glue and screw them back together. No more sliding around while adding clamps. And later you'll route away the screw holes when you route out your pickup cavities.

I definitely have to try that.

Next step in my building project would be neck and fretboard. I think it would be easier to glue neck and fretboard together if those blanks were as big as possible and after gluing cut them in shape. Then I thought that if I trim my necks in final width with a router, how big is the risk to damage fretboards sides ? Are fretboards sides normally prone to chipping easily ?

Second mystery to me is that router cuts rounded corners on cavities, then how to match that accurately with that same bit ? I could shape the heel to match routerbits radius with handtools, but was wondering about a router template of some sort. And while writing this I thought of an idea to screw a ballbearing into a plywood or plywood sandwich and then rout it to match that radius.

I would like to build all kind of templates out of mdf because it´s fast and easy, but there is not a single store selling that stuff in my city, can you imagine ?

Edited January 19, 2018 by Liquorice

[Liquorice]

Had a busy summer but now I´m back patching mistakes.

On 1/19/2018 at 8:00 AM, Liquorice said:

Then I thought that if I trim my necks in final width with a router, how big is the risk to damage fretboards sides ? Are fretboards sides normally prone to chipping easily ? 

Tried both methods, gluead a preshaped fretboard on the neck and trimmed full width blanks. Both worked fine, no notable chipping. Still there are risks for both methods I quess.

I´m really bad at taking pictures and it get´s even worse while working. Here is one of my current mistakes. Oh boy have I made a lot of mistakes while building. Trussrod I chose has a 9mm head and it sits in a 10mm wide cavity. I checked from pictures that locking nut has mounting hole spacing of 14mm. So 14mm > 10mm all good right, but now I have realised that screw holes will narrow that space down to zero. In other words locking nut screws will poke out the truss rod cavity. My locking nuts have through neck mounting. Another thing is that I will propably need longer screws for mounting the locking nut because the trussrod cavity is 11 mm deep and those screws are poking out max 10mm.

So the question would be is it all good if I just make a volute on the neck and put longer screws in the neck ? I dont like thin necks luckily and there are carbon rods all the way the neck to give some support.

[curtisa]

Is there anything stopping you substituting regular woodthread screws and mounting from the top, rather than using threaded bolts mounted from the rear? Original Floyd Rose Nuts, for example, usually ship with both types of screws to allow for mounting in either fashion.

[Liquorice]

1 hour ago, curtisa said:

Is there anything stopping you substituting regular woodthread screws and mounting from the top, rather than using threaded bolts mounted from the rear? Original Floyd Rose Nuts, for example, usually ship with both types of screws to allow for mounting in either fashion. 

I have gotoh parts, they come with either threads for the bolts and flat bottom or with countersink bottom for the wood screws and no threads. Those bolts would not interfere with the trussrod in anyway. Perhaps you could see those bolts if you look straight in to trussrod cavity, but they would not touch truss rod. I might have to take this one for the team and see what happens with bad decisions piling up. (Like I don´t already know)

There is also the possibility to put instead zero fret and regular nut on the locking nut shelf.

[Liquorice]

Has anyone used car wax on guitar parts, metal parts mainly ? To protect those nice golden parts from wear and swetty acid rain ? For example golden tuner buttons might show some wear particularly on edges and I think it looks horrible. Saddles and tremolo base plates can wear also particularly from the bass side. Ofcourse you´d have to use wax without any abrasive particles.

Next string change maybe I´ll give it a go.

[ScottR]

That sounds like a good idea. I use car wax on the lacquer finish to protect that, but have not tried it on the hardware.

SR

[Guitar Goomba]

13 hours ago, Liquorice said:

Has anyone used car wax on guitar parts, metal parts mainly ? To protect those nice golden parts from wear and swetty acid rain ? For example golden tuner buttons might show some wear particularly on edges and I think it looks horrible. Saddles and tremolo base plates can wear also particularly from the bass side. Ofcourse you´d have to use wax without any abrasive particles.

Next string change maybe I´ll give it a go.

I would go with a nano-ceramic coating instead of wax, it's harder, more durable, and lasts longer.  Here is a link to the Adams brand coating.  https://amzn.to/2Irw9MW

[Liquorice]

10 hours ago, Guitar Goomba said:

I would go with a nano-ceramic coating instead of wax, it's harder, more durable, and lasts longer.  Here is a link to the Adams brand coating.  https://amzn.to/2Irw9MW

Nice looking product, would last for a life time considering it´s meant to cover cars. Too pricey for my tastes (wallet) though.

[Guitar Goomba]

6 hours ago, Liquorice said:

Nice looking product, would last for a life time considering it´s meant to cover cars. Too pricey for my tastes (wallet) though.

True, but consider that you get enough to do two whole cars.  You might be able to find a small sample amount.

[Liquorice]

No string changes yet so no waxing on guitar parts.

I confirmed to myself that 7-string locking nut indeed has wider mounting hole spacing so there´s no problems at all with trussrod cavity. Has anyone tried to put threads in the wood itself ? Those mounting bolts are 4mm in diameter, what if I drill 3mm holes and use a thread cutting tool on the wood so the holes won´t poke out in trussrod cavity ? Is this idea doomed under any situation ?

[curtisa]

There isn't enough thread area to tap a thread into wood for a standard metal thread bolt. You might get the bolt in to the wood, but it will have no strength. In all likelihood the nut will pull out the first time you do a divebomb on the bar. You either need to use woodthread screws and attach from the front or use the bolts and secure the nut from behind, as Ibanez do.

[Liquorice]

15 hours ago, curtisa said:

There isn't enough thread area to tap a thread into wood for a standard metal thread bolt. You might get the bolt in to the wood, but it will have no strength. In all likelihood the nut will pull out the first time you do a divebomb on the bar. You either need to use woodthread screws and attach from the front or use the bolts and secure the nut from behind, as Ibanez do.

I was planning to install it in a normal way, with washers and countersunk holes for the bolt heads. What I meant was to try to install those bolts in a tight hole because of the wide trussrod head cavity.

I made a bunch of spool clamps, hope they will do a decent job. As always I made also this the hard way, I think it would be strong enough with a 6mm bolt and one sheet of thin plywood. These are 8 mm bolts with a plywood and birch wood discs.

[Liquorice]

I have one general woodworking question puzzling me. This time of year is quite humid and I have blanks that have been in cold garage. If I make tenons on those pieces and join them together Will there be any problems when I bring them inside? They are in same humidity level and will shrink same amount in same time, but still it made me think will it crack or show gaps when in dry indoor air? Grain orientaition Will be parallel.

[Liquorice]

I call this color "actual beetroot", anyone tried something similar with other than kitchen table or counter top? I let this dry on top of my jar of color so it picked up some extra moisture hence the round blotch.

[ScottR]

4 hours ago, Liquorice said:

I call this color "actual beetroot", anyone tried something similar with other than kitchen table or counter top? I let this dry on top of my jar of color so it picked up some extra moisture hence the round blotch.

 

Down at the bottom of this page is one I did. (pg 5)

SR

[Liquorice]

4 hours ago, ScottR said:

Down at the bottom of this page is one I did. (pg 5)

Oh yeah now I remember, I was surprised how light the color was on my piece. Yours seems a bit darker, mine was just the water from boiling some beetroots. Blueberries could be nice also? I might have actual guitar pics later this week

 

[ScottR]

Oh, yours was not only called actual beetroot, but was actually made from beetroot? I did not realize that. Mine is Transtint dye and had gone through several stages of dying and sanding back to get to that stage. That's why it is darker.

I remember mulberries staining like a bastard when I was a kid and prone to getting into mulberry chucking wars with my brothers. They might be a good source of color.

SR

[Liquorice]

12 hours ago, ScottR said:

Oh, yours was not only called actual beetroot, but was actually made from beetroot? I did not realize that. Mine is Transtint dye and had gone through several stages of dying and sanding back to get to that stage. That's why it is darker. 

Yes it´s all natural vegan dye, looks really dark on the kettle but surprisingly light on the wood. I quess like all dyes and stains do. It´s hard to sand back so small objects, I need bigger or flatter test piece.

12 hours ago, ScottR said:

I remember mulberries staining like a bastard when I was a kid and prone to getting into mulberry chucking wars with my brothers. They might be a good source of color.

We don´t have mulberries here at least that I know of. Lots of blueberries though. On the long run I have no idea if these kind of organic colors fade more or quicker than factory stuff.

[mistermikev]

On 1/16/2018 at 7:26 PM, ScottR said:

I tried this after seeing @sdshirtman doing it. Worked quite well, but I agree you need pressure in the center areas as well.

SR

i don't mean to derail but you can't just drop a pick like that and not expect a guy to be like "MORE PLEASE".  that looks really cool!  I hearby petition you to do a thread showing me more!