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I Like Turtles

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  1. Hello all!!! Back from the dead!!! It has been six and a half years since I have done any work on this guitar, and about 11 years since I started it. At this pace I plan to be done by the time I am 70. Anyways, I finally have some better woodworking skills and enough money to buy necessities. Plus, I am not a total moron anymore, just a partial one. I decided to sort of reset this project because there were a lot of issues: 1. The fretboard was way too thin -- I was warned by many on here about that one 2. The frets were not seated in all the way 3. I hate hardtail style bridges 4. Everything was just... ugly and rough and quite poorly done. All that being said, I took off the fretboard using a clothes iron and some putty knives and the back of a thin flush cut saw. I then sharpened my handplane and got to work making things flat that were supposed to be flat. Particularly the top, neck-fretboard joint, and the back. Didn't have to take off much material, so it wasn't too bad. I am going to swap the hardtail bridge out for a recessed tune-o-matic. So to deal with the existing holes, I got some plug cutting bits from good old harbor freight and cut a few for the string ferrule holes in the back, and the bridge holes in the front. I bought some cool macassar ebony veneer that I plan on laminating to the top and back faces (excluding the carved edges). Starting to think that I may as well just fill the front holes with some epoxy instead of having to drill them out and plug them, since they will be covered up anyways. I don't see how that would be an issue according to my googling. I also roughed up the neck a little when I was removing the fretboard, and I'll probably fill that spot up with epoxy and wood dust as well. Here's a veneer shot. Looks like it matches the general color scheme here. Not sure yet if I'm going to bookmatch it or just tilt one sheet to fit the whole face. If I tilt it, it would either have a cool effect, or look like total crap. I'll mock it up before I do it. Also, have you guys seen this technique for laminating a veneer? Looks really easy. https://youtu.be/dysWUDX6PdE So anyways, I ordered a bunch of parts, a new pre-slotted fretboard from LMII (no zero fret this time because I'm a big boy), and a fret press attachment for my drill press so these new frets actually get seated. Hopefully I'm not breaking any forum rules with this hyperbump! This time I mean business. Thanks for reading.
  2. Long time no post. I have been working lately but not on my guitar. Did a few things today with it and over the past month. Now I'm just down to side dots, final sanding and shaping, finishing, and then a final setup. I have basically a week left before school soooo... Headstock veneer is on. I am making a truss rod cover right now that should be cool. The nut (really a string guide) is finished but I have no picture of that apparently. Rear route is basically done. I just need to chisel it a bit. Also drilled the output jack at an angle. Tricky stuff.
  3. I am using templates that I've made. I should have made an inner template though instead of trying to freehand it. Lesson learned. And I didn't even consider that about the dowels. Hopefully they don't move too much. Thanks for the tips. I love learning about this stuff. The back of the headstock is glued and cleaned up. I made a little volute with it.
  4. Thanks for the tips guys. I did the re-drill with a forstner and I'll be picking up a brad point when I redrill the holes. I'm glad I finally got a drill press. I ended up just ordering some macassar ebony veneer which should arrive next week. So the past few days I've been making templates and marking out where my control cavity and humbucker routes are gonna be. Humbucker route is finished. Ended up being 3/16" too deep because 10/16" + 13/16" does not equal 26/16". Small mistake aside, I am very happy with my second ever template route. Needs just a little cleaning up. My first ever template route was a little worse, but all in all not too bad. It's not at full depth yet and I can still fix it easily. The headstock is now sanded flush and is awaiting veneer for the new tuner holes. Another possibility is countersinking the tuners correctly this time and staining the countersinks so dark that the oak is invisible. But I will wait on the veneer to decide. I think I am getting better at this stuff . I'm also planning on building a 7-string v right after this is finished.
  5. Happy Father's Day everybody. Hope everybody enjoys it. Summer break is on and I'm back to work fixing my f-ups. Firstly, the headstock was too thick. I could have simply sanded down the headstock, but I figured it would be cool to countersink the tuners instead. STUPID! I didn't research much. I made the recesses too small in diameter. Plus half of them got screwed up because I was using a hand drill. Then turns out I made them too close together anyways. So I decided to plug em and then veneer the headstock. I think that will hide my mistakes nicely. You can see what I was trying to do... BAD. Wow that looks horrible. I am glad I can fix that. I bought a drill press yesterday and got to work. Four are done. I'm gonna let these dry before I do the others. Does anybody have any tips for veneering? Specifically making veneer without a bandsaw. I'm not sure if I wanna make my own veneer from one of the woods I'm already using or if I ought to just buy some black veneer.
  6. Tuner holes drilled! One is crooked. I may plug it and redrill it. But probably not haha. I installed my bridge! It turns out that the center line of the fretboard is not in line with the centerline of the body. So my bridge appears crooked according to the body. But it should be in line with the neck and that's what matters. I haven't strung it up yet, so I'm not sure if I'll need to recess the bridge or not yet. will find out soon. It is super close. I also put in the ferrules in the back, but no pictures of that. Those are not completely perfect, but they're not noticeably crooked and horrible. And they work!
  7. Duke can be my favorite thing again if this guitar doesn't play great. A few days ago I fretted the neck! I used a plastic tipped hammer from lowe's. Things turned out pretty good considering it was my first time. A few frets I had to pull and redo. There were four that I ended up using some CA glue to keep them in because the slot was a little too wide. I also had to use CA to fix a few chips. But things turned out alright. I also glued on an ear to the headstock and cut out the shape. Simple but I like it. I also dressed the fret ends with a file and sandpaper. It is very rough right now. I also carved the neck transition into the headstock. No volute on this one. Maybe next time. I got all my parts in and hope to play it tomorrow! I am so damn proud of this neck heel. I have never owned a non-clunky-necked guitar before. So excited to play this thing. Updates will be slow for a while. I am back in school but after this semester I may start a new build!
  8. I am loving the headless! Your work is so clean. So why do you hate zero frets?
  9. Heel is carved. I used a belt sander, orbital sander, rasps, and hand sanding. EDIT: I have also carved the neck. Belt sander and orbital sander again.
  10. Thanks Scott. I ended up going with 1 7/8". My fretboard is pretty thin. That's my biggest issue with this build. I have a hardtail bridge that's 5/16" tall. My fretboard is about 3/32". Factoring in fret height I am not yet sure if I'll need to recess the bridge yet or not. If I do, it'll only need to be a tiny bit. Ok so far today I've marked out the neck taper by drawing a straight line from the final width of the neck at the nut to the corner of my fretboard (which is already the width I need it to be). Then I used a sideways beltsander to take it down to the line. It took me about 15 minutes. I love this beltsander! I got so excited with the beltsander I did a rough carve of the neck. feels like a geetar!!!! Here's what I'm doing tonight! I'm hoping to finish the full neck tonight.
  11. Thanks guys. She weighs 8.6 pounds right now. I'm guessing after the rest of carving and routing and hardware it'll be around 7. It's a bit neck heavy right now. But I got this shape so I could straddle it on my right leg while playing. feels good so far. To carve I used a rasp to get the rough shape and then I actually used an orbital sander with an 80 grit pad and a little hand sanding. So I'm in between a 1.75" nut width and 1 7/8". Has anyone used 1 7/8" before?
  12. Thanks for the positive comments everybody. I planed both surfaces and sanded them flat. I think I probably just didn't do that job perfectly. Also maybe there wasn't enough clamping pressure, or it wasn't applied evenly. More clamps is always better. From the lumberyard the wood was very very rough and I did have it thicknessed, but the glue surfaces I did not. I only handplaned and sanded the gluing surfaces. So the past few days I finished most of the carving. The front face is done. The back has all the edges tapered, and now I just need to carve the neck joint. I probably won't do a belly cut. I also found out that my neck is not actually wide enough to fit the bridge I wanted, so I am going to drop back down to six strings. On the bright side, I will now be building a 7 string flying v this summer with a bolt on neck!!!!!!!!!! So this guitar will be getting a hipshot hardtail and locking tuners from dragonfire. Today I'm planning on sanding in the neck taper and carving the neck. I am going for a pretty wide string spacing at the nut. Wiped down with mineral spirits. There has been some fine-tuning since I took these pictures. The upper horn was a little weird in these pictures before I changed it.
  13. So the past few days I've been sanding a lot. The final overall shape is finished, and now I'm in the process of carving. I also decided on a hipshot hardtail bridge and hipshot tuners. I also ordered an EMG 707 for the bridge. No neck pup on this one. Honestly I don't think I'll need it enough to spend $100+ on something I'll hardly use. Here's just some block and hand sanding down to the lines I've drawn. I actually had to carve in the curve by hand on a part of the guitar because I lost the line I drew (and my dog ate my template). It turned out good though. wiped with mineral spirits you can see the pretty stuff I keep talking about. The little bump at the end of the wing is where I had to freehand the curve. Big chip! But it fits! Glue it! Rough carve with an old rasp is taking shape. Duke, destroyer of important templates.
  14. Here's another update! So I glued both wings onto the neck. It was a little difficult because over the years the lumber sat, it warped a little. The joints ended up pretty good though. I also recut the fret slots after radiusing the board. I am hoping the board will be fine. It's little thin at the edges. I then jigsawed the rough body shape and did some sanding of the front and back face. I don't have a drum sander, so getting the guitar into final shape will be done with a sideways beltsander, a rasp, and a lot of hand sanding. Almost looks like a guitar. Here's a somewhat bad closeup of the waterfall-y grain of the wings. I'm hoping it shows up nice after finishing. I'm planning on using the stewmac waterbase nitro with a matte finish.
  15. Dry run on gluing the first wing. The joint looks seamless after some handplaning and some block sanding. It was pretty out of whack after sitting for three years. I'm getting some glue and clamps tomorrow!
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