Zenith Bass

[mattharris75]

Thanks Ash.

Neck update.

When gluing the neck blank I didn't manage to get my alignment pins all the way through, which made things a bit sloppy. Between that and cleaning the blank up I managed to introduce a bit of twist, about 5 mm corner to corner. So I made an MDF sled, shimmed the blank level, secured it with some hot glue, and ran it through the thickness sander until it was flat.

I then cut/sanded the blank down to 22 mm thickness and laid out the headstock/taper/fretboard position/ truss rod/etc on the blank.

I then proceeded to make another mistake. When routing for the truss rod the edge guide managed to slip a bit on the second pass, which I didn't notice on the third pass, because I was apparently on autopilot. So, I fixed the edge guide 2 mm the other direction, tightening it down better this time, and routed in the correct spot. Then I cut a 2mm walnut shim, glued it in, and scraped it flush. No harm no foul.

So the neck (well, my own carelessness really) is fighting me a bit so far, but progress is being made.

 

Next up, route the neck taper and get the fretboard glued on and cut flush to the neck.

[Bizman62]

8 minutes ago, mattharris75 said:

So the neck (well, my own carelessness really) is fighting me a bit so far, but progress is being made.

You know it and so do all the other regulars, but just as a reminder: A great builder isn't the one making no mistakes, a great builder is the one who can turn his mistakes into features and learn from them.

[mattharris75]

Just now, Bizman62 said:

You know it and so do all the other regulars, but just as a reminder: A great builder isn't the one making no mistakes, a great builder is the one who can turn his mistakes into features and learn from them.

Absolutely!

It was also a great opportunity, as my 8 year old daughter (who is absolutely a 'maker' type and in spite of her ADHD can really focus and absorb this sort of information) was helping me, and was able to see me work through a problem. Hopefully a little learning experience for her as well.

[mattharris75]

More work done on the neck. I tapered the neck and glued and trimmed the fretboard, and glued the headplate and backstrap laminates. Then it was time to use my jiggiest of jigs. The binding jig:

I hot glued the neck and the MDF together to have a nice solid platform and ran it through. I got one side of the binding glued on tonight and will get the rest finished up and sanded flush to the fretboard this weekend. 

I also cut the outside profile of the headstock. Here's a quick preview of how the laminates look together:

 

Should look cool once the interior is cut out and the ramp down to the tuners is carved.

[ScottR]

On 2/12/2022 at 3:36 PM, mattharris75 said:

Yes, I think this is going to do the trick nicely...

Ya think?

Damn.

SR

[ScottR]

10 hours ago, mattharris75 said:

I also cut the outside profile of the headstock. Here's a quick preview of how the laminates look together:

The laminates look stunning.

10 hours ago, mattharris75 said:

the ramp down to the tuners is carved.

This has me a bit nervous. On the surface it sounds like you plan to carve away the stunning laminates.

SR

[mattharris75]

Only in the area behind the nut where the strings break down toward the tuners, Scott. It should look quite nice, nothing too radical here. It'll make more sense when I get the headstock finished.

I finished the binding on the neck. The fretboard is all shined up, but there are still some scratches in the first 4 frets, so that will require a bit more work.

Here's a quick mockup. The positioning of everything is roughly (very roughly) correct. You can barely see the pencil line where the last few inches of the neck will get cut off.

 

 

[mattharris75]

Alright, headstock time!

First thing to do, drill the tuner holes:

 

Then use some .625" pieces of MDF, with a little binding tape to keep the rails tight to each other and double sided tape to hold it on, for my routing template:

 

Fresh off the router. Needs a little sanding where that router burn is, but it's looking good:

[mattharris75]

@ScottR it's not quite finished yet, but this should give you an idea of how the headstock carve is going to look:

[Alucard0811]

Thats some really nice and clean work.

 

Wooow.

[Bizman62]

Gotta love the simplicity of tools you use! People whining how they'd need a template for every detail before they can build a guitar should take a keen look at your headstock. Similarly, there's great wisdom involved in how you drilled the tuner holes. Not only did you prevent splitting with the pieces of plywood in your vise, you also prevented the end of the holes splintering by drilling the holes before cutting the center off.

The ramp to the headstock opening is going to be a showstopper!

[mattharris75]

Thanks guys.

@Bizman62, the overall simplicity of my templates and jigs is in large part born out of experience. My first couple of builds I did the opposite, and made templates and jigs for everything. After a while you learn what your critical dimensions are, what you are capable of doing by hand, and where you really shouldn't wing it. If I was interested in making a run of the same instruments and needed a repeatable and simple process I wouldn't work this way. But doing one-off builds, and being more worried with expressing creativity and letting yourself adjust and tweak as you see things come to life, there's really just no reason for it.

[Bizman62]

7 minutes ago, mattharris75 said:

the overall simplicity of my templates and jigs is in large part born out of experience. My first couple of builds I did the opposite, and made templates and jigs for everything. After a while you learn what your critical dimensions are, what you are capable of doing by hand, and where you really shouldn't wing it.

Exactly. Yet I'd like the makeshift template idea to be taught to any budding luthier at an early stage. Not only would that save them money, that would also make them understand the basic mechanics of a template. A routing template is just a fence and  in cavities and holes the diameter of the router bit (or rather the bearing) plays a big role in corners. I still remember the feeling when I realized that a square template creates a round cornered hole!

[Charlie H 72]

Drooling @ this headstock and the whole look in general here. Awesome. Makes me want to do an open headstock one day too. 

[Andyjr1515]

That makes for a really nice feature @mattharris75 

The whole build is coming along very nicely indeed.

[ScottR]

On 2/21/2022 at 11:39 PM, mattharris75 said:

@ScottR it's not quite finished yet, but this should give you an idea of how the headstock carve is going to look:

 

I had forgotten that you were going with the classical style tuner positioning. You get extra credit for seeing in advance how the neck lams were going to work out in that carve and bonus points for pulling it off so nicely.

Also, it is rather slick how you quietly slipped in your logo. What is that made of?

SR

[mattharris75]

Thanks guys.

@ScottR the logo is laser cut out of brass. 

Neck pocket is routed. I'll get the pickups and control cavity done, then the part I'm looking forward to: carving the body!

[Charlie H 72]

Ok you just said “laser cut brass” so nonchalant but I have never heard of a laser being able to cut metal - something about reflecting the beam back into the machine? How did that go?

[mattharris75]

I had them cut by a service called Send Cut Send. I think highly reflective metals require more power, but they do cut a variety of metals. I've also had them cut titanium before.

[mattharris75]

Pickups routed. Started working on the top carve on the bass side.

You can see the knot on the upper bout, which I think is a pretty nice little beauty mark.

 

[Bizman62]

Knots are flowers on wood, for what I've heard.

[mattharris75]

It's very rough, but it's a start. Going to have to put in some hours to get this refined, but I think it's headed in a good direction.

[ScottR]

On 2/28/2022 at 11:38 PM, mattharris75 said:

it's headed in a good direction

I'll say.

SR

[Charlie H 72]

On 2/26/2022 at 10:46 PM, mattharris75 said:

I had them cut by a service called Send Cut Send. I think highly reflective metals require more power, but they do cut a variety of metals. I've also had them cut titanium before.

Cool! I’ll have to keep that in mind - maybe a laser cut metal logo in my future who knows. This continues to look amazing- the carve is just right and the top is gorgeous

[mattharris75]

Thanks guys.

Here's a bit more progress on the carve. I think I'm about to 90% done, just little tweaking of angles and curves and cleaning things up at this point.