Mother Of Pearl Line Under Maple Top

[javacody]

I'm gluing on a birdseye maple veneer to hide some mistakes on a guitar I'm making and I thought it would be cool to have a line of Mother of Pearl or Paua Shell under the veneer. How would I go about doing this?

[RAI6]

I'm gluing on a birdseye maple veneer to hide some mistakes on a guitar I'm making and I thought it would be cool to have a line of Mother of Pearl or Paua Shell under the veneer. How would I go about doing this?

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Well, normally something like that would be done with purfling (I believe that's the right word), applied almost like binding in a routed channel around the body. What you're asking about is something completely different. You have to lay down a whole sheet on the face of the body.

Mother-of-toiletseat is your only option, but I don't know how much it would actually look like anything more than white plastic, when all you're seeing is the thin edge. It's designed to look like mother-of-pearl from the front...

Maybe there are other options.

[frank falbo]

I'd fake it if I were you. Get pearloid binding material, and route a binding channel onto the guitar before you laminate your maple top. So you'll have the look of a middle piece, but it won't actually be a piece. By adjusting the binding channel depth, you could get it 1/8" thick or whatever you wanted, while still having the right look. Perhaps more importantly, you'll have wood-to-wood contact for the guitar tonally, rather than a plastic laminate across the whole top of the guitar.

Also pearloid is going to be laminated to something, so laying it flat will show that line. But the binding channel will make the whole thing pearloid.

[javacody]

Thanks for the ideas guys.

This guitar is a Gibson bluesbird copy. Poplar back, 1/4" maple top. I screwed up (majorly) routing pickups, so I've patched the routes and am glueing a very thin birdseye veneer on. There are f-holes, and I've figured out how to locate them under the veneer (use a very small pin as a probe), but If I could find some way to use a very thin plastic layer as a substrate, it would give me a purfling look around the edge of the guitar side and around the f-holes. I think it would be very cool.

Here is a link to something similar from Warmoth:

Warmoth Pinstripe Accent

What I'd like to do is have a slightly thicker piece made out of shell. Hmm. just had a thought, what about copper sheeting for this layer? Or Aluminum? Might not look too bad, but I'd still prefer shell.

[frank falbo]

You can go to precision drums.com and get pearloid drum wrap. Its pretty thin, but you won't see the pearloid with that thin of a strip going sideways. Plus the pearloid has a white or off-white backing. Bermuda Sand goes all the way through, that might be cool looking from the side. Also Pearl Onyx goes all the way through. That would give you misc. alternating black and pearl sections with a little copper sporadically.

http://www.precisiondrum.com/html/colors.html

[javacody]

That is pretty cool stuff, thanks for the help Frank!

Although, I think I'm looking at spending about $80 (at least).

That's all right, if it turns out, it'll be worth it.

I'm going with a brown dyed back and sides with natural binding and a amber top. Which of those colors would fit in best?

[skibum5545]

I'm thinkin the Topo Gold wrap, personally.

[frank falbo]

I have a Topo Gold sample here and it is awesome, but it doesn't show anything from the side. Plus it's laminated to black, so half of it would just be a black line. You need something that goes all the way through.

Topo Gold would make a great guitar top, as would Mediterranean.