Myka Guitars

HiTone, I must not have gotten your email or something. I looked again and I couldn't find it. Sorry about that! I make my own brass hinges from 1/2" wide 3/16" thick stock and a piece of 3/32" steel rod for the pin (usually a finish nail). I drill a hole for the hinge pin and then a couple anchor holes to attach it to the body. Then I cut a slot into the tailpiece to fit the hinge (I use a router but you can use a 1/4" forstner bit and chisels). Make sure the slot is not too wide so the hinge fits snug. Then drill the pin hole in the tailpiece through one side only. I clamp the tailpiece in a drill vise for this. Once the pin hole is drilled I put the hinge into the slot and clamp it square. I then drill the remainder of the pin hole using the actual hinge as a guide. This produces a much more accurate hole considering the flexible 3/32" bit. Get the pieces buffed and finished and then the pin fits good I push the pin into the tailpiece and fill the hole with a wood/epoxy mixture to cover it up. Here are some pics: You can see some more here: tailpiece hinge pictures. Sorry about the poor quality photos. This is from 5 years ago! ~David

I have to totally disagree on this, the book is a waste of money. When this book gets into any technical detail it references Benedetto's book. So if you want to know about archtops and the details get the Benedetto book. And then there's the chapter about how to make your molds, forget it. He casts plaster off an old Guild without protecting the guitar and then uses his van to "clamp" them together. He fails to offer any useful advice on how to actually craft a model from scratch and make a decent mold from it. There also is no alternatives to the van mentioned so those of us that would want to do this in their own shops are at a loss once again with this book. You are much better off testing out some of your own ideas than getting this book. Just my $.02 One way already mentioned is to bend solid wood to a curve. This can work but I prefer to make my arches so that they are not under tension. I use a mold that I press veneer onto in layers using a vacuum bag system. If you use standard veneer thickness and laminate about 4-5 sheets together the pressure needed is not excessive and you could get away with using clamps but you would have to have a male and female form. The trick with both techniques is carving the molds. Take your time with this and you will have good results. This picture is of a guitar I did that has a solid carved spruce top with a veneer over the top: ~David

Please don't do that. Use good tonewood always. With a great finish like that you should use great wood. Otherwise what's the point? Really nice job! I love the mutli-level finish. I've got some gold and copper leaf I am experimenting with currently. I can't wait to get started now that I've seen this. Thanks for the inspiration! ~David

This next guitar is for a good friend of mine from WNY where I grew up. I saw him playing and I wanted to build him a guitar. I lent him my #001 and it was all over. This one has the body made from the same board as #001. Curly black limba body The top is a great piece from the Woodnut in California. It has a nice subtle curl all the way through: Curly claro top The body has a cool little detail that I came up with as an offering for my clients who want binding but don't have the budget for full on wood binding and purfling. I call it simple binding because it is very easy to do, takes very little time, and looks amazing. First I route a ledge in the body edge (pics are from #070): Simple binding ledge and binding Then it gets glued into place. I make the binding taller and wider than I need it so I can just bend it and glue it in quickly without fussing over it. After gluing I send the body and binding through the drum sander to flush it up prior to gluing on the top. Then the top is glued on and the binding and top is routed to shape using the body as a template. The result is a fine black line on the edge: Simple binding complete This guitar needs some neck work to catch up to the other but here is it so far: More to come in a couple days. ~David

It's been a little while since I had the time to post anything from start to finish lately but here we go. I have two projects underway that are happening side by side. The first is a simple yet killer combination of Korina (white limba) and Brazilian rosewood like the old V's and Explorers but in a 15" single cut shape. I got a great set of Korina from Marc at Gilmer that I made the body and top with. Here's a pic of the top prior to carving: Korina topy The body is chambered quite a bit to open it up. I made the material thick in between the chambers so that it still responds with that heavy chunk that I like so much in a fully solid guitar. Chembered body Body and top before vacuuming the top In the vacuum press The neck is pretty simple. Korina neck with Brazilian fretboard and binding. I got the Brazilian from an old barn beam in Brazil. After cutting away the rot I got several fretboards, headstock veneers, knobs, and bridge parts. And it is the old chocolate brown Brazilian. Love it! I was jamming on the neck build when verhoevenc was here so I didn't photograph all the steps (there's more detail to the next build). The front and back of the neck contrast so nicely with the Brazilan fretboard and Korina headstock veneer on the front and the Korina neck and Brazilian headstock veneer on the back. Headstock front Headstock back Here it is so far: Next post the Walnut guitar... ~David

Robbie, Nice work as usual. Love the new bridge! How do you like the Q-tuner pickups? They look incredible to me but I haven't tried them, yet. Let us know what you think about their adjustability and tonal range. ~David

Who is this guy?! And how did he get templates for my shapes?!?!?!?! j/k: this is Chris on David's computer! Chris

Spruce body guitars are great sounding. With a resonant neck these guitars sound great. In addition to playing a Turner (WRC body) and one of Steve Klein's headless guitars with a spruce body and a rosewood neck I have also built one. I love it now. I cannot recommend it enough. Once thing to think about is the softness of the spruce. To deal with this I wrapped the body in a harder wood (in this case walnut). It is just a veneer and the spruce is the dominant tonewood. Here is a pic: Here is the rest of the in progress gallery so you can see some more of the veneer details: Spruce/rosewood guitar. And the finished gallery. I used a rosewood neck for this, a sitka body, and an Adirondack top. This guitar was the most harmonically beautiful sounding electric guitar I have ever played (the Klein being a close second). Amazing combination. I have one more neck plank and it's going on my personal spruce electric (as soon as I find the time to make it). ~David

Hey Matt, I just checked up on what you are doing and man, you have come a long way since you started building! That is a beautiful guitar. The details are very nice and it looks like a great player. Nice job. Good for you for taking all the timeline comments in stride and finishing with a killer axe! ~David

I built two guitars with veneer over carved top. I used a vacuum bag setup and it worked well. Make sure you do a couple of dry runs. The middle will want to separate because of the carve but you can compensate by making gaps at the tail and neck areas of teh book match. If you are doing one piece it might split on you, but if you dry run it first you will know. I used regular wood glue rolled on pretty thin and had no problems. Here is one guitar where you can see the veneer from the edge: Veneered carve top. And the finished guitar. Have fun, these are great to build! ~David

I agree that the neck angle is too much and as a result you will have a very tall bridge/saddle height. While this won't necessarily make it unplayable what it will do is add some extra rotational force to the soundboard via the bridge. Over time this will deform the top of the guitar more easily than a lower bridge height will. How much so depends on your bracing. If you have heavy bracing you will get more life out of it. If you braced it lightly you could find that the top deforms radically and within a short period of time. This will affect the tone of the guitar and it will ultimately affect playability when the top starts to dip and pulls the neck up. It's all about leverage and the higher string height equates to more leverage (pulling/rotating force on the bridge). But the short answer is no it won't make it unplayable in the short term. In the long term you might have some more serious structural issues to deal with. So you just might end up resetting the neck in a couple of years anyway. It is not that difficult to remove a neck and if you plan to have this guitar for years you might want to just go ahead and do it right. Check out this article from Frank Ford. It might be easier than you think. For what it's worth I shoot for a 1/2" bridge height when the guitar is complete. 5/8" seems too high but I have seen guitars like this. Not sure how they look after a few years though. ~David

I will have some more progress of this one very soon. I have just been slammed over here and haven't had much time to update the website. I'll post here when I do. Thanks for all the comments. My client Rob Taylor is the design mastermind behind this one. It is always a pleasure working with his ideas. They are all off the charts cool and so much fun to build. ~David

Not too much more to add. I love hand cut rasps as well. I have the Nicholson #49 and #50 and a nice set from Gramercy. These come in 3 sizes. I love the smaller fine rasp for headstock and neck heel work. You can't beat the price for the set either. ~David

I agree. I don't use the UTS method for leveling a fretboard (the wood is shaped with the radius beam and 80-320 grit paper). The technique I describe above is just for leveling the frets after they are installed and the strings are on. It is one of the last steps in my build process. ~David

This sheds some light on how these jigs can be used to get good results. The demos I have seen were all far less intensive and seemed to push the neck into position as opposed to letting the strings do the work. I appreciate the detail. I never knew Gallup had done the strings-on-fret-level before. I wonder if the technique was picked up earlier and then remembered as a 'new idea' or if they both arrived at the same idea separately? Thanks, ~David

Hey Erik! I forgot to mention the Ghost preamp system. I usually use it for the hexaphonic output but it has a great piezo sound as well as a nice blending preamp. The great thing about he GraphTech stuff is that it is modular so you can go with either piezo or hexaphonic add the other later. I do like the separate controls too. With the LRBaggs you have a blender knob instead. Good but not as versatile as separate controls. ~David

Yes, you are correct. The original poster asked a general question about fret levelers and I, like you, sought to express my own views without asking whether or not the OP was seeking the same fretboard shape. I will certainly be more specific in the future so as to avoid confusion. Excellent! I still prefer a constant 12" after being quite satisfied with both. A clarification of what you are talking about would be most helpful to the discussion. What neck jig do you have? With all due respect to your time, if you have a neck jig that accurately simulates string tension in the exact same way that strings do I would think it would greatly benefit this discussion if you detailed it's construction and usage. The neck jig I am referring to is the one that StewMac sells and that most I have seen are modeled after. It puts upward pressure on the neck at a perpendicular angle to the actual string pull. The difference should be obvious. Wood moves very differently under these two conditions. The Turner method does not try and mimic the string pull, it makes use of the neck under actual and natural string tension. You do not get any more accurate than that. ~David

And say goodbye to the conical radius that I find superior as a player ? No, of course not. Why would you adopt my methods if you truly find the conical radius superior? Please continue to do what works for you. My description of my methods are in no way a critique of anyone else's methods. I am just sharing what works for me, as you are also doing. To try and answer your question I think a smaller radius (less than 10") needs to be conical or the strings fret out when bending. With a 12" radius this does not occur using my methods (your experience may be very different from mine). But I will point out that I am using the radius beam to true the fingerboard. I do not use it to level frets for the same reasons you stated a few posts ago. My methods will not apply to the conical boards with varying radii. This cannot be done with a radius beam. But is also not my goal. I may not have answered this in a satisfactory way. It might be helpful if you stated your radius and goals for your necks. It might make your statement more clear. ~David

Sorry to take so long getting back to this thread. I was out of town for a bit this month. I use the LRBaggs Control-X preamp as well as one I make based on the Tillman preamp. It works great and you can modify it anyway you want to. The advantage of the LRBaggs setup is the switching and blending ability. But with some effort you can make your own for less if you have the time to do it. For blended circuits I use the LRBaggs. For separate circuits I use the Tillman preamp. I hope this helps. ~David

Save the money spent on straight edge fret levelers and buy the radius beam to get your fretboards perfect instead. I use a radius beam to get my fingerboard perfectly radiused and straight. Then I fret it. I use a fret press for consistency (I used to use a hammer but I find the arbor press to be just as good only much quicker). Once the frets are in I leave them alone until I put the strings on it. It is only when the neck is under tension that the neck will take it's final shape and this is the only time to consider leveling the frets. And forget about neck jigs that pull the necks in ways that strings don't. To level the frets I use a method that Rick Turner was kind enough to share. It utilizes a piece of 1/2" x 1/2" aluminum angle stock with 1/16" wall thickness. Put some adhesive backed sandpaper on the outside surfaces and you have a simple and cheap fret leveler. I have a set with 320 and 400 grit paper on them in lengths of 3" and 6" each. With the strings on adjust the truss rod so the fretboard is level (check the tops of the frets at this point, the fretboard surface is meaningless once the frets are in place). Then slide the aluminum leveler under each string and lightly go over the tops of the frets until they are all level and there is no fretting out or buzzing anywhere. Play the guitar as you go so you can adjust and level as necessary. This is such a quick and easy method and very inexpensive. The last 4 guitars I have built needed almost no leveling at all. I used the leveler to hone the tops of the frets only. This method works very well for me and is the quickest and most accurate method I have used yet. ~David

If you want to use the carbon fiber rods for structural reinforcement then I recommend epoxy. If you do use wood glue remember that the surface of CF is smooth and wood glue will not mechanically bond with it unless you roughen the surface. I find that this is not necessary with epoxy. ~David

Sure you can do that. I often have magnetics and piezos on the same guitar with a separate output for each system. I have put in blending preamps too for some interesting tonal variety. Since you are thinking of keeping the systems separate it should be as easy as making room for the controls and batteries. Here is a guitar with mags and piezo, and another with mags and an undersaddle transducer. I used the LRBaggs Control-X for the blender preamp. It works pretty well but I had to modify the circuit to work with 2 output jacks. ~David

If you are new to amp circuits then it would be best to read up on them before you start working on them. Every article I read on amp safety states that the power supply caps will hold a charge that needs to be discharged before you can safely work on the amp. It is better to be safe than dead so check the caps with a meter before you do anything. Also be sure to read the manual and have the schematics nearby. Read this. ~David

I remember a thread a while back where people thought Lie Nielsen's were too much. I would gladly pay for a quality tool like this. His #98 looks really nice. It might take a few years to save up and justify the price but I would buy one of these just to be able to work with such an amazing tool. Craftsmen like this are so rare in the world. And $200 for a plane like this is an insulting price. That might cover materials if you went with the cheap stuff. I know my time is worth more than that. Geez.... ~David

What you have drawn looks fine to me. The difference in adjustability that you are finding is due to the difference between the 2-way and vintage style truss rods. The 2-way has a rod threaded on both ends with the direction of the threads reversed. This makes one turn move the rod twice as much as the vintage style. Plus the vintage is a compression rod acting on the wood of the neck itself. The 2-way acts on the second rod. ~David