JimF

We now have level frets! Just need to re-crown them now. I'm not going to lie, this hasn't been my favourite part of the process. names with the letter z

Great info thanks!

Aaaaand we have frets! Ebony is a nightmare to work with. Ended up using a triangular needle file and putting a chamfer on the top of the slot. Everything else went pretty good! Found is easier to work one side to another, rather than left-right-middle. I think I was fighting the barbs of the fret tangs, trying to make them go sideways to counteract their radius. All sorted now!

Ssssshhhh nobody is supposed to notice that dot! But yes its winding the cock off me lol. That's great advice thank you. I'll try that!

As per the title, slow progress, but progress nonetheless. I've made a point with this project that whenever I start getting impatient or slightly frustrated, or tired, I stop. This is when I make mistakes (learned this the hard way from knifemaking). As a result of this its meant that I've been literally weeks without doing anything. A new job in October hasn't helped either. BUT its starting to look even more like a guitar, and I'm over the moon. I was never sure about the padauk in the neck since switching to a walnut body but now its oxidised more to a rich brown rather than a disco orange I'm falling in love with it. Very pleased with myself haha! Now for pics!

Thanks! that had crossed my mind but on the practice body I ended up running too close and nicking the body in several places so was playing it safe.

Pictures are self explanatory really: I tackled the neck, added the truss rod, fretboard and glued all together, flush trimmed it to suit the neck, then made a start on the body. Rough cut to shape (in the end I decided to go for Side B, but inverted), did a few passes with the router then stopped for the night. The next day my Dad was round, and he is Mr Precision (time served engineer) so got him to assist with the inlays, hence why the body is stopped mid progress! The fretboard inlays have a dab of superglue, and the side markers are held in by optimism and wishful thinking. Pics!

Thanks! I'm sure to go super careful with this body and also avoid having any highly figured bits near the edges. I'll probably shelve this body until I end up with a piece to add to it, or a spare neck!

Just to clarify, the poplar blank above will be going in the bin, its only approx 30mm thick, and not got a great surface finish. I'll just use it for routing practice (cavities etc), the walnut is a full body blank and will be cut & routed shortly.

More progress. As I'm extremely pleased with the walnut blank I have, and don't want to have to do any more thicknessing, problem solving etc, I've decided to do a practice body to make sure I'm fully comfortable with routing this before I attack the walnut. Pretty pleased with the results on the warped tulip poplar blank! A few cheeky mock ups with the neck blank to remind me what it is I'm making I just need to decide which side of the blank to have as the face. A B I was leaning towards B, but now i'm thinking that A, whilst not having the lighter flash, will actually take on more character when oiled (from experience). I may even invert A so I get that lovely flamey section in the control area, but that knot may make routing the lower horn tricky...

Managed to get it salvaged!

Yep! Nail on head there. I didn’t want to take a full depth cut, but the nature of the bearing cutter and thickness of my template kind of forced my hand there.

Thanks! That's the plan. Not sure whether to fine tune it this weekend or wait until the neck is more complete (i.e. fretboard on and fretted). To be honest I don't think I can bear looking at it! I'll be sorting that shortly.

Recently routed the neck shape, truss rod channel, and rough cut the headstock. Pleased with the results and pleased with how my budget router is performing. A little off centre, but who's checking! Ended up buying another body blank, glued and planed to thickness, so all that needs to be done is routing. Went for black walnut and bought blind, was pleasantly surprised when it arrived. I think I'll end up using the side with the lighter flash, and use that at the bottom/bridge end of the guitar. The other side is relatively interesting, but the colouring between the two pieces is too different, and also the interesting swirls will end up being lost when the shape is cutout. Very pleased with this body blank, and I am planning to do an oil finish, no stain or anything. With this whole build, I've tried to remain philosophical about the whole thing: yes I've chosen some tricky woods for a first build BUT I have woodworking experience, as does my father, and he is a skilled engineering consultant. The philosophical approach helped me when the first body blank went wrong, as I just kept in mind that my goal was to make a guitar, NOT to make a guitar with those particular pieces of wood; and anything wrong that happens is part of the learning curve, and part of my journey towards reaching the goal of finishing the project. If at one point we have some disasterous event, then that was always going to happen, and its a learning opportunity. Which brings me neatly onto my next set of photos, entitled "Tearout Tuesday": It can be safely said that I don't like Padauk as a wood to work with. It seems to be unpredictable whereas my experience with the Wenge is that it is hard hard hard hard, it seems consistent. This Padauk will cut beautifully, and then have massive tearout. I'm not making a full tribute Blackmachine replica guitar so modifying the headstock shape slightly was always on the cards as the piece I scarfed onto the neck wasn't long enough. This just means it will take longer. I'm not discouraged, just a little frustrated. Most likely its occurred with interlocking grain and on radiuses where I perhaps should have gone in the opposite direction. Like I said, its all a learning experienced.