VanKirk

Yeah drew! That looks cool. Doesn't look like a mistake to me. That neck heel looks really comfy to play on For the pros around here... If lizard's neck pocket mistake is too large could you even all the edges of the pocket and glue in a new block of wood (same wood as the rest of the body) and just re-route? Would this make it more stable than a shim or not worth the effort?

Sorry to hear that Litch Good luck on the move. Been too lazy to PM you but I'll do it soon. This is a great area for Luthiery. You should take a tour of USA Custom Guitars if you get here. Tommy's a really cool guy and has a nice shop. I live close to USAGC & Warmoth is not far (Warmoth still ships parts to me even though I can easily drive there in 20 minutes ). Oh yeah, Tacoma Guitars is here too. The Guild of American Luthiers is in town and there are good sources for wood and parts. I'll have to check but I think they meet this year. They only gather every 4 years I think.

I hope I'm not getting to pic post happy. I made the rib contour deeper. Fits like a glove now Body Rib Contour

Ditto Sounds like a dangerous workshop hehe Laughing about thoughts of you gettin drunk and making guitars. It would be fun to have a few drinks and talk about guitars. I'd learn alot. Thank you again Hyunsu! Very inspiring pics. Careful with the soju and carving knife!

I did the same thing. I used MSPaint and reversed the colors on the pic and had a nice outline. It works really well.

That's the one! Thanks alot!

I know I've been to the Project Guitar member's on-line store but I've lost the link. Anyone know what this link is?

Sorry to clutter up the forum guys. My Fiance designed the decal and a guy that does the decals for my work made a sheet of 8 of them for me with 2 of them in black with the gold border. He made them and delivered them to me at work for VERY cheap. His name is Shane Mascorro. Here's his website Shane Mascorro. Cool guy.

Now that just kicks all kinds of bootay! Here's what Warmoth has in Spalted Maple on Alder Yours puts it to shame!

...and being a Strat guy/Blues player, I have this birdseye maple neck w/rosewood fb from USACG to bolt on this body. Graphtech nut and Sperzel tuners. I think in the future I'll make a 3-3 tuner neck but I love the figuring on this neck.

Sounds like a drug deal j/k

I'm gonna route the neck pocket with a 2 degree angle by just shimming the body side of my template. This way the template will be at the proper angle and my router will follow it. I was thinking I could get the angle with a protractor and use a solid shim under the template. I just need to make sure that the template won't shift as I'm routing once I have it lined up correctly. I'll draw a line on paper that measures the length of the neck pocket. Then I'll use a protractor to find my 2 degrees from neck pocket length line. Then join these two lines to make a 90 degree angle (a right triangle will be formed from all 3 lines). The length of this line will tell me how much to shim the template. Does this sound right to you experts?

I'm not to worried about hijacking this particular thread so I'll give my 2 cents. My understanding is that veneer is VERY thin, like 1/8 to 1/16 of an inch or so. When you say 1/2" that becomes what I'd call a 'top'. The 1/2" figured tops that I've seen are really pricey. I think 1/4" tops seem to be the most common. I'm just guessing but PRS uses tops that are ~3/4" to 5/8" or so and rated at least AAA and better. Really thick and REALLY expensive! The 'A' ratings I believe relate to how many grain lines per square inch, grain pattern and overall grain quality ie...no pitch pockets or knots. Higher the 'A' rating the better the quality.

I've played several guitars and done action set-ups but I am only building my first from scratch now. My guess is that if you go with a straight angle headstock you would less likely have problems if you used graduating tuners or use a string tree or two. I just don't like having string trees on my neck. I think they cover up my nice birdseye maple and they also add more resistance to the strings. I think more string resistance could lead to tuning instability.

Yeah, after i put a little more thought into it this made more sense. Thanks for the input frank falbo. Although, I would guess action setting may play a small part in string tension over the nut but probably very slight.

Thanks alot! Possitive feedback and constructive criticism is MUCH appreciated and only gets me more into this new hobby I've found. This web-site and it's members have been a great resource to me. Thanks! ...and Streamline, if you like that quilt maple here's another pic that I drool over. I set it as my desktop wallpaper. I love the f-holes. I've never played a Don Grosh guitar myself but I like the look. If this goes well I'll have to try a semi-hollow, quilt top version. Don Grosh Sunburst As far as the finish goes, I don't have spray equipment or a well ventilated area to spray in. I'm also inexperienced at finishing although there are some very good on-line resources to help me out. I'm thinking I may go with a Tru-oil finish for easy application. I've heard that this is a polymerized linseed oil that builds a nice gloss better than straight tung oil does. I know Alder isn't usually a stunning grain kinda wood but this piece looks pretty good to me. I may try some dye & the Preval sprayer to go for a transparent cherry burst but I still have time to think about it. Things are going slow since I'm on a budget and have limited tools.

On the Kurzweil K25/26 series keyboards the player controll has 1 mod wheel, 1 spring loaded pitch wheel and a 3" x 1" pitch strip with after touch MIDI controllers. I can provide the schematics for this section but you would have to slightly modify this circuit to work. Just make sure you don't mass produce this circuit and sell it (copyright infringements). After thinking about my earlier post on this thread I don't think the MIDI wheels would be very practical to control real-time effects. It would be tough to use while playing. It would still be cool for lighting control though. If you have trouble with finding the pitch strip PM me and I can get you one for a reasonable price. It has an adhesive back and I could even look into a plastic bezel for it but something outta wood would be cool. You would have to redesign the circuit to have only the pitch strip but you could even make it pressure sensitive so you can have 2 MIDI signals from 1 pitch strip. The only Scanner microprocessor that I know of for this circuit would be the M37451 IC (Motorola?) but it seems like it would be more power than is needed in this situation. You'd have to research this thoroughly.

They use a thicker top than I can afford and carve it.

By "keeper" you must mean the string tree. I have also noticed that on a Fender style guitar the tuners for the lower gauge strings are closer to the nut causing a steeper angle thus, more tension over the nut. The tuners further from the nut have less angle causing less string tension over the nut. I don't seem to have any problems with my 6 in-line tuners on my straight headstock. I just put my strings on so that the strings wrap around the tuner from top to bottom. This way I don't need the string tree covering up my birdseye maple. When I put this neck on the body I'm making I'll angle the whole neck pocket. Then I shouldn't ever have any problem with string tension over the nut. Any of the experienced guys here please correct me if I'm wrong.

Yeah, would be cool to have something different. A buddy of mine is going to change the pups on his PRS and is going to sell me his old ones if I wire in his new ones. I should give them a try...but 2 PAFs with gold covers/hardware, also thinkin about the Hipshot Babygrand for the bridge...hmmm I have Sperzels on the neck already. I'll have to start looking for some PAFs Thanks for the input. Here's a Grosh guitar and possible hardware I may go with. I don't trust myself enough on this one to carve a quilted maple top. I'm still thinking Hipshot Babygrand for the bridge with either single coils or humbuckers. Don Grosh Guitar Here's the bridge Hipshot Babygrand Bridge BTW...I Posted these pics at PHOTOBUCKET.COM

Here's another noobie posting my first time guitar work-in-progress. 2 piece Alder body. I'm going to make the rib contour bigger than it is in the pics. It's going to have a carved top as well. It's my 'tele-prs kinda body' similar to Don Grosh guitars. I'm a blues player and will probably have 2 single coil pups and a bridge humbucker. Still deciding if I may want 2 PAFs though since I already have strats & with 3 single coils. Body

Bummer Ansil Ibanez should have a receiving log from their shipping dept showing that they got it. If you have any proof of shipment (such as a picking ticket from shipping company) then you could send Ibanez a copy. If they have never received it and you, Ibanez or shipping company have no proof of shipment then you may be SOL but if any proof is available then they owe you some dough. The longer you wait though, the harder it will be to proove. Squeeky wheel gets the greese as they say. I would be pissed thinking some guitar tech at Ibanez took my axe! I wouldn't take "we lost it" for an answer without some kinda compensation. Tell 'em your band is ready to purchase all Ibanez gear and you'll have to change your mind if this doesn't get resolved. Just keep your cool and be as business-like as you know how to be. I always insure my gear with the shipping company to avoid this kinda thing. That way the shipping company compensates you and they go after Ibanez for reimbursement.

Hmmm....Most all major keyboard manufacturers have pitch/mod wheels that send MIDI messages. I bet I could make a small circuit that would xmit MIDI messages and use a small spring loaded 'return to zero' mod wheel and a small pitch strip with touch sensitivity. Keyboards have had them for years and there are many, many devices out there that receive MIDI messages. All that the modulation wheel and pitch strip would be responsible for would be to xmit MIDI values. Any device it's connected to would do the rest of the work. ie...the spring loaded mod wheel could xmit MIDI value 127 at the middle detent, 0 at the 'bottom' end and 255 at the 'top' end. The MIDI device that it's connected to could be used to decode this value into a pitch value, reverb value, flange, whatever the connected device can do. This must have been done in some other form before but I like the idea of a small diameter mod wheel and pitch/touch sensitive strip on-board the guitar. Hmmm....Bridge the gap between keyboards and guitars. Anyone seen one like this before? If so could I get the link, please. For an idea of what I mean, go to a local keyboard dealer and play a Korg or Kurzweil and move the mod wheel around a bit. Shooot! Sry Biohazard. I didn't mean to hijack your thread. Thanks for getting me think about it though.

I'm an Electronic Technician at Kurweil and I deal alot with MIDI controllers. My thought is that it would be much easier to have a MIDI interface controlled by a ribbon or slider. To add a direct effect like you want to your guitar would take electronic engineering experience and alot of time. At this point MIDI is the way to go. The Brian Moore iGuitar has a built in jack that can connect directly to Roland MIDI devices. This way you could get your wah effects as well as many others. Roland also has a MIDI pickup that you can add to an existing guitar (whoa! did I just endorse Roland?!) Oh yeah! Kurzweil has the XM-1 expressionmate but it's a huge ribbon.

Hello Hyunsu! Beautiful Flame Maple neck! Your pictures are exactly why I browse these forums! Very useful. You show us great work and we get to see tools in use and your progress in very clear pictures. EXCELLENT!!! Thank You!