jay5

Fender, that sounds like a sweet deal you have going! I may take you up on the offer in the future. I will definately have to check out Capital City Lumber. Thanksd for the heads up. How much did you pay for the ash?

It would be great to get a group of local luthiers together! I was actuall wondering if there were any professionals in the area. There is a violin maker in downtown Raleigh that I want to pay a visit to.

I was impressesed that woodcraft had the selection they had. I am sure if we asked for certain things they would accomidate. they were pretty helpful when I was there. I was hoping to find some wood suitable for neck blanks. I am limited in my tool inventory so the closest I can get to workable dimensions the better. I might ask them about that next trip. I am making sketches for a miter box. I should have something design-wise in a few days. Well see.

Erik, I am sure that the Stewmac stuff will do the job, I just dont want to spend the money on somthing I think I might be able to build. Im glad you have had success, hopefully I will be able to do the same

The LGM constellation

Nice touch Jeremy!

Fender, believe it or not I am in the Triangle! Cary to be exact. Thats funny Leave me a few to mess up if you dont mind Like you said the cost of the Stewmac setup was my main issue in starting this earlier but I am confident that I could come up with some form of miter box that would work. I too havent been able to find an adequet saw locally either. How did you make your radiusing blocks? I was going to try the router jig method next weekend.

Frenzy, they have some great videos on that site! I was also contemplating that method but I dont have a table saw or radial arm saw. I am also leary of the power behind some power tools, especially on a 1/4" piece of wood I was looking around and LMI sells a Japanese pull saw that will cut a .023" kerf on the pull stroke, although I cant actually find out how much it is on the site. It got pretty good praise over on the MIMF forum. My only reason for wanting a miter box was for the extra control. It would allow me to make sure my cuts were perfectly perpendicular to the face of the board as well as square to one side. The LMI box looks like it has some nice design features;

http://www.lmii.com/CartTwo/thirdproducts....Slotting+System

I want to get some of that plastic that you can get for jigs and such for the areas that contact the blade. I think it will allow for a smoother cut and less wear on the saw. http://www.woodcraft.com/Woodcraft/product...FE6177244E54BDC

Check out this link, this is the wood I found at my local dealer. Some of the woods are a little more than $8 but they have some nice stuff. Bolivian rosewood is $8, purpleheart is $7. The ones at the actual Woodcraft I went to were really nice pieces. I saw them from about 10 feet away and was like "Hey, those are fretboards!"

http://www.woodcraft.com/Woodcraft/dept.as...FE6177244E54BDC

WWW, I was shocked when I heard that about their saws too ACspike, that is a cool idea. Thanks for the pics.

Great work Setch! I knew I had seen that pic floating around before. What blades did you use? How long are each of those? Thanks!

I just bought 3 finger plane blades from International Luthiers; I have a semi-hollow with a carved top in the works so I figured this would be a fun, worthwile project.

http://www.internationalluthiers.com/tools.php

I was going to get 2 but the minimum credit card order was $20 There really wasnt anything else on the site that interested me at the moment anyway. I got a toothed 12mm, a toothed 18mm, and a standard 12mm. I am really not sure if those were the right sizes or not. I am thinking I should have gotten a standard 18mm instead of a standard 12mm, but oh well. These were by the way the lowest prices I was able to find for blades on the net. Anyway, there were a few threads on the MIMF forum about finger planes (and making your own) so I think I might be ok. I have some quartersawn bloodwood and some 1/4" rosewood i will be using for the bodies. Bloodwood in the middle and rosewood laminated to each side. There are a couple of diagrams and pictures flotaing around at MIMF that I will be basing mine off of. As soon as the blades arrive I will be getting started and I will take some pics. Does anyone have any experience with this kind of thing that they would like to share? I am still contemplating what angle to set the blades at as well as weather or not to use a simple wedge to secure the blade or a screw/lever kind of deal. ANy help is welcome Thanks guys!

I have decided that I would like to try slotting my own fingerboards. I figure in the long run it will be cheaper and it is somthing I would like to learn. Plus my local Woodcraft stocks 3"X 20ish"X 1/4" pieces of hardwood (about 10 kinds I could actually use) and they run about $8 a piece. I have read on the MIMF forum that the Stewmac fret saw is junk. I also dont feel like paying that much for their miter box either. So my question is, what saws do you all use and has anyone made their own miter box for slotting? I am pretty confident I could do this but I am curious as to any input on a design. Thanks to all!

You will have to rout out the cavities a little larger if it has standard tele routs. Im pretty sure you will have to use a pickguard to cover the rear rout. Where are you getting the body from?

HAHAHAHAHA! You gave it a last smoke! I admire your dedication Hyunsu. Cant wat to see what you do with the parts.

I would think you would want more than the standard 3/4" depth of a fender style neck for gluing. I might be wrong though. What would be the advantage of gluing it in if you still had the chunky fender heel?

Yeah, the binding will be the main issue for me. Youre neck looks pretty good. I am still trying to get my headstock template just right.

P.S.-are you going to leave the little stairstep extension on that tailpiece? I think it might look better if you cut it off.

Try to make an intelligent topic title. You'll get a better response. "Super-stupid dumbass question" isnt going to get you very far. Just ask what you want to know and someone will answer, promise. Unless its a dumb stupid idiot question

Thats classy! Leave it white and do a black control plate. I really like it

I havent figured out the binding issue. I really dont know how to rout a rabbit around the body. I havent done the math to see what size bearing i would need to get the right depth. Im still working on a tele project. I dont want to get too ahead of myself. Im reworking my headstock template right now.

You can certailnly do it with a template and a router but I would HIGHLY advise rough cutting the body out first. You will put unnescessary(sp?) strain on the bit otherwise. Try rough cutting with the jigsaw first. One thing to be super careful about with this method is when doing curves. A jigsaw blade will torque on curves and while you might not see it on the top, you will be cutting inside your line on the bottom. I messed up a perfectly good blank doing this. Anyway, just be careful, go slow and you should be in good shape.

Cool, where did you get it? How much? I forgot, but have you started the body?

I think the Bennedetto book shows how to make such a tool with pieces of old bandsaw blades. I agree that a string wont cut any nut material.

I would just do as wide as necessary to mount the bridge. The less material you leave the more acoustic volume you should get (more chance of feedback as well). In my gretsch semi-hollow project I decided to do away with all the material down the center except for a block directly under the bridge. I left adequet room for the neck pocket in front and a small heel block for a strap pin but otherwise everything else is gone. PRS uses this method on their archtops. What type of semihollow are you attempting?

Something about it.....

P.S. John5 is an AMAZING player

I would just use this fact as a way to elevate yourself above the other sellers on ebay. Why not include a short description of grading wood in your auctions. Then print up some more detailed wood grading info and send it out with each purchase. That way, buyers would be better informed and would be able to pick through the crap out there (and realize you have the good stuff! ). Then, I bet you would have a lot more repeat buyers. Don't just give up. Help people make a good purchase. I know I would appreciate such help. I have come across a lot of wood on ebay that I held off of because I wasnt exactly sure what I would get.

Hyunsu, are you going to try to build a hollow body?

Denis Waring's book mas my first and is great for building a solidbody electric. He also goes through building a neck through bass. Great color pics throughout. Martin Koch's book, whill a little unorganized is great. He shows several ways to do almost every aspect of a build. Good for those with limited tools. He also touches on semi-hollows as well. Robert Benedetto's bood is also great. Super quality pictures. I will say that out of all of the books I have seen (I have the three I have mentioned) I like Melvin's book the least. Not sure why, I just never really liked it. I work at a Barnes and Noble so I can safetly say that I have seen just about all the build books out there at one time or another. Still a good book, but my favorites are the three I have listed. Good luck with it, I know several others love it.