My Neck Thru Guitar Project, Unique Design!

[Ben]

Latest design

Dont expect this to be regularly updated, It wont be!

I'll try to update it occasionally.

Heres the album with a few of my many, many design ideas and design revisions. This keeps changing all the time, the most current one is the one named "copy of new"

Guitar folder

Please dont tell me you prefer one of the older designs, its too late.

I have already started this project, made the neck (not the fretboard though), and body wings, and a few other little odd bits.

I will try to get photos sometime soon.

Anyway, The specs are:

• 25.5" scale
  
• Neck Thru
  
• Oak neck and body, all salvaged from an old table (I know its heavy, its mainly hollow, and weight doesnt bother me that much anyway)
  
• 1 vol, 1 tone
  
• Sustainer on top of neck pickup
  
• Possibly a speaker, just for the hell of it, powered by same circuity as sustainer
  
• switching is with a rotary switch, idea stolen from gutarelectronics.com, "5 sounds from one humbucker", but instead of the humbucker I have 2 RWRP singles
  
• Multiple heat pickups, Idea is again stolen from someone on another forum
  
• Winding the pickups myself
  

Neck Pickup will have the alnico bar magnet down the centre, and a taller, thinner coil for a more stratty sound.

Bridge pickup will be a P-90 clone.

The wiring is going to be INSANELY complex, I've drawn a layout for it, and it is pretty crazy.

The reason I'm going so overboard on my first decent attempt at building a whole guitar is because I want to do everything myself for practice for future, and I also want every switching option under the sun, so that in future I can refine it down to just the ones that work well and sound good.

Any thoughts/ opinions appreciated!

Edited April 2, 2006 by Ben

[erikbojerik]

Err....

The image “http://content.photodex.com/deliver/sharing/displayImage/Copy%20of%20NEW%20smaller.JPG?fl=2569441&ss=1280” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

[Ben]

Ok, I fixed it, it was the same as on yahoo anyway, just a bigger image. Thanks for pointing it out!

[custom22]

Looks like a sweet project. Where are you planning to obtain your sustainer?

[Ben]

Thanks,

I'm building the sustainer myself, see the 84 page thread in the elcetronics section of the site.

A few people there have built them with good results, so I'm going to give it a go myself, definitely cheaper than buying one!

[Guitarfrenzy]

Very neat design I like it. I think that if you use oak it's going to be very, very heavy though. You might want to chamber it out so it's lighter.

[Ben]

To quote myself

(I know its heavy, its mainly hollow, and weight doesnt bother me that much anyway)

It is practically a hollow-body its chambered loads.

Also the real body wings (which I will photograph soon) are smaller than the ones in the plan, so the overall body size will be smaller and therefore lighter.

Glad you like the design too!

Edited April 2, 2006 by Ben

[Ben]

Pictures!

Took some photos today, there all in the album;

Guitar album

They're not great photos, but my camera is crap, and its a dull day.

This project is all being done on the cheap, I have very few tools, mainly cheapo hand tools, so I'm not expecting 100% perfection on this project.

I saved some money on a fretsaw today, I made my own!

FRETSAW

I was lucky and had some coping saw blades that were the right width to cut a nice fret slot that the frets will fit in (with a little persuasion) and stay in. I just glued it to a bit of a metal rod thing.

If you are confused by the different coloured woods when I said it was all made of oak, its because I played around with some wood stains on the body wings. They are still unsanded so it will be sanded off during the finishing process.

Edited April 3, 2006 by Ben

[thegarehanman]

Your design reminds me a lot of this guitar that a member entered in the gotm competition last year:

good luck with the build.

peace,

russ

[Druss]

Man thats going to be a nice guitar the wings have a cool grain pattern.

[Ben]

I know its similar!!!

I saw that guitar on here a while back AFTER designing mine, and was shocked by how similar it is!

If thats his first in that body shape I can prove I did it first! (my first project was the same shape as this one)

I was surprised by the surprisingly nice figuring on the oak actually... considering its from a beat up old table, I didnt expect it to have any.

Shame that in my current design the best of the figuring will all be covered by the pickguard!

Kinda makes me want to ditch the pickguard.. but I think that the pickguard shape its-self is pretty cool, and they make the wiring more convenient too. There'll still be the grain pattern on the back I suppose.

Thanks

Loving these smilies BTW, dont get them on other forums I've been on

Edited April 3, 2006 by Ben

[Marzocchi705]

Id say ditch the pick guard on this one, then just build another with. 2 guitars are better than 1 right? I like this design, its cool. Keep it up man.

[redwhiteandthemaple]

Try a transparent pickguard

I like the design. Where did its inspiration come from?

[Ben]

I like explorers, so I took the basic shape, stole the lower horn off an iceman, then played around with the design for a while until I came up with the curved back bit. The top horn (the one that looks slightly sg-ish) was suggested by someone else, I was going to go with a more angular one, but this one looks better in my opinion.

I still cant make my mind up about the pickguard...

Decisions........

If anyone is interested I could dig up a pic of my very first guitar which I built in this shape. (it was more of a half-build really, I bought the neck and it was a very imperfect guitar)

Edited April 4, 2006 by Ben

[Ben]

No-one asked for it, but if anyone is interested, here is guitar #1:

The photo is old, the wierd flame maple veneer control plate things I made round the neck pup and pot have been converted to a large metal washer and some carefully cut CD cover plastic respectively.

And heres more photos:

Album

Admire my precise master-craftsmanship!

the other guitar in the pics is another project I started..and then got bored of. I'd made too many mistakes and cut corners.

I'll finish it sometime, but I am more into this new project now.

Edit, looking back at this post; If I ditch the pickguard it'll look almost entirely like my first guitar!

Edited April 4, 2006 by Ben

[psw]

Don't worry Ben, it looks "like" a lot of guitar designs...maybe a little like this washburn...

OK, yours looks a lot better than Stanley's attempt at guitar design...should have stuck with the Iceman. I really like yours though...it would be a shame to cover the wood (though you will see it from the back ) particularly the neck through on the top...but the scratchplate design is great and would make things easier.

The speaker idea is novel and do-able with the sustainer circuit...won't be a great sound, but does work! Will use up batteries so easy access will be necessary or remote power. That means that the scratchplate on top will be a problem as you won't want to have to take that off every couple of days! Just some things to consider!!!

I'm really fond of the iceman design and commented before to this effect. The explorer too of course, in fact all the "reverse" shapes. I haven't seen that GOTM entry before but thats nice...yamaha's really old hocky stick was another interesting one...anyway, nothing new under the sun, so I wouldn't be concerned or no one would do anything!

It will be great to see a dedicated sustainer guitar at PG and a design like this will really be striking...so glad to see it has a trem as the sustainer is so much more fun with this feature...looking good and will be following with interest...keep up the good work... pete

[skibum5545]

Definitely no pickguard!

I really like the grain on that oak, and the laminates of the neck all look really good together. To then go and cover that all up with a big sheet of black plastic would just be wrong.

[Ben]

Thanks, Pete and skibum5545!

Pickguard:

Pros

+makes electronics much easier to wire and fit into guitar

+Looks kinda cool in its own way

+avoids excessive rear routing

+If I mess up the routing of the pickup holes in the pickguard I can make a new one easier than I can make a new guitar

+need to find another way to get the switches to the horns if I dont use it

Cons

-Covers the wood

-without it I could improve the carving on the front sg style horn (the rear one is more 'smoothly' carved, looks better in my opinion)

Still cant decide

I know theres more +s than -s there, but their not all equally important to me.

BTW, the neck laminates and body wood are all the same (oak). Once glued and sanded, the wood dye I put on the body wings (to test it) will probably sand off and leave it all a more flat, uniform colour. If I wanted the same effect back I'd have to mask it and dye the wings again

For the battery I was going to buy one of those flip-out battery pack things. I have one on my 1st guitar and its easy and convenient.

I drafted a wiring diagram for it last night.. Yikes!

Diagram

Edited April 5, 2006 by Ben

[manquesa]

with that onboard speaker, is a single 9v battery gonna last long?

[Ben]

I have no idea, the speaker is just a gimmick really, I might not bother permenently fitting it.

I probably wouldnt use it much, I just stuck it in there since all the circuitry to power it is already there.

If I get all this to work I might look into this remote power idea.

[psw]

is a single 9v battery gonna last long?

Nope...cause the sustainer is so much fun, you won't want to turn it off!!!

The next phase of the DIY Sustainer development is to provide for remote power and this is the future for this device. It solves so many problems! No need to find room for the battery and unlimited power...fantastic! I am assured that it is do-able with a stereo lead and was doing it with a conventional regulated powerpack that runs effects in testing without problems. Build it with a battery and convert it later to run off either. I can't presently do any more development on these aspects so it is super cool to see Ben here making a purpose built guitar for the device and taking the thing another step forward in the process for everyone...

I can't decide either about the pickguard...it is a cool looking design and sets off the whole guitar...plus all the points are valid. I don't think it is necessary to adhere to the cult of the "wood" where the grain has to be shown...it didn't stop Leo putting an unprecedented mega guard on the strat...

Keep thinking about it, and good work... pete

[Mickguard]

The problem I have with the pickguard is that it's just way over the top --it's too much, mostly because of the neck through laminates. Too many lines, too many colors.

I think you could ditch the extensions onto the horns-- you shouldn't be covering those up, they're too much a part of the shape of the guitar.

I'd suggest starting the pickguard at the treble sides of the pickups (the guard can meet the side and bottom of each pup), and narrowing the lower curve to cover just the control cavity, more like a P-bass style.

But I really prefer the guard on psw's Washburn pic --very simple, nicely understated, that could work well with the lines of the laminates. Rear mount the controls.

And why can't you drill your wire channels before gluing the wings on? I saw that someone here uses a neat trick of placing straws in the channel --that way the glue won't fill them in, makes it easier to slide the wires through.

Dunno what you can do about the control at the top...maybe get a long drill bit and drill channel from the side of the horn through to the pickup wire channel? (You could plug the hole on the side, since that won't be too visible).

[Ben]

Its most likely all going to be one colour once glued up and sanded as all the wood used is oak, the only reason for the colour variation is cos I messed around with some wood dye

That is more like I would expect it to look. The body colour is more likely to be flatter, in which case I think it may actually look a little plain if pickguard-less.

It is one hell of a mega pickguard though

I might modify it on paint to try out the P-bass pickguard idea...

[Mickguard]

Ah yeah, it looks much better against the solid color. Still, I think you could do better with the horns --the pickguard kind of takes away from them.

[thegarehanman]

The guitar might be better suited for an lp style pickguard. Honestly, I think the horns are a bit unrefined and it seems that that is inhibiting your ability to get the pickguard the way you want it. Anyhow, I thought I might give you some food for thought:

peace,

russ