guitart

I see the fire breathing devil skull in the top of that wood, but that is just me.You put the neck thru his face.

Yep, straight through the skull

Here's a little fire breathing skull....

Finally did some more work..... man I'm slow.

Crafty! So all you do is build a new sled if you want a different radius?

That is correct sir.... just need to take into consideration the fingerboard height compared to the height of the pipes. Then you can adjust the radius and make a new cradle.....

The jigs that people come up with on this forum are amazing! How many ways can you make the same thing? I'd have to say that this looks like it'll become my favorite way to radius a fingerboard!

Got the idea from another guitar forum... MIMF site

Had to do a new fingerboard.... sanded a little too much at the end to one side

So I decided to to build a jig for a 12 degree radius...

and here is the result

works great and does a 12 degree radius in 5 minutes

Glad I could help. When the guitar gets finished I'll put a few layers of danish oil to help pop the figure on the fretboard.

Little update, got the fretboard radius done along with the fret slots. I hope to get more done next weekend.... I guess we'll see.

cocobolo fretboard

Thanks! I just ordered the rest of the hardware for it,,, I can't wait!

Update, here's some pics from todays work.

reminds me of an oreo cookie.

clamp time..... think I have enough clamps? I'm lucky my dad has a wood shop, he has over 100 various clamps.

Before clamping

Clamped

I decided to not do the bubinga with the cocobolo. In a few years the woods would both turn brown anyway.

Book-match for the back.

Here's the board the top and back came from and I still have enough for another top set.

Went over to my dad's shop tonight and got some work done. Check it out.

here are some of the neck parts,, rough cut and close to thickness.

And here's the top book-match.

I'm thinking about making more of these and going to a local art festival this summer. Try to sell some and get my name out there.

Here's some more pics....

With all the bracing it sounds really nice. It has a bell like ring. I wish I had an audio clip to share.

I'll post some more photos of it later tonight if I can remember.

Here's something I just finished for a friend.

It's a cigar box mandolin with most of the bracing you would find in an acoustic guitar.

There's an X-brace, head/tail blocks and other braces under the bridge and on the back.

Neck woods - anigre, walnut, cocobolo veneer, cocobolo fretboard

Brass with black epoxy dot inlays.

That's really cool that you where able to save it after being in that mess for three weeks. Good luck with the rest of them!

Since the body will only be 1 5/8" thick I think I'll use SPDT switches for each of the pickups.

I have some bubinga strips dimensioned for he neck. I hope I get a chance to work on it some more this weekend.

The wife has me painting the house..... fun fun

Here's the revise that shows the added bubinga and true to scale neck strips.

I think I found a way to mount the pickups with out having to rout out an open area for the wiring.

I'll pre-rout the sides of the neck before attaching the wings. This is where the wire portion of the pickup will slide into.

So from the top of the guitar all you will see is the pickup and its screws. I'll have to make a mock-up and see if it works.

Yesterday I bought some more wood for the guitar. Got some nice quarter sawn bubinga which I will use in the neck and body sandwich. Two strips of bubinga will be used between the three cocobolo strips on the neck. The maple will still be on the sides. For the body the bubinga will go between the cocobolo and the maple as an accent line. On Monday I'll make another concept drawing in photoshop.

I like to sculpt the pickup rings and by layering them they are easier to work with. The sides get so thin and flimsy that if I didn't layer them they would just break, I learned that the hard way.

Anyway, I was at the local guitar shop today looking for pickup covers, which they were out of, and I got to looking at the other guitars that have single coil pickups and how they mounted them.... I think I will just rout out the cavity for them and mount them to the bottom. At least that way I can still contour the body the way that I want. What do you all think?

Here's a quick drawing of the pickup ring.

The ring will be done in cocobolo, in thick veneer layers to make them stronger.

I used adobe illustrator to layout everything at size. I have the bridge, volume, tone, 5-way switch and neck all measured out on other layer in the program.

I brought what I needed into photoshop to render the mock-up. I may need to add pickup rings and that might change the way I shape the surface contour. I'll try to post a drawing of the pickup ring soon.

Thanks for the heads up on the cocobolo bleeding. I've never had a problem with it doing that but you never know. I'll just have to be careful while doing the final shaping.

I have most of the wood, just need to buy some cocobolo for the neck and save some money for the hardware.

Happy New Year!

This is what I want to build in the near future

Neck through construction... alembic style

Body - sandwich - cocobolo maple cocobolo

Neck - cocobolo and maple racing strips

Pickups - seymour duncan 50's set single coil

Tuners - Gotoh 510 chrome

Bridge - Fender style Schaller roller bridge

Fingerboard - cocobolo,,, inlay??? to be determined

It'll be my first neck through guitar and the body will need a 1 degree angle for the bridge if I do my usual 1/4" fingerboard height.

The design is based on carl thompson shape with alembic wood choices and style.

Did some work on the fret board this weekend. Here's some pics.

http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb135/m.../fretboard4.jpg

http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb135/m.../fretboard5.jpg

Kiki- The body is small and the top will be carved. Here's one that I finished

http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb135/m...ar2007005-1.jpg