RTA Posted October 9, 2004 Report Share Posted October 9, 2004 ive got a epiphone les paul special, and i was wondering if its possible to carve it out and creat a nice looking semi-hollow body guitar, because im trying to customize it until it is completely original. first of all i want to know if anyone has everyone done something similar secondly i want to know the difficulty level of it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PerryL Posted October 9, 2004 Report Share Posted October 9, 2004 Sounds like a large task to me. If It were me, Remove all the hardware then I'd start by slicing the top off altogther. Don't change anything but the top, by just sanding it down by about a 1/4 inch, route out any wood inside that isn't nessesary, then find myself a nice maple top to put on. Glue it down, then With a flush cutting router bit, run it around the outside edge and neck pocket. Next you'd need to plan where you want you're pickups and if it's rear routed for the controls, it's piece of cake to hook up your pickups. Route for your pickups then drill any control locations you wanna add then it's time Put a finish on the top. if this were my first project, I'd stick to a nice easy wipe on poly, Fine sand it to 600 grit and polish. Mount all your hardware again and you should be ready to go. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skibum5545 Posted October 9, 2004 Report Share Posted October 9, 2004 Hmm... seems to me I'd either slice/ sand off 1/4" from the back so you don't have to re-carve the top, then complete Perry's instructions. If you want to carve off the top, you could ad a killer flame or quilt top to it and re-carve that. Otherwise, if you bandsawed the back off, you could buy a nice slice of mahogany for the back; a thin piece of nice ribbon-grained mahogany would look magnificent! Or how about this: unglue the neck, cut the top off just below the edge of the top (maple, I assume?), sand excess mahogany off the back, and then either take the current back, chamber it, and reattach the top, or just buy a new slab of mahogany for the back! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluespresence Posted October 9, 2004 Report Share Posted October 9, 2004 Epi LP Specials are laminated alder/mahogany so I would suggest buying a nice hunk of whatever wood you want and making a body the way you envision (hollowed, chambered, carved top, whatever!) and bolting on all of the hardware from the original body. It would be a nice project and you have the original body at you disposal for dimensions, etc. When you're done you can sell the original body and recoup some of your costs......The bonus with this plan is you can still play your guitar while you're working on the new body Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mushy the shroom Posted October 9, 2004 Report Share Posted October 9, 2004 The top would be a lot harder to cut off, but like Dan said, you could later add a veneer or thin strip of maple. Fun stuff! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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