Thinness

[Johnny Foreigner]

inspired a little by Restoration's superthins, I'm becoming a little obsessed with building a super-thin, super-light guitar.

so my question is: what's the thinnest body you've ever built that worked.

[avengers63]

The SG is 1 3/8" thick. It's been working for what... 50 years?

[supplebanana]

the major issue is balance.... make the body super-light an' you're gonna need a super-light h/stock too... but this depends on where the strap buttons are placed too.

some SG's are h/s heavy & can nose dive.... on mine however i put the strap button on the back of the upper horn & had no probs with balance.

[levitator]

the ibanez s prestiges are about an inch thick around the pickups and about half an inch thick around the edges of the body and sound fine. balance has never been an issue either. oddly enough one of the only guitars that used to nose dive on me was a warlock which has a thick ass, heavy body. but i did the same thing as SB and put the strap button under the top horn. good to go.

[Tim37]

it just needs to be thick enough to hold your electronics/trem and picups. i personaly wouldnt want my switch to be sticking out the back of the guitar.

[Wademeister]

Coming from the bass guitar side of the house, I can tell you that a Rickenbacker 4003 is about 1.25" and the second bass I built was 1.20". Works great but it limited my pickup choices a bit.

[Johnny Foreigner]

So my 4/4 piece of limba (so, 13/16") combined with my .30" maple top should work provide the electronics will fit. Which they will.

that's around 1.1125" or 1 1/8"

it's gonna be tight....

[westhemann]

the ibanez s prestiges are about an inch thick around the pickups

The Ibanez S is 1 5/8" thick around the pickups...and with the heavier body wood(mahogany) and heavier hardware it still weighs pretty much the same as a basswood RG....but it feels nicer because of the shape.

Ibanez trems will not work in a body 1" thick.

going with a Kahler trem or a top mount fixed bridge of some sort will let you get thinner..perhaps maybe even as thin as 1"

[verhoevenc]

The guitar I gave injun to finish since I didn't like it anymore (anyone seen him? he was so new he can't receive PMs... hmmm....) was 15/16" aniegre with a 1/2" claro top. Top was then carved into the aneigre. So... 1.5" max, down to like 1.2" in the deepest part of the carve near the arm, down to 1" at all edge almost. It seemed as if it was gunna turn out just fine.

Chris

[Mors Phagist]

I was just about to bring up the Ibanez S series. But lets see... I would have to say, if you had a set bridge, and minimum electronics, such as a single bridge pup, I think the only limit would be the thickness of the pickup and how deep the neck would have to lie in the body, although you could fix that with a through neck.

So I would say the depth of the pickup, with another 1/8th inch or more on the back.

[Prostheta]

Yeah, Ibanez S's are actually fairly thick in the central portion compared to the very slender all around taper. I think that the thinnest body would be (as mentioned) a factor of pickup depth and how far the bridge was off the body. Maybe that would also advocate the SG style as John mentioned. Hold the hardware out of the body with strings further away.

I feel it becomes more of an engineering problem at this point. Rear mounting pickups and hardware are a reality here....which is where John pipes in with his back bolt stuff....

[avengers63]

I feel it becomes more of an engineering problem at this point. Rear mounting pickups and hardware are a reality here....which is where John pipes in with his back bolt stuff....

Someone rattled my cage?

My experience with the back bolt is that the body needs to be at least 1 3/4". Anywhere over that is better. This is because of the tenon length and the pickup routes.

The tenon needs to extend beyond the neck pup route so it has somewhere to bolt into. If it doesn't, the mounting bolts pop through into where the pup itself needs to be. The tenon itself needs to be thick enough to both hold the ferrules AND have enough wood under the ferrules to withstand the pressure, so there's a minimum thickness you can't bypass.

If you go too thin on the body, the tenon would get thinner as well because there's only so much you can take off in the back neck pocket before blowing through the pup routes. I suppose you could have the neck pup be a complete hole, extending through to the rear neck pocket, but I don't believe you'd want that.

All that could feasibly go right out the window were you no not have a neck pup. Then your minimum thickness would be determined by the bolt length.

And thinking this through just told me that the LPjr/dc that I've been mulling over can be a back bolt. Thanks!

Another thing that could make it all possible is if you used some super thin surface-mount pickups like Tiesco had. This would completely eliminate the pup routes and leave tons of room for the bolts. Do we have a pickup maker who wants to experiment with some of these designs?

[westhemann]

The best way in my opinion to make the thinnest guitar possible is to use a TOM for the bridge,which needs a neck angle and puts the pickups farther out of the body than most other bridges,so that you need less routing depth on the pickups...make it a neck through and use a shape with alot of body wing next to where the neck joins the body and I think you could get 1" easy

[RestorationAD]

The best way in my opinion to make the thinnest guitar possible is to use a TOM for the bridge,which needs a neck angle and puts the pickups farther out of the body than most other bridges,so that you need less routing depth on the pickups...make it a neck through and use a shape with alot of body wing next to where the neck joins the body and I think you could get 1" easy

Wes this is not me being argumentative it is just a point. You are still the man.

While I agree that the theory is sound (neck angle = 1" thick) one of the ergonomic issues I have with Gibsons and the 4.4+ Degree neck angle is that it is not comfortable on the wrist. One thing I strive for is proper wrist position when muting strings. Having the bridge way above the body causes me pain. Now some guys play fine like this... but I know that Steve Via specifically had the trem recessed to get his wrist comfortable. I like having wood close to the bridge to rest my hand on.

Thin guitars require a little more planning than regular guitars. A surface mount Kahler, shallow pickup routes and some compact switches go a long way. Don't expect to slam a vintage strat 5-way and Some vintage long leg pickups in a thin guitar.

I think 31mm is very do able (I do it all the time).

BTW I volunteered to engineer a very shallow pickup for John. I am pretty sure I can get an HB that requires minimum depth... stay tuned

[westhemann]

I hear you on the LP wrist comfort issue,but I disagree about the cause of it being the neck angle,rather I think it is the shape of the LP that does it...At least for me.

For me,A Gibson Explorer is super comfortable because of the lack of body in the wrist area,but an LP is almost unbearable..which is one reason I sold my LP studio even though it was a very fine guitar.

[akvguitars]

What about the Parker fly series? They use the adjustable pole pieces screwed into the guitar to mount, if I'm not mistaken. You do it that way, you can do away with the entire baseplate, saving yourself about 3/8 of routing.

[RestorationAD]

I hear you on the LP wrist comfort issue,but I disagree about the cause of it being the neck angle,rather I think it is the shape of the LP that does it...At least for me.

For me,A Gibson Explorer is super comfortable because of the lack of body in the wrist area,but an LP is almost unbearable..which is one reason I sold my LP studio even though it was a very fine guitar.

K I see what you are saying. My Gibson V is not that bad...

The LP is definitively extreme because of the carve along with the bridge being an 1" off the body.

What about the Parker fly series? They use the adjustable pole pieces screwed into the guitar to mount, if I'm not mistaken. You do it that way, you can do away with the entire baseplate, saving yourself about 3/8 of routing.

The parker method requires that you use pickups that have pole pieces on both sides. The main issue with getting the extra space back by mounting parker style is that Pole pieces are usually 3/4". If you cut them shorter... flush with the bottom of the pickup you drastically effect the tone of the pickup (Some people actually like the difference). A slug only pickup could easily be modified to take up less route by flattening the ears and re-drilling the screw holes.

The issue with custom pickups is you lose the ability to swap out all those aftermarket pickups. Not a big deal for me since I make my own... but for the customer it limits them to one set (or more customs).