Mr Natural

well- that hole sucks- but- you could slap an ear stud in that hole and make him a hipster- tell people he has a dermal piercing. . or maybe just some dust/.glue like the other bug holes.

ah- thanks for the explanation- makes perfect sense.

awesome work as always Curtisa- but I have a question on what you said here as I am trying to fully understand the process (and I am a complete noob on cad etc)-you said you scanned the original- which would have given you a 1:1 scale (is that correct?)- and the part I am confused on is you said you then "scaled it down" to match the original- perhaps I am just not understanding- but I am taking that as you reduced the size of the scan(?) I am thinking the scan would have given you a true sized one to one ratio (maybe that is a wrong assumption)- and then loading into cad all you had to do (with the exception of adding the missing portion) is print it and its a match. (so I am not understanding the term scale down here).

CHINABERRIES! they look great CJ. At first when you added that red I was thinking in my head- oh no- how could you do that to that beautiful wood- but it appears that the effect is subtle and very nice. great job!

I am totally stealing that idea for the drill press thickness jig- I was just about to start looking for ideas for the top of my veillette copy so perfect timing. thank you for sharing. also- I must have missed your May 27th post but that mock up really looks great Matt. I am still coming over to your house and throwing some saw dust around and mess things up a bit. You need to come to the dark side and join us slobs.

red is always a tricky color to capture accurately on the internet/pc/digital- but the way that red looks to me- I would call it "devils velvet". very deep , rich, nice. (even if it isn't real wood) considering that quilted maple of that quality is so rare (what- 1 in a 1000 trees has heavy figure(?)- you may be onto something here with our tree/figured lumber supply slowly dwindling. if you can take the top out of the "tone equation" (- ie-route out the top=mount the bridge to the wood (recess the bridge) I cant see why these wouldn't sound comparable to a (fully wooded) guitar. (your comment about stage vs studio wouldn't apply then) if you can produce and sell those tops or guitars at a lower price point than current market- you may have something there dude. I commend your efforts here. Especially with the patents. I know from experience with the company I work for how much fun those can be. I cant even imagine having to pay for it.

SR- this is from a "triplet" bookmatch-ie- one board sliced into three- I have 2 boards for a top (the best bookmatched face)- I will save the remainder of this board for head cap to use with that book match.

sorry to hear about your mom.

Pan- I wasn't inferring that I did a swirl- but had seen others do it. here are a couple vids you mayhave already seen.

a pic would help - what type of pickups-and if needed based on pickups an explanation of how its grounded. Without any other info I would take a stab in the dark and say you have an issue with a ground wire- but I don't know if you have say EMGs in there or not.

are you going with the magic marbles paint again? I think that color scheme is nice- guitars I have seen swirled with those colors have always looked good.

rum and coke is very fitting name for that color. Great job. I am glad you mentioned final set up wasn't done as I thought at first you had this set up for slide with that first pic- (the low E action is a little high ). I am looking forward to the next build- I have been on the hunt for "just the right piece" of spalted maple myself- just haven't wanted to pay the prices I have found (yikes)

wow that looks great!

you have my interest peaked on this subject. I have wanted to try solarez after watching a video on youtube- I have plans on doing a Pedulla bass sometime- Pedulla uses polyester but what a pain it looks like. The video I watched the guy (Highline guitars I think it was) brushed it on, very thick- but I was very captivated by the fact he could put one coat on and finish a guitar in one day. and it really did shine. I have used Preval sprayers but I must say- I don't know squat about polyester- but I think you would have to find a very thin polyester, or be able to thin it out for it to work. with some lacquers you have to thin almost 30% for it to flow correctly with the Preval, and thinning that much can introduce issues-you basically have to build up mist coats- anything thicker and its run city. I wish the Preval had multiple heads to allow bigger droplet size to flow thru.

with the ken Lawrence copy almost finished, I have been giving this one some thought, firstly I need to get these materials out of their sheltered environment and into my garage where this time of year it is typically fairly humid and hot at times. I put them out tonight and we will see if anything "moves" this weekend. I have decided to use a figured piece of maple on the fingerboard. This goes against what I would normally do with a fingerboard- that is- I would stay away from figured wood, stick with certain tone woods that are as close to quarter sawn as possible, etc- but I have a specific finish and look I am going for with this one- and instead of saying "why" I am saying "why not" which is something I struggle with at times. its not like I will be bending notes on this- so hopefully this board will work out. flip side is I get a great big learning experience on why I shouldn't use figured maple on a fingerboard if it doesn't work out and I can experience sanding off/replacing the board. .

not a whole lot done this weekend, too many visiting family/friends/dead animals smoking over coals for extended periods of time to get a lot done. started to carve a wood nut out of cocobolo, and found a scrap of the body wood to fashion a truss rod cover out of. slapped a coat of teak oil on it.

that bites about the Watco Japan product CJ. The Watco Danish and Teak Oil products in the states dry over night (or quicker) and are so easy to use and give really good results. hopefully it dries sufficiently and works out. its coming along nicely otherwise. Mt Fuji!

Matt- I am up 85- northeast of Mall of Georgia- in between Hamilton Mill and Chateau Elan exits. and still not far enough away from Atlanta

as luck would have it, I just happened to be cleaning out some items in my garage, in hopes of getting it somewhere as neat as @mattharris75's and low and behold I had some old skiing stuff (a SWIX bag that came with cross country skis I bought in 1989- it contained some wax, tools, file, and a couple of scrapers!- including a small card scraper!). Pretty pathetic I had this all these years and had no idea. happy accident as I was going to go to Rockler or WoodCraft tomorrow- but those stores are about 45 miles from me and I hate driving down towards Atlanta. started with a small chisel but started to get dips and more wood than I bargained for so- .perfect time for my new found scraper. and some wisdom from my avatar: sourced from http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2007/3/9/653/57005

sweet spray job man!

sweet Carl!. have you ever used that brummer under lacquer? I am still looking for the "perfect" filler that just wont shrink under lacquer.

;and an ugly shot- here is the glue around the neck- to the right- those spots- to the left- I am not convinced that is all glue there- I think part of it is glue- part of it is a light/white grain line, we will see this weekend. I didn't use steel wool on this today like the back- no sense as I need this dry- and will be sanding back- reapplying oil etc. Also- I need to touch up the sound holes with cloth on steel rod or something to get in there and get the edges of the holes oiled

so @KempGuitars tru-oil masterpiece got me all worked up to move ahead with my hackjob here and see if I couldn't get a half decent result. . We had a sunny day (was supposed to rain- we missed it)- anyway- I plowed ahead and wet sanded with 0000 steel wool, wiped it down, and hung to dry. these pics are after 3 hrs of drying. I think I got the back pretty well filled, I am going to have to do the front over once I completely get the glue I missed around the neck and bridge (and tailpiece)- I want to have the back done so I don't have to worry about drying etc and can work on the front when I can sit down and really concentrate.. I am going to have to pull out my optivisors and sanding stick/mini chisels and heck maybe even the big ass card scraper I have and really be careful not to mess up the edges of the fingerboard, bridge and tailpiece. should have make sure I got all that squeeze out. shoulda coulda woulda. I thought I did. Eyes are not what they used to be I guess. Lesson (I already knew) learned again.

got the build bug don't ya. looking forward to this build

that is a great tip. I noticed with the teak oil I am using on my project that I was getting a considerable amount of "hardened oil" clogging the (400 grit) paper I was using- perhaps I should be using a lower grit- and perhaps the addition of mineral spirits to thin it out may help as well. I had to be careful as that hardened oil on the paper was introducing scratches- also- my pressure on the paper may have been too much- I tend to muscle things to much when a bit of finesse is required