This was my first build. I have refinished several guitars in the past, but this is the first one where I built the body. I am a visual artist primarily, but I have always found satisfaction playing music, be it drums or guitar. Here is the story behind the Jazzmeister:
The shape is based on a Fender Jazzmaster- I just shortened the body down by 1/2". The body is solid mahogany salvaged from an old bed headboard; two 3/4" pieces were sandwiched together & glued, then cut on a bandsaw. It is finished with 8 coats of tung oil and the natural tones of the wood came through nicely. Amazing that the original antique headboard was made with solid 16" wide mahogany! The pickups were discovered in an old Univox strat copy- they turned out to be Seymour Duncans from 1985 and they sound clear and warm. The pickguard is made from a piece of perforated aluminum from an 1870 fanning mill (antique farming implement). The 3-way switch and tone/volume pots were salvaged from previous projects. I decided to go with a tune-o-matic bridge because I love the feel when my right hand rests on the bridge when picking. The neck is a generic strat neck 25.5" scale that I found on Kijiji- the radius looks like 12". I am happy to say that the whole thing has cost me less than $100 CAD, mostly because I had stuff laying around. It plays really nicely and sounds great. It was a satisfying experience that I plan on doing again sometime. Check out my artist website: http://stevenwhite.ca/site/
