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The Carvecaster


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Right now I'm tempted to go stealth...mainly because I like the 'traditional' tele look a lot...those extra dots would ruin that.

But, because I feel kind of silly for having bought this pickguard --well, that was before I started getting good at routing --I'm thinking I'll just make a new one (or two or three) with the holes. Just to prove I can :D

one of the nice parts of the tele's pickguard is you can take it off without have to unwire everything else!

But at the next string change (because I'm a cheap bastard and don't want to waste a $2 set of strings! Weird, eh?) I'm going to move the bridge back a few millimeters --in order to intonate, I had to move the saddles way back --so that the windings on the strings are riding on the saddles. Doesn't seem to be hurting the sound, but still.

But once I do that, I'm going to need a new guard to cover up the patch I'll need to make on the bridge cavity.

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And finally, the pictures:

th_carvecasterfullfront.jpg th_carvecasterfront.jpg th_carvecasterfinalside.jpg th_carvecasterfinalbridge.jpg th_carvecasterfinalshim.jpg

I still need to file the nut slots, my guitar teacher's lending me his files for that. And since I like the sound of the P90 so much, I'm tempted to get a 'real' pickup --this one's a Mighty Mite, and I've got the idea that the real thing will have even more bite to it.

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Looks good, but I was expecting the carve to be more pronounced. Maybe it's just the pic.

I copied the carve off of my strat, but it seems less pronounced because I kept the tele's flattop...I can say this though, it really changes a lot about playing the tele, it's much more comfortable to play now, standing up and sitting down...

When do we get to hear the thing? :D

When I learn how to play it! :D But that might not be too long, I've been taking lessons the past year, I'm finally starting to get somewhere. Wish I'd have practiced this much when I was a kid....

I can definitely recommend adding a P90 for anyone who's tempted!

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I wonder if Marksound knew that the 'carvecaster' just features a belly carve, not a carved top. :D

Looks great! I love that natural look for Telecasters.

Greg

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well it's not too sunny today so I can't get good photos yet. In the meantime, let's play a game called:

Can you guess what I screwed up?

th_carvecasterbeforenafterLarge.jpg

(The light changed, not the color of the guitar --it actually looks more like the 'after' shot in person)

The screw up was pretty fundamental...but it gave me the opportunity to ditch that wooden pickguard --which was pretty enough but rather bland, and annoying to play with (too thick) and besides, it bugged me that I didn't make it myself. I'm really pleased with the metal pickguard (featuring rust patterns courtesy of my kid's pee!), even though I had to remove the P90, which wasn't compatible. Luckily, I had this old 60s era pickup, in pieces, and the polepieces fit perfectly.

Here's a closeup of the guard th_carvecastermetalfinalcloseupLarge.jpg

I'm going to experiment with other metal types, and eventually I'll try to remount the P90, because it sounded really good. But for now I just want to play the damn thing!

So, what's your guess? How did I screw up, and how did I fix it?

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No, it was even more simple than that...when I first started shopping for the neck, I had all my specs laid out...

But it took a while to find the neck I wanted....then one came up on ebay, a nice deal, had a buy-it-now price so I didn't have to deal with people bidding up the necks with stupidly inflated prices...

Except I forgot to count the number of frets....the neck I was replacing had 22...the neck I bought had 21....of course, it didn't intonate properly...took me a couple of weeks to figure this one out!

So yeah, I moved the bridge back by around 8 mm...and now it's perfect.

Of course, I had to make the new pickguard to cover up the holes...it's pretty ugly under there!

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