metalcarver

It's not so much the nature of the tool as it is the part where the eyeball connects to the headbone. It takes skill to use a hacksaw and a file is really your basic cutting tool after a chisel and you can screw up just as bad and I can prove it. Anyway, use a smaller cutter and higher speed so that you're not moving much metal. The sandwich idea sounds good, it'll keep any burrs from getting in the way. I've had success with double back tape like they use on carpets for workholding. Might work too good on really thin stuff or a combination sandwich/tape. Earplugs...

Actually, I've used a hand held router on .060 (1.5mm) sheet aluminum using a carbide bit with the edging bearing. Made some Tele pickguards just hand guiding around a form plate. The work needs to be clamped pretty good and you don't let go while the thing is on. You can rub on some hand soap on the cut line to keep the chips from sticking to the cutter. WD-40 works excellent but then the fumes could kill you. Very noisy but not much extra pressure to cut. An increase in pressure to move it means that the cutter is loading up with chips. If it gets gobbed up you can pick it out easily. Carbide wood cutting bits are actually pretty close to the right cutting geometry for aluminum. I've cut thick plates with a skil saw which is probably the noisiest industrial job I've ever had. A good HSS band saw blade with a deep gullet can cut a fairly thick plate on a wood cutting band saw. Takes a lot longer than wood and don't push too hard. Band sawing to a line and then filing the rest of the way is really pretty quick and those big disk sanders work very fast on thin sheet. Some folks are using alu in inlays because it stays bright under a finish. I think the Fouke Industrial guitars use uhmw sheet plastic sandwiched between alu plates The last guitar started out as a 25lb. (11kg) chunk and 20-1/2 lbs ended up on the floor. About $100 for a that piece delivered in Alaska. 1" (25mm) 6061 T6. It's probably the most common grade. It stays shinier than 7075 or 2024. Tonally you need the t6 hardness which 2024 & 7075 come in but pure aluminum like they use in castings and the 5000 series which is meant for welding don't ring like the harder alloys.

I think you could put a metal top on a soft wood - you just have to plan for the expansion. slotted screw holes or maybe inset into grooves in the wood. Could look really nice. Here's a list of folks I've found on the web who are making aluminum guitars. http://www.veleno.net/ http://www.zeroguitars.com/ http://www.pkselective.com/ http://www.specimenproducts.com/index.html http://www.industrialguitar.com/ http://www.sprucehillguitars.com/ and an article on aluminum instruments:Mugwumps aluminum instruments article

That there is purty. You get another attaboy. For the guitar - I worry about your mind...

When I talked to John Veleno he said that any pickup he used sounded better in the Al guitar. He especially noted how much quieter that single coils were. I'm doing my first single coil guitar right now so we'll see. I'm not sure about this eddy current stuff. It seems to me that any eddy currents that were set up would cancel each other out since the metal body surrounds the pickup. I think the timbre of the sound is more affected by the variations in the magnetic field by the string than the shape of that field. It might affect the overall efficiency of the p/u but I'm not set up to measure that. As far as temperature variations I haven't tested the stage light thing. I think that the Beans and Kramers were more affected because of the neck. Wood has a thermal expansion rate 1/10 as much as aluminum. I think both of those have wood and aluminum in the neck. If one of those is exposed to wide temperature swings it would probably curl up like a thermostat. I've use either wood or graphite necks and the only overlap with the Al is the mounting bolts. The aluminum is a big heat sink and is slow to exchange heat with air so if it does get cold it takes a lot longer to warm up at room temperature than the wood. I'm using 6061 t6 aluminum and they are all bare so far. I really like the hand polished finish and it wears quite well. It does scratch but the effect is more like silverware. One is three years old and still looks nice. The engine turning was originally used on the soft metal of pocket watches. It doesn't show scratches and wear as much as smooth metal. I usually rest my pinkie on the body while playing and after a few hours the tip of your finger is smugded a little grey. Probably a white shirt might show a little grey after a long evening - rinses out and doesn't stain. The guitar I'm putting together now will be anodized black and that should be a smooth hard surface. I'm also looking into bright dipping them and clear anodizing.

Here's a link to some guys that were doing metal guitars on a CNC: Xtreme guitar I build my guitars by hand on old manual machines. As far as that graphite neck goes I love it. The fret job was dorky. Had to bring down 3-4 frets and I never did ask them what kind of a job it was to refret. But playing it is a dream. Slick and fast. It's very thin and I've noteced that folks who have a habit of wiggling their fingers really fast trip up a little until they get the feel. It couples very well with the Al . Acoustically, this is the loudest of the guitars I've made so far. Dave

How about inlay with aluminum? Anyone tried it? You can polish it to a mirror finish. The back of mirrors is vapor deposited aluminum. Dave

I think that hammering sheet metal would be an excellent method. Especially for someone who had body shop tools. Check out James Trussart (sp?) guitars. He makes them out of steel sheet and then lets them rust in interesting patterns. You can do a lot of forming with a sand bag and a rubber mallet. Copper? Aluminiunobtainium? Torres said that the back doesn't matter anyways. The combination of graphite neck and aluminum body is the best sounding yet. I have another thin wall Lp that's getting anodized and has a maple neck and hopefully I'll get to A - B them. A couple years ago I emailed John Veleno the guy who made aluminum guitars in the 70's (aluminum neck too)and he mentioned a sheilding effect that quieted down even the noisiest of single coils. He said that any pickup sounded better shielded like that. I called Bill Lawrence on the phone and asked him about it and he said that it would cost $2 million to be able to come up with a pickup that would work in a metal guitar because of the eddy currents. So not understanding all I know I proceeded. And by accounts from a few professional players, It sounds really good with lots of comments about the sustain. Those same guys promised to make me some audio files... we'll see... Dave

On that graphite neck, it's held on by four bolts #8 -32 and there are thread inserts they give you with the neck. I try to make the neck pocket so that it's a light press fit for total contact. As for prices Call 907-283-0966. 9am-6pm PST I'll be hollowing out a Tele in the next few days so I guess I should post some pics of how it's done. But really you folks are machining your guitars only they're wood and your router doesn't have to be 2 tons and ten horsepower.

Thank you for the comments. I'm just now getting consistent times on these things. Takes a long time to sort out the tooling but machine time has come down drastically. I kind of compare the work/patience ratio of the ornamental machining with inlay work. The way to get the price down would be to CNC the bodies then do the ornamental thing. There's been a couple of companies that tooled up for aluminum guitars and went belly up. (Xtreme Guitars, Magnum Guitars) I,m not convinced that the market is large enough to amortize a $50k to $100k machine) Fouke Industrial Guitars and Specimen Guitars are aluminum and have been around a while but different construction methods there. So I machine them on old manual machines. 1956 Fritz Werner vertical mill, 1953 18" Lodge & Shipley lathe, 1944 20" Reed Prentice lathe , and of course the beat up Bridgeport. My mill on the prototype My first one was 12 1/2 pounds. Really good tone, good sustain, wide tonal palate. and 7 hernias to date. The last one ended up at 7lb 10oz (3-1/2 kg) The only way to get that weight is to really hollow it out. Ended up between 1/8" - 3/16" (3-4mm) wall. THAT is the key to aluminum instruments I believe. You need a thin wall and hollow body. Then the tone goes crazy. It increases the total efficiency of the beast, boosting bass notes as well as treble So there's none of the tinny sound that people seem to expect. Theres also lots of haunting overtones. I leave the tone control all the way bright for my own stuff. I got a couple of Brubek licks I mellow it out on but for rock or blues I really don't need a tone control. (izzat cuz of the gitar or me?...) The ornamental turning is stolen right off the back of pocket watches from a century or two ago. Most of the patterns are only .030" (1mm) or so deep. The v shape of the tool is very shallow. The reflections make it look deeper. Not a problem while playing (whilst playing ... ) I usually rest my pinkie on the pickgaurd and on the deep patterns you notice it right at first and immediately forget about it. I've got a blond neck that I'm putting on a yet to be black anodized axe and I'll see how I feel about the anodizing. As far as the spelling the story I heard was that there was a scientific meeting in Europe in the mid 19th century where they were discussing a breakthrough in the manufacturing process. The person who transcribed the report into English (American) misspelled it and it was published that way in America. So with typical American practicality, rather than reprint the report they changed the spelling of the word. So a century later it becomes obvious that anyone spelling it with an extra "i" is pinko commie secular humanist evil doer from Old Europe. Oh yeah, while I'm at it, that's NUK-U-LAR. Shoot, I 'spect them Limeys don't know no Texan at all.

My latest aluminum monstrosity. Body 1" thick hollow carved from solid billet aluminum. Moses graphite neck 1-3/4 nut X 5/8" thick. Seymour Duncan humbuckers. Schaller roller bridge. Gotoh tuners. Best sounding yet. Rich full sound with very wide tonal palate. Came in at 7lb 10oz.

A guitar like you probably haven't seen before. http://www.africanguitars.com/ music will triumph

A guitar like you probably haven't seen before. http://www.africanguitars.com/ music will triumph

Thank you. Attaboy's go a long way I've been booted out of the oil patch so I gotta come up with something new to make a living. Yes the guitar is carved out of a solid piece of 6061 t6 aluminum billet. It's all done on manual tools no confusticators attached. Every line in the pattern is separately indexed and plunge cut. Spent a lot of time figuring out tool geometry and building fixtures. The first one was a lark. "shoot, ah kin build one a them" "no you caint" "oh yeah?" And that was the design parameters and project resource meeting... Trouble is, it worked. Heavy as hell but it sounded great. Something about the aluminum. You'd think it would be tinny sounding but it expands harmonics in both directions. Very wide tonal range. I built the second one because of the sound. I went to Seymour Duncan Jazz/JB with a series/off/parallel switch for each. A Schaller roller bridge slams every bit of acoustic energy right into the body. I'm really impressed with those. And the second guitar sounds much better than the first.(??) It's much lighter...about 9 lbs and feels the same as LP. The sound can go from nasty bites and growls to sensuous carresses. (damn, I need to put that on a big slick ad...) And it sustains forever. And the finish, the result of about 5 years of experimenting. The cutting tool has to leave a polished finish. If you let the tool chatter you have one dotted line and the rest smooth so you start over. No, there's no sharp edges. The facets reflect off each other and it looks deeper than it is. The deepest grooves go down about 1/32" (1mm). Aluminum is a soft metal so it does and will scratch but is much harder than a paint finish so normal guitar care will suffice. After a year the first one started looking a little hazy but it was mostly drool. A clean cotton rag picks up a tiny bit of aluminum oxide (the haze) and it acts like a buffing compound. Just rubbing it buffs up a nice shine. And of course it could be dismantled and re buffed. But just using it will keep it shiny. I have a bunch of ideas for radically new shapes - double cutaway, headless neck, metal gothic headsman axe, bear trap with pickup for bait. Every guitar is a brand new day so I'm hoping to run into buyers with radical ideas. And the electric ideas are mild compared to what I want to do with acoustic. I wish Martin had never tried it. Their aluminum topped guitar has wood bracing under the soundboard. stoopid. aluminum has a thermal expansion rate that is ten times that of wood. In a few years I bet you won't find a single aluminum martin with a flat top. They'll be wavy. I use wood necks on aluminum bodies but the overlap where aluminum and wood are married together is the distance between the neck bolts. They're not fighting each other. Something to think about if you hard mount a metal pickgaurd on a wooden guitar...not that you can't... just plan your fasteners for the expansion difference. And I love to yak about building stuff. I'll try to stop by more often now that I've rediscovered this site. Dave Eldredge dave@metalcarver.com www.metalcarver.com 907-283-0966 Later,