unclej

nice work indeed. it's easier to go to my website to see all that i make out of wood than it would be for me to tell you. by the way, none of the items there are still available and i'm in the process of changing the entire site to an advertising type site instead of a point of purchase site. i just flat out don't have time to maintain and update it...anyway, the whole point of that was to assure everyone that this isn't spam....just responding to the question of what i make out of wood.

uncle johnnys woodshop

if it didn't have a compensated bridge to begin with then i'd just glue it back where it was. i just glued the top and back on my first uke yesterday and while researching the building of ukes i didn't see any mention of slanting the bridge. a real short scale and the fact that most cords are played in the first few frets may be why it's not needed.

good luck

i think the first logical step would be to clean the pots and see if that fixes it. while you're in there check the wiring against the factory schematic and make sure that someone hasn't changed it. after that if it still doesn't work you'll have to ask someone smarter than me.

i just bought a warwick rockbass streamer 5 string, i love this thing....but, it has some sound issues. the volume kicks in at around 7/10, and the 2 tone knobs hardly do anything. do the pots need cleaning? does the whole shabang need a new wiring job? should i just get a new preamp?

i see that this thread has been resurected so i'll add that i used the minwax hardener on the above project and have used it a couple of times since on some art projects and was very satisfied with it. easy to use, great shelf life and dried very clear. the only suggestion that i'll make is get plenty of sand paper. the minwax loads up fairly quickly at first an if you over use the same piece, especially on a random orbital, the minwax that has loaded up will harden on the paper and actually create fairly deep swirls in the wood that are tough to get out.

good luck.

just measure from the middle of the neck pup cavity to the middle of the bridge pup cavity then divide by two. whatever the resulting number is place the middle pup there. other than cosmetics it won't matter too much if you're off a mm or two. as for protecting the surface cover the whole front with masking tape then mark your cavity and route away.

good luck.

ola

Monday - my parts-o-caster will arrive. It's a finished body n everything. Got standard routing but I want to put a p90 at the neck and at the middle position. So my question is:

Where should I put the middle pup - How far away from the end of the Tele bridge? And what should I take care off routing on a finished body(I will use a rather large pg to cover up the routing areas - but still....)

cheers

my first and only semi-hollow bodied build was a walnut back with a zebra wood top and a single sound hole on the upper bout. i installed a gibson t-bucker in the neck position and an overwound dimarzio single coil in the bridge. simple three way switch with tone and volume controls. it was the jazziest, bluseiest sounding guitar i've ever heard. couldn't get a country twang out of it if you tried. it had great sustain and sold fairly quickly.

all in all it was a very satisfying build and a great sounding guitar.

well..that didn't turn out to be nearly as challenging as i thought it would be. when i disassembled the four prong male connector that attaches to the mic i discovered that it was only a three wire cable so it was hooked up as a regular mic. all i had to do was attach it to a regular cable.. ending up with two three prong male ends and the mic worked fine.

thought i had a real brain teaser.

thanks again for all the input and next time i'll try for something a little more challenging.

thanks steve..i'll try that this morning when i go in and post results.

allright...i forgot my camera but it doesn't matter. these guys were very accomodating. the mic is an old electro-voice model 664 and unk seems to have nailed it. stamped on one side is the following: "impedence changes are made on the cord plug. plug shell and no. 1 contact are ground. contact no. 2 hi-z. contacts no. 3 and 4 160 ohm.

now, armed with that info can anyone tell me which of the 4 wires on the original cord can be attached to which three wires on a three prong cord to make it work in a modern PA? the female plug end that attaches to the mic is labeled 1 thru 4 so it will be easy to trace the wires.

i guess part of what i need to know is what the three wires on a modern mic cord are for and if it will work as a low-z mic. if so it would seem logical that i could atach ground to ground and then the two remaining wires to #'s 3 and 4.

thanks

thanks unk..i'll post a pic and the name in the morning when i go in. at this point i don't know if i can help him or not but i'd like to if i can. he's been a good guitar setup/repair customer.

just for the heck of it i just googled "microphone forums" and sure enough there seem to be a lot of them so once i post the specifics of this mic i may be able to find what i need there if no one here knows the answer.

MidnightLamp..thanks for your input as well.

hi UncleJ,

you didn't mention the make or model of that mic.

many of the older mics used a 4 pin connector with a threaded retainer ring.

some of them connected a low impedance winding from an internal transformer to pins 1 & 2, and a high impedance winding to pins 3 & 4.

but, without knowing the make and model, you can't be certain how it's wired.

cheers,

unk

i really don't have any more info at this time. i've been off since it came in. he brought the mic in with one cord that had a four hole female connector on one end and the connector cut off on the other. he also provided a standard three prong cord. in the morning i'm going to cut off the male end of the three prong cord, bare the wires, plug it into my PA, bare the wires on the four wire cord and with three jumpers see if there's a combination that will work.

i don't know what the mic went to originally but i know it's probably out of the 50's. i'll post my results sometime tomorrow.

sunday afternoon one of my regular customers dropped off an old mic that had a four prong receptacle for the cord. he left the cord that came with it years ago and a standard cord with three prongs connectors and wanted to have the mic converted so that he could use it in his PA. i had a store full of people and didn't really have time to talk with him and after he left i started wondering if it can be done.

can anyone tell me what the fourth wire on an old mic was for..will it work with just three wires and if so how do i determine which one can be eliminated. i'm assuming that if it can be done that i can just splice the three prong female connector onto the end of his four wire cord leaving the four prong male connector on the other end to fit into the mic.

thanks

that's a very nice, clean job...congrats

if you do a lot of string bending at the 12th fret or higher you'll find that the compound radius that wes mentioned will reduce the chances of fretting out while bending. strats with rounder radii are nortorious for this.

i tried this once with good success...instead of using a cloth get a piece of paper and use a household iron set to medium so you don't burn the wood. lay the paper over the spot then heat. the glue will most likely stick to the paper when you lift it off. it did for me anyway.

good luck

start by trying to hook a fingernail under one end and see if it will lift right out. if it won't it's probably glued in. if that's the case take a small piece of wood and place it at the very end of the nut and tap it with a small hammer. that should break the glue loose and allow it to be slipped right out.

and you should be able to "shave" it down a little and re-use it.

try going online to usacustomguitarparts and allparts. i don't know for sure that they offer what you need but i've used necks from both and they make a good product.

good luck

since you asked for the best and not the cheapest i'm gonna agree with wes. they make a great neck, will customize the profile and the radius and offer several different wood combinations. their customer service is the best.

"Compare it to your own & see what happens. I imagine that his ear has started to go a bit or that he's never actually had perfect pitch."

frankly this is what i think is happening. i know for a fact that when i tune by ear i almost always tune to the sharp side. he does say that it doesn't happen with any of his other guitars so i guess we'll see today.

the strings are indeed new..basic earnie ball slinkies but he says that it was happening with the set before as well. the two things that i'm going to check tomorrow..while he's there...are intonation and his tuner against my tuner. the high frets don't play a part in this scenario because the problem's with the strings being played open. i'll definitely let you know if i figure it out. thanks for the input.

j

one of my repeat customers brought me an american strat last week. he was asking about new tuners for it. he thought it wasn't staying in tune and that the tuners were at fault. after further questioning it turns out that what was really happening was that after he tuned it he thought that a few strings were sounding sharp when he played simple chords. i got him to leave it with me and this is what i've done so far:

i added a fourth spring and set the floating trem properly. i lowered the nut slots just a bit and lubed them. i set the neck relief, saddle height and intonation. with all that done i checked with a tuner and the only way that i could get any of the strings to go sharp was to press really hard while chording. it has pretty tall frets so there was enough travel for that to happen.

ok..he came back in..i explained everything that i had done and told him that if that didn't fix it to let me know. he came in today and told me that it was still doing it. after asking a few more questions i realized that he hadn't really explained the problem properly the first time.

when he tunes the guitar with his eight year old boss tuner and gets it perfectly in tune it sounds sharp to him. when he tunes it by ear..he says he's pitch perfect...then puts it on his tuner it shows up as flat. (i think i got that right) the G and B strings seem to be the biggest culprits. i told him that if he had a new battery in it then there were only two things that i could think of that could be wrong..his tuner had degraded over the years or his ears had.

am i right? have i missed something? anything else that could be causing this problem? he's bringing it back in tomorrow with his tuner to check it against my tuner but if i get the same results i'd like to look real smart and have an alternative.

one thing you said made me want to comment. you said you were going to "flip" the nut. generally speaking using a right handed nut flipped won't work real well. you probably already know this but your breakover point for the strings will be on the wrong side and you can get all kinds of buzzing and such.

equilibrated? i'm gonna have to check that out but if it's not a real word it should be.

ok, i checked and it's a real word. that's why i love this forum...learn something new every day.

I was thinking of getting a custom 5-string bass next year and i was just wondering witch woods would give me a good tone.

I play hardcore, punk, metalcore, and sometimes some heavier metal so i kinda want a wood that has alot of sustain, would give the a nice punchy tone for punk but could still add to the growling lows too.

I was looking around and i saw alot of basses are made of Ash so i was thinking that might be a good choice.

I was thinking of puting a flamed walnut laminate top on it, idk if taht would affect tone or not.

Basicly i want to know what woos would eb best for this sound.

walnut, mesquite, mahogany all have good bright tones with plenty of sustain when combined with the right pickups. this is in no way spam but visit a friend's website www.birdsongguitars.com and check out the wide variety of woods that he uses in his custom basses. in fact, if you were to give him a call i'm sure he'd spend a few minutes with you explaining the differing tone woods.

good luck

i've only made three or four pairs of earrings so far and am holding the abalone in one hand and a dremel with a diamond burr in the other. it hasn't been a major problem or occurence..just happened a couple of times and i was probably rushing things instead of letting the burr do the work.

i've also found for my use that i can do some pretty good rough shaping by usind my stationary belt sander or spindle sander and holding the abalone in my hand.

if i do some detailed inlay i'll definitely use my jewelers saw.

thanks

j

i use a good bit of abalone for jewelry making but have never used it for inlays..which i'm thinking of doing. while cutting and shaping abalone with my diamond bits i have noticed that it will chip a bit..and when i say chip i mean the top layer flaking off a bit and leaving a somewhat duller layer below it.

question..if you inlay a slightly curved piece of abalone and leave it a bit proud and then sand it down flat will it be dull or bring up another layer of the full color and pattern of the top layer?

thanks

unclej

How are you cutting this that it is chipping on the top level? "Diamond bit", so can I assume you are using a router of some sort? I use a router in my CAM machines but that is very different than by hand. If you are using a router, you may not be using enough spindle speed. I have found that faster spindle speed like you would find on a dremel at 2/3 speed is the best for cutting most shells. If you are using a router by hand though, I would suggest that you check out do it with a jeweler's saw instead.