GregA Posted April 22, 2004 Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 Well, I thought I may update everyone on my progress. I have spent most of the time recently working on shaping the mother of peal inlays and getting them into the fingerboard. See pics below. The knobs etc....are just sitting there to give you the idea. I have also placed the perloid tuner pegs that I will be putting on the finished project. I decided to go with a "scalloped" inlay similar to the traditional les paul inlay. I added the "extra" scalloped inlay at the first fret, which makes it a little different. Not really sure why Gibson didn't put one in there on most of their Pauls. (the LP's with the standard block pattern as well as the customs all have pearl at the first fret) Anyway.....I think it looks pretty good up there! We basically started with rectangular pieces of pearl and built a jig to hold each piece at the same angle. We then sanded them down to final size. (as an aside......you need to be very careful when sanding pearl as those little pieces of shell do not come out of your lungs and throat once they are in there!) We did have a minor disaster as a tiny corner of one of the inlays cihipped a bit at the back of the piece. (see pic below) The unforutnate thing is that it creates a tiny dark spot in the corner of the inlay but that just the way the cookie crumbles sometimes. I imagine it won't be quite as noticeable once the strings are on. I also have the truss rod fitted. The control cavity plates are also complete and fitted (a bit of a pain since the larger cover is actually 3 pieces of maple laminated in different directions to prevent warping. The top laminate is actually flamed maple on both plates but it is difficult to see) The next step will be to glue on the finger board and shape the the neck. Then it will be time to do the final radiusing and sanding of the fretboard and then install the frets. After that, I'll install the nut, tuners, and all the other hardware. Finally, we will finish it! The finish is going to be a bit of a tough choice for me. I was thinking about heritage cherry sunburst but that creates a problem with the headstock.....it would look ridiculous bursted so what colour do you stain it? I was thinking I could just stain it the "lightest" colour used on the body but I am not sure about how that will look. I am seriously considering doing a trans-amber finish on the whole guitar then adding the slightest darker amber around the outside edge of the body....not a burst really, just a hint of darkness around the outside edge to give it some depth. Then the headstock could be simply trans-amber and it would all look great! Lots to think about in the meantime........I would greatly appreciate any opinions on finishing this beast and how to address the issue of staining the headstock. Once again, thanks for reading! I will quote the orignal post below so you can see the earlier progress. Take it easy. GregA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GregA Posted April 22, 2004 Author Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 ORIGINAL POST First of all, sorry for this long-winded post...but I thought some may find the info interesting. Several months ago I posted some pics of a Les Paul I had been building and I thought I may post a few updated “work in progress” pics. (Much of the info below is a repeat of what was in the original post...so feel free to skip it!) Just to inform those who didn’t catch the earlier info, I started working on this project off and on over 2 ½ years ago. I am fortunate enough to have two friends who are expert luthiers and were nice enough to guide me through this process. (I could not have done it without them) The surface of the guitar has been lightly moistened to show the flame in all of these pictures. The nice thing about taking such a ridiculously long time to build this guitar was that every single piece of wood was left to stablize after any major cut was made. Any twisting that resulted because of a cut was then corrected and recorrected. The neck alone sat for close to two months after it was initially roughed out. It will be continually corrected as the build process continues. The result should be a very “stable” instrument as any twisting should be taken care of. (Of course I will need to keep it at a relatively similar humidity as what we have here in Calgary, Alberta. So I guess no trips to Costa Rica for this one!) The body and neck is British Honduras mahogany (each are one piece) and the top is a hand picked chunk of maple from British Columbia. The arch top was shaped entirely with chisels and a scraper and is slightly over an inch in depth at the deepest part. (so yeah...it is probably going to be a back breaker!) The neck joint is a little different than the traditional Gibson neck joint. (see pics below) The angled dovetale was a major task to get right but my buddies swear by it. It definitely seems to me to be a much more solid connection than a basic mortise-tenon joint. CONTINUED BELOW...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GregA Posted April 22, 2004 Author Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 The fretboard was one of the more challenging parts that has slowed me down and we are a long way from attaching it yet. (see pic below) Hand planing it down to the right taper, making the back perfectly flat, radiusing the top, cutting the frets, binding the edge, inserting the fret markers into the binding...and still a lot of work to do. Add the fact that ebony is extremely fragile and you have one of the biggest jobs in the entire process! We did nail the binding job on the fret board as the mitres on the corners of the board are invisible. (see the pic on the right) The next step wil be to do the perl inlay and finally, install the frets. We went with the traditional Gibson Les Paul shape headstock (**cough**copy infringement**cough**) but decided to go with a bookmatched piece of flamed maple cut from the same piece of wood as the body. (see pic below) Binding the headstock........that was a challenge. Anyone who has tried binding a guitar knows how involved it can be. Compared to the headstock, binding the body and fret board was a walk in the park. The binding and perfling needs to be cut into six pieces and mitred to fit into the routed grove perfectly. Nothing shows up more that a bad mitre on a binding job and this head stock is far from perfect. We did nail most of them really well (see the first pic below..dead on) but we were a tiny bit off on the "dimple" at the top and the bottom right corner (see the second and third pics below). Still, they are not "blatantly" obvious errors so, on the whole, I am really pleased with the results. It really helps to pull the guitar together since it matches the binding on the body. What's next? After the perl inlay and frets are done, we will be shaping the neck then installing the fret board and making wood covers for the back of the guitar. These covers will be made with a veneer of flame maple cut from the same piece of maple that was used for the top. (the toggle switch cover is already done as shown in the pic below) As far as the finish, I am leaning toward a sunburst of some variety. (heritage cherry perhaps?) We will then install the electronics, tuning pegs, pickups etc. (I am thinking about Seymour Duncan Seth Lovers) What else is cool is that there are seven of us each working on our own Les Paul. All are being built using identical methods to mine. The tops all look great and they are all unique in their own way. I will try to get a shot of all seven together when they are done. Anyway, thanks for reading! Greg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Myka Guitars Posted April 22, 2004 Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 Sweet guitar! Nice work. I think a burst on the headstock would look pretty good if it matched the body. Are you going to stain the purfling or will you mask that to keep it white? Nice details on this guitar. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars Posted April 22, 2004 Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 lookin real good. Cant wait to see the final product. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maher Posted April 22, 2004 Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 Great work, looking forward to seeing the finished product Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
krazyderek Posted April 22, 2004 Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 pretty spiffy, very clean craftsmanship at every stage Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devon Headen Posted April 22, 2004 Report Share Posted April 22, 2004 Can't wait to see this one Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mahelcaya Posted April 23, 2004 Report Share Posted April 23, 2004 Great job, it's looking BELLISSIMA ! Did you use the original body shape, do you have a project plan design of it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JFC Posted April 23, 2004 Report Share Posted April 23, 2004 Beautiful Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spirit Posted April 23, 2004 Report Share Posted April 23, 2004 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigtommyb Posted April 23, 2004 Report Share Posted April 23, 2004 Damn that looks Sweet!!! Big Tom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skibum5545 Posted April 23, 2004 Report Share Posted April 23, 2004 once more i must say that the binding is perhaps the best job I have ever seen. Some binding seems gratuitous but the way you layered the colors and did such a good installation job makes the whole thing 10 times better than without the binding. uber-props to you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Posted April 24, 2004 Report Share Posted April 24, 2004 Excellent Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnJohn Posted April 25, 2004 Report Share Posted April 25, 2004 Great Job.Are you gonna use any colours when you finish it? I hope you're going to enter this for Guitar of the month when you're done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
imunwell2 Posted April 26, 2004 Report Share Posted April 26, 2004 WOW! That is good work!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Brown Posted April 26, 2004 Report Share Posted April 26, 2004 Gee whiz! That is a work of art my friend!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maher Posted April 26, 2004 Report Share Posted April 26, 2004 Jee Jilickers RadioActive Man, looks damn sweet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josh Posted May 8, 2004 Report Share Posted May 8, 2004 great stuff. love the binding. can't wait to see the other 6 together with this one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goth_fiend Posted May 8, 2004 Report Share Posted May 8, 2004 ..........whoa , thats awesome! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frankie Posted May 9, 2004 Report Share Posted May 9, 2004 dang dude, i love it. your fretboard looks pretty high in quality, and you're inlays are pretty sweet too Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jehle Posted May 10, 2004 Report Share Posted May 10, 2004 I have yet to try inlays, but that looks like some mighty fine work there. Top notch, and a great choice for a future GOTM! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snork Posted May 11, 2004 Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 that binding is brilliant! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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