Grindell

Don't know if anyone else saw it, but I got an email from Grizzly this AM about a sale on their Heirloom Guitar kit for $225. I ordered two, just to see what the quality is like.

Just out of curiosity, what kind of knee surgery did your mom have? My dad had a complete knee replacement about 2 months ago. It was really weird, he only hit the morphine pump, like, 3 times, and he was released after the 3rd day, but they probably could have released him after two. The doctor said he'd never seen anything like it. He was out mowing the lawn after the 3rd week with a pushmower. If they take my entire knee out and put in an artificial joint, I'm going to hit that morphine drip as fast as I can! Man, I hope I don't have to have that done....

Darren, I belong to AMPGE. Try www.ampge.com. I get all my pickup parts there. They sound great, actually. I wound them to about 10900 turns, and they are RWRP, so they are hum cancelling in the middle. I used 42SPN wire, and ceramic magnets for a little hotter, sharper sound.

Thanks, krazyderek. I wanted something a little different, so I just removed everything that didn't look right. The cutaway on the lower horn was done with a JET oscillating spindle sander. I chucked up the biggest sleeve I had and held the guitar at that angle and sanded away. After a couple of mintues, I had the perfect cutaway there.

I hand stained the top with blue first, then cleared over the whole guitar, about 3 coats. Lightly sanded the top, just to level, then sanded the sides and back. I mixed up a shader of Colortone and blue dye, with a drop of black, then sprayed the first burst, which you can't actually see in the photo, but you can in person. Then, I added a little more black dye and shot the outside again, moving closer to the edge. Then I taped off the front and shot the opaque black on the back and sides. Untaped and shot the solid black on the front, curling over the edges to complete the burst. I'm getting ready to do a Tobacco sunburst for the first time, maybe I'll take some pics of that process to show.

The body is done with Colortone water based, the neck is done in Tru-Oil. The p90's I wound.

This is my newest guitar. A flamed maple top, alder back Tele-style guitar.

They have the same thing, except for it being a knock-off brand of clamps, at Menards here in the midwest for $3.99.

I got a deep red using the red, plus a couple of drops of black. I also enhanced the grain with black before coating with red. See the pic below.

I'll maybe try a test this weekend with a 3/8 and another with a 1/2, and I'll post the pics. Thanks for the quick reply!

This is kinda late in the process, but what size router bit did you use to cut the access for the truss rod? I saw you said you used a core bit, but what size? I was thinking of going with a 3/8". But, I was going to test first, of course. I'm getting ready to do a similar guitar, and I was going to do the top a little different, but your idea probably makes more sense than mine. Good work, though. Excellent job so far!

I've got it down to about 2 hours to machine the wood, cut the truss rod, and glue the fingerboard on. Then, about another 2 hours to bandsaw to shape, flush trim and shape the back using spokeshaves and rasps. Then, about 1 hour for final sanding, fretting, putting in the side dots and fingerboard dots. So, 5 hours total, then finishing time, maybe 3 horus spread over a couple of weeks. That includes spraying, sanding, and final polishing. Then, about 1 hour for the final fret job and buff and polish the frets, and 1 hour for the nut. I'm really slow when it comes to making nuts, as I hate to have to start from scratch. Soooo, about 10 hours total.

In a kind of off topic way, I use pickgaurd material like that in the wooden pens I turn. I'll use the .90 thick tortise shell to make a custom center band, and I use b/w/b pickgaurd material to make a striped band running through the body of the pen. When I'm done, I buff them out using the same buffer and compound I use on guitar finishes. You have to be carefull sanding the pickguard material, as it heats up when you sand at 3000rpm. I always wet sand mine. Don't know how that would work on a guitar, though. If you hand sanded, it would probably be ok. Ok, I did use a piece of binding material for the stem of my vine inlay, that worked out great. I'd assume pickguards are made of the same stuff.

Ebony. I think it loses definition on the maple, but then, I'm color blind so maybe that has something to do with it.

I should have said, per bobbin, not per pickup. 4500 per bobbin, for a total of 8.9k ohms.

Thanks. The pickups were wound to 8.9k Ohms, which for me was, if I remember right, 4500-4700 turns per pickup. I used wire from Essex, but I just bought wire from Wirenetics. The bobbins are forbon, with A5 rod magnets, and 42 gauge SPN wire. Thanks for all the kind comments.

Pickups weren't hard to wind. I built my own pickup winder rom the Lollar book. You can go to home.mchsi.com/~kswaim to see a pic.

Oh, I almost forgot the specs. It is 34" scale lenght. THe neck through core is braz. cherry, walnut, maple, walnut, braz. cherry. The body wings are figured bubinga, maple, and figured bubinga. Fingerboard is Wenge, headstock plate is figured bubinga. Frets are Stew-Mac jumbo. Pickups I wound myself. Bridge is a Leo Quahn BadAss, tuners are Gotoh. Finish is 6 coats of Danish oil, of which the last 2 are wet sanded with 600 grit and Danish oil. Then, a coat of paste wax. The S inlay for my name, Swaim, I cut out of abalone and inlayed with epoxy. Nut is bone. There is a thin strip of ebony between the nut and headstock. I wanted to get ebony on there somewhere, but I only had some small pieces of ebony, so I made the slot for the nut wider, then used a thin strip of ebony to fill the space. I thought about using ebony for a binding around the headstock, but I didn't have enough for that, either. The shape I drew from a Ibanez Roadstar bass, then started cutting way until I found the shape I liked.

This is one I built. I wanted the headstock shape to be unique to me, but I also wanted it to be heavy, to counter-weight the body. Plus, I wanted it to have a lot of mass, so that it would help sustain. I didn't want a 4 to the side config, so I bought a 4 to the side and a 2 to the side set, then made 2 3+1 sets. The thing sounds amazing. I wound the pickups to about 8.9k, which is a little weak, but I have a 4X10 cabinet, and can more than make up for volume that way. Plus, the notes ring out like a bell. I can play a full 4 note chord, and there is no loss of definition. My friend Nathan has played it, and he agreed on the sound. It almost sounds like piano strings, they way they ring.

Since it was my bass, I figure I would add my own pickgaurd. I just drew one out about 4 or 5 times, then picked the best one. I haven't seen one quite like it before, I figure I was in good shape!

Like these? Yes, exactly like those! Thanks! I guess they are bronze, not brass. My mistake.

Oh, and I bought one of those concave spokeshaves, the green painted kind they sell at Woodcraft, but it was junk. The arc of the blade doesn't match the arc of the sole of the spokeshave, you almost can't set the blade depth correctly, and the chipbreaker is junk.