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"weight Loss" Idea


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There was a thread about lightening a Les Paul a few weeks back...

Personally, I don't like heavy guitars, and I really like hollow-bodies and semis.

I have a telecaster here that I'm planning on turning into a Thinline...but I don't want to cap it, if I don't have to...

So I was thinking...

Suppose I cut the wings off the guitar (I'd make the cut between the bridge and the control panel, for example, the other cut would be on the other side of the bridge, this way I leave the central column intact).

Then, if necessary I joint the pieces so they'll glue nicely back together.

Then, I route INSIDE the wing pieces, that is, not the top or the bottom but the innards --and the lower parts of the central column too.

Then I glue the pieces back together again. If I didn't tell you it was hollow, you wouldn't know by looking (although I'd probably add a sound hole anyway).

This would work for the guy's Les Paul too...I figure with the thin blade of a bandsaw, I'll lose just a little bit of the guitar, but not much and nothing that'll be too visible.

Sound feasible? Insane?

Edited by idch
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I guess you could do that to lighten up the body. Just remember that you will be taking the balance away from the guitar. The result could be a neck heavy instrument and there is no real way to fix that, aside from adding weight to the body, :D .

Edited by Southpa
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i guess that would work but are you plannign on doing this to an aleady existing guitar, one youre planning to build, or justthrowing the idea out there. LPs generally are made with a cap so chambering isnt really and isue there........as far as the tele goes i belive you could do this but unless the guitar is being made form scratch your gonna need to put in some thin peices of wood to repalce what you take away even with a thin blade

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I guess you could do that to lighten up the body.  Just remember that you will be taking the balance away from the guitar.  The result could be a neck heavy instrument and there is no real way to fix that, aside from adding weight to the body,  :D .

Well, you could shave the neck down & install lighter tuners and/or tuning keys...

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I guess you could do that to lighten up the body.  Just remember that you will be taking the balance away from the guitar.  The result could be a neck heavy instrument and there is no real way to fix that, aside from adding weight to the body,  :D .

Well, I've already put a Bigsby on there, plenty of counterweight there. What I'll be doing in fact is cut away the existing wings (after sanding the body down of course) and adding new wings -- in my Bocaster shape, of course!

The body is alder, and I have a matching block of alder here already.

If I have to cap it, I can --I have some maple coming in, and I just found an old mahogany bedstead in the loft of one of the barns/garages here...it's probably 100 years old, and it has some nice thin panels that will make excellent caps...

But still, I prefer keeping the guitar all alder.

I'm just wondering if it's feasible to route from this direction, and what kind of other issues I might be facing --like, if you route into the grain like that, do you risk splitting the wood?

As for the weight, the other Bocaster balances really well, despite all the weight I cut off of it. Of course, that one has a featherlight neck, that helps! (Still going to slap a tremolo on there!)

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This method should work, but the wood will of course split if you go too thin.  The router will be limited in depth.  I think you could remove the same amount of wood by drilling with a forstner bit deeper and leaving the sides (or top and bottom of the guitar body) a bit thicker.

Yeah, I can see that. I can clamp the wood down, and use my drill stand --much less risk of losing control, like I would with the router (just learning how to use that)...didn't think of that one, thanks!

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Sounds feasible.

I think a cap is still preferable.

You want to have a good sized glue line to keep those wings from snapping off if you drop the guitar. That will limit how thin you will make the top/back compared to a cap.

The Bocaster's straight sides make it easy to set the depth of the channel, you're going to hog out. For a guitar with contours, like a LP, it's going to be more difficult. It's likely that, to maintain a margin for error, less material is going to be taken out than would be for a cap.

Finally, there's the router depth of cut issue. Either you're stuck with a couple inches of chambering or you're drilling a bunch of holes.

If you want the chambered guitar to be the same species of wood, make the cap alder, too. You can hide the glueline under a binding. If you want it to look like it's out of the same slab of wood, take it to a shop that has resaw capability and have them slice off the cap. You can glue it back on after you've chambered the body.

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You want to have a good sized glue line to keep those wings from snapping off if you drop the guitar.  That will limit how thin you will make the top/back compared to a cap.

A friend of mine has an attachment for one of his tables--it cuts matching grooves into two pieces of wood, that way they fit together nicely...that would take care of the gluing issue. But for that I'd probably have to leave the sides even thicker..

Okay, I can see the issues with this idea now....I might try it for the telecaster mod, using the existing wings first.

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I like the idea of drilling as many holes as you can without breaking through to the hole next to it. With one of those Forstner(?) bits you should be able to clear a lot of shavings with complete control. My main concern would be the strength of the neck pocket after you have cut this thing into three pieces(right beside the neck) and put it back together. What will keep the back of the neck pocket solidly attached to your two "wings"? I might reccomend a pair of "biscuits", if you know what I mean. Those semi-circular joining pieces of wood you use to make strong glue joints. I bring this issue up because of an earlier error I made when routing pickup pockets that thinned this area to the point where I had strength issues.

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Bad Idea unless you split it down the middle so as to get a top and bottom. You're not going to get an unbalanced guitar.Thats nonsense.How heavy is a guitar neck with tuners? If anything it will balance it.I dont really think you have a snowballs chance in hell to get it right but if you did you would gain better tone,more sustain and of course less weight.

Dont do it. If you're going to go through all the trouble of splitting it just make a new body instead. I hope you're patient and creative .

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Dont do it.  If you're going to go through all the trouble of splitting it just make a new body instead. I hope you're patient and creative .

Heh heh...well, I'm creative... :D

But yeah, I thought about the splitting part, but it makes more sense to cap it rather than go through the hassle of finding a shop willing to do it for me. That way I'll keep more of the volume of the guitar.

For the hollowing out the wings idea, as the doctor pointed out, I'd have to cut pretty wide in order to keep the neck joint strong enough. Which would defeat the purpose.

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