Les Paul Body Template

[Insane]

Hi guys,

Although this is actually my first post here, I've been reading the forum for quite a while, but as my mom tought me "If you ain't got nothing nice to say, shut up" I'm building an LP style guitar, actually I'm trying to go nearer the PRS Tremonti body and headstock, but I believe the body is quite near isn't it? I've made a list of the problems I'll find like working on the wood, finishing, and so on, and I've pretty much got all of them covered through asking around and some research. There is only one problem I couldn't solve in order to start building it:

1 - Templates

I mean I searched the forum and I can see everyone has templates of the guitars they're building but I don't have the measurements, nor templates so I'm kinda lost. I'm from Portugal and I've never seen them for sale around here. Does any of you guys have a CAD template of a LP and would be willing to mail me it? Any other solution would be fully apreciated since I don't have acess to a LP in order to make a template from it... Thnx guys, best regards from Portugal

[Simo]

There's a couple of Les Paul plans in the Advanced Memeber Section, click here for more info.... http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.php?showtopic=2828

[Insane]

That looks sweet m8 thnx for the info... But I'm not getting Advanced Membership anytime soon . Thnx for the idea though, cheers

[Simo]

I think there's a free LP Junior plan on http://www.guitarbuild.com , don't know if that's any good for ya.

[Setch]

There's a free full size PDF of a '59 Les Paul in the MIMF library. If you register as a member (free!) you can download it. That said, the Tremonti body is significantly different in shape, so you may be better off acquiring as many photo's of the Tremonti as possible, and drawing out your own plans.

[Insane]

Thanks Setch. Yes I'm aware of that. What I'm planing on doing is making kind of an hybrid. What I love the most on the Tremonti are the body contours (or shapes - dunno, my english is sucking lol). So I'll just pick a base from an LP and then just move on and mod it... This is my first build ever, I want to have a solid base so there's as less I can screw up as I can

[Hotrock]

Right then, how to cheat at templates lesson 1:

Print out a photo of your guitar from straight on.

Print it at (lets say) 1:10 scale, so if the scale length is 25.5" the photo will have a scale length of 2.25" (in actual fact you should print the photo out as large as possible as work the scale out from that, but for the time being, lets use the 1:10 scale).

DRAW THE CENTRE LINE OF THE BODY ON THE PHOTO.

On a piece of tracing paper, draw a grid of thin lines at (lets say) 5mm spacing, clearly marking the centre line. Line up the centre line of the paper grid with the centre line on the photo and stick the paper to it.

On your wood, mark a grid with 50mm spacing (as the scale is 1:10), again with a CLEAR CENTRE LINE.

At each point where the body crosses the grids on the photo, put that information on the grid on the wood and hey presto, You’ll have an outline of the body exactly 10 times the size as the photo.

Kaj