avengers63

I completely missed the discussion about slotting the nut. All the questions and issues brought up? Those are some of the reasons I use a zero fret and have the nut serve as a placement guide. 

It's been a busy couple of days for me out in the garage. We had neck deconstruction, making new templates, laying out the three new necks, routing the truss rods, cutting out the new necks & routing to the templates, picking out new fretboard woods, milling the f/b blanks, routing the radius, and slotting. 

I particularly like milling lumber. I can't esplain it, but re-sawing, planing, and jointing are satisfying to me. Some folks here like doing wiring, some like finishing. I like milling and shaping.

First up is the deconstruction....

Template layout tools of the trade...

This is how far off the old templates were...

New necks. 

Top to bottom: quartersawn white oak reverse banana for the Aelita, Spanish cedar for the Jackson Kelly, and big-head maple for the StraTeleCaster

Next are the new fretboards...

Left to right: bloodwood, mahogany, maple, beli, hickory, tzalam, and some unknown cutoff I found at Woodcraft. I'm disappointed at how featureless the tzalam is, but pleased with how much character hickory has.

Welcome to the club. I hope you've said your goodbyes to any disposable income you might have in the future.

12 minutes ago, nakedzen said:

Also, well shit

I feel ya.

If you had any idea how many times something like that has happened to me.....

Any given barrier finish can be used to pore fill. You simply have to sand-back until the pores are filled. If you use c/a, you'll almost certainly seal the area around the pores, preventing the oil from penetrating.

Strictly speaking, you don't HAVE to pore fill the fretboard. But if you don't you'll risk the pores filling up with gunk.

57 minutes ago, ADFinlayson said:

oooh that veneer looks amazing, never see anything that nice around these parts

https://www.veneersupplies.com/

I can't imagine why they wouldn't ship to the UK.

2 hours ago, henrim said:

Raw or lightly oiled padouk gets considerably darker in less time than a clear coated or shellac treated surface.

What he said.

Nothing will stop it from darkening. In your case, I would put a barrier finish like lacquer on it for the same reason you'd do that to a maple board. The sap wood will get filthy in a hurry.

So here is where everything has completely gone to hell.

Several weeks ago, I made a couple of neck templates for 1-piece, dropdown, Fender-style necks. One was a banana, the other pointy.  Well, I screwed them up. The heel is too narrow by over 1/4". I honestly don't know how it happened. The base I used was my old neck taper template that has been working perfectly for as long as I've been doing this. I even used IT as the template to route the new templates for the shaft. 

What this means is that the necks I prepped for the Aelita, Kelly, StraTeleCaster, and 2 others are unusable. I'm honestly more aggravated over the wasted lumber than having to make the templates and necks again. 

So if you heard me cussing, that's why.

On the good side, I sold the old bandsaw, table saw, and a tool stand. Wifey let me go to Rockler & Woodcraft today and get some more lumber to replace what I demolished.

quartersawn beli that will make 2 fretboards, quartersawn white oak that will make 2 necks, flatsawn maple for at least 2 necks, and a piece of bloodwood flooring that will be planed down to be a fretboard. I got all of these from "dumpster diving" in their cutoffs bin. The prices aren't special (except for the $3.50 bloodwood), but I'm also not buying a huge piece of lumber when I only need it 30ish inches long.

Then there's the spanish cedar and black limba. THESE and the QSWO are what I was pissed about losing. 

And now I'm bound and determined to make the replacements even better than the originals. I will not be defeated by my own foolishness. Stalled, but not defeated.

Just in case you didn't know: Paduk is an amazing reddish brown that nearly glows when its freshly worked. A year later it's a dark, rich reddish brown. But the sapwood doesn't darken appreciably. So sometime next year, that fretboard will have an amazing level of contrast. I highly encourage you to get the line of demarcation as close to the middle as possible for maximum impact. 

I highly recommend using crushed stone for the smaller bits. 1) It comes in various sizes, including powdered. 2) It's a hellofalot easier than cutting out the teeny pieces of shell. 3) Using both stone & shell will give the impression of varied textures, enhancing the overall visual interest of the package.

I cut through about  3/8" of my fingertip once - nail and all. About 1/32" of nail held it together.  About half of it reattached. The rest grew back, but there's no feeling there.

Burl is weird.

You see, it absorbs a crap-ton of both dye and finish.  It also reflects light in odd ways. This makes getting good photos of test pieces difficult. These pics look a TON better as a small pic rather than a large one. Hopefully, you'll be seeing these on a phone instead of a monitor. Maybe you can just look at the monitor from the other side of the room.

I did three test pieces, then hit them with some rattle can poly I had lying around. In order below are the plain burl, brown dye, heritage cherry dye, then a brown sanded back with the cherry over it. Once you view the last pic at the proper size, well.... there won't be any question what I'm going to do to this thing.

The uncolored burl is a little bland. The brown is pretty good. The red is total garbage. But the sandback.... dude!

Out of the clamping cauls. Even if the red dye doesn't work out, this burl is gonna be amazing under some lacquer.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but it's my understanding that "march of the hammers" is a customary, if not mandatory, progress pic, even though nobody really cares about it.

I've seen some brands use meranti on their lower end guitars. I hadn't heard of it before they started using it. It's reported to have a mahogany-like tone. All I can testify to is that it was labeled as African mahogany, but it doesn't smell like it. I'm confident that Rockler named it exactly what their lumber mill sold it to them as. 

Whatever it is, it's what this body is made of, and enough to make another. 

I completely forgot that I had made a 2-piece Spanish cedar blank a few weeks ago. I've been wanting a SC neck for some time now. A bloodwood fretboard is appropriate as I'm hoping to make the body a woody red. Even if the dye doesn't work out, the burl has red undertones.

How many can I have going on at once! I have the High End, Kit Bash, Aelita, StraTeleCaster, Church guitar, and now this thing. I have to fight myself to not start the Rickenbacker 4000G I've been planning for months.

So I bought these bad boys at Christmas when Wylde was having a good sale. The pair were around $120 shipped.

As they are traditionally used as metal pickups, they needed a proper home. Not just any shape would do. As I've wanted a Kelly for years, here we go!

2-piece poplar body. I've also been jonesing to use some of the veneer I picked up a few months ago. Of the three I bought, it's the one I only picked up because it was really cheap that is wide enough to cover the body. I was really wanting to use the quilted maple and do a dye/sandback to make it look like lava, but that wasn't to be. Life goes on.

My high-tech jig to joint the edge of the veneer. Don't laugh - it works perfectly. Run that through the jointer and the veneer doesn't chip out.

And, of course, I was in the middle of the glue-up when I remembered about the contact cement. 

I'm going to experiment with some cutoff burl and some red dye. I haven't decided on the neck yet, but it'll prolly be African mahogany. For the bridge, I've been holding on to a gold Kahler-esque trem made by Schaller. You can see it in the bottom right of the last pic. This seems like the right home for it.

On a less cat-pissy note...

Reverse hocky stick quartersawn white oak neck with quartersawn cherry fretboard. If oak is anything like ash, and I suspect it is as they are structurally similar, this neck will add a distinctive mid-range growl to the bottom end of the mahogany body. Single coil pups are naturally bright, so this should have an overall good tonal balance.

10 minutes ago, mistermikev said:

mahog just smells so nice when you work it... sort of that cinnamon thing.  that... walnut and oak are my fav smells!  "these are a few of my favorite smells..."

 

Bloodwood is the best. It smells like Christmas cookies. I've encountered a couple that smell like cat piss. IIRC, Spanish cedar was one of them. And then there's poplar. It sometimes gives me dry heaves.

40 minutes ago, mistermikev said:

...all that said i'm sure I'll swear!

Surely the only part of the process common to all builders. It is definitely an intrigal part of mine! 

I dig it.  I'm hoping for something similar with the Aelita. 

On 4/24/2023 at 5:39 PM, ScottR said:

At which point I commenced to sanding rocks. Wood is easier.

YES IT IS!!!!!!! Welcome to the Crushed Stone Inlay Club.

In investigating crushed stone inlay, I discovered something we already knew: some rocks are harder than others. This means that some are far more appropriate for inlay as they will sand smooth far easier. Would that I had made this logical connection earlier. 

In hindsight, it seems best to me too mix the sizes of stones when doing the inlay. You have large voids, so you used larger stone. This left noticeable gaps. Mixing in a smaller grit would have helped fill those in. 

On 4/22/2023 at 6:41 AM, henrim said:

I can see a nightmarish hellscape where the little birdseye things are the faces of condemned souls. Seeing this immediately might explain a few things about me.

13 minutes ago, Prostheta said:

Again, I'm probably preaching to the converted here however it really does help to spend time tuning the blade, getting the wheels balanced and coplanar and aligning the bearings. Setup setup setup.

Here's a beast for you.

https://www.weinig.com/en/solid-wood/band-resaws/variosplit-900/variosplit-900.html

Now THAT is a resawing machine, even if it is on the side of line automation. Those can automatically throw out clean 3mm splits with no issues at all.

I agree 100%. Bandsaws are ridiculously versatile, but this comes at a price. They are fiddly beasts who can be quite temperamental at times. Wifey tells me I am much the same.  I did the initial setup already. The fine-tuning won't happen until I get it onto the mobile base. Yes, fully stationary is best. In my shop, it just isn't a possibility. We do the best with what we have.

And who among us could afford that type of saw! Some of us are gunshy at the price of higher end pickups and tuners. That thing is just in fantasy land.

Yes sir! You have no idea how grateful I am that you gifted me that setup what... 10 years ago? It has really made life immensely easier.

So three coats later and I'm satisfied that the results will come out basically like I was anticipating. This gives me the confidence to go ahead and start on the two bodies I'll be using this technique on. After I get a little bit of a thickness built up, I'll be sanding it smooth. Lather/rinse/repeat until I'm satisfied with the results.

Mahogany on the left, white limba on the right. So wait.... I didn't tell you about the white limba Strat body routed for a Nashville Tele setup? It might just have something to do with one of the quartersawn white oak necks I have in the garage that I also didn't tell y'all about. Or it might not. There might be a maple Strat neck hiding out there. 

Ans speaking of things I've been keeping to myself....

Bubinga neck/bubinga fretboard. 1) This stuff is dense. 2) It also polishes up smooth as glass. 3) Crushed stone inlay is fun. 4) This wood is THIRSTY! It's just drinking up the linseed oil. This is the 3rd heavy coat just on the top. The next day there it looks mostly dry. I hope all this moisture being introduced doesn't do anything untoward to the wood.