javacody

There was no Jury, there was only a Judge, and PRS lost the case. Consider that the case was tried in Tennesee and the Judge was apparently already friendly to certain Gibson execs (from what I've read on the internet, you know how that goes). PRS will probably win in the end ( I hope) as the singlecut is significantly different from a Les Paul. Currently, Fender has an application underway to trademark the Strat and Tele body shapes. Several smaller builders have already been shut down (Lentz being one of them). It's even ok to buy a liscensed strat body and neck, but you cannot sell them put together. How screwed up is that? http://www.lentzguitar.com/forum/showthread.php?t=166&page=1

I think the thing about the oil being sticky was speaking to linseed oil, which has a much, much longer drying time than Tung Oil. Tung Oil is the be all, end all tonally, in my opinion. For an easy finish that offers better protection than Tung Oil, I would recommend one of several things: 1. Hand Rubbedy Minwax Poly 2. Waterlox Tung Oil/Phenolic Resin Varnish 3. Tru-Oil I've used the first two, in addition to pure tung oil, and for tonal reasons, (the guitar finished in only tung oil is quite a bit more resonant) I prefer pure Tung Oil. Each layer of Tung Oil polymerizes with the layer underneath it, forming one solid layer of finish. Also, you can use pre-polymerized Tung Oil for better gloss and quicker dry times. Last but not least, you could build a drying box with a lightbulb and a fan in it, to speed up Tung Oil drying time (haven't tried this, but I will on my next guitar).

southpa, you want to sell some of those?

knox, what kind of wood are you going to use for your "real" guitar? What scale is it going to be? What radius is your fretboard going to have? By the way, that is a cool body concept. Take your time with the real thing and make it the best you can. I look forward to seeing your progress.

Jim posts on the Gear Page forum, I think he is making them himself.

GuitarMaestro, what is your problem? How have I spread negative things? I only voiced an opinion, and there was no fanaticism (I'm assuming this is the term you meant to use?) involved. I admitted my bias, and never did anything more than comment and frankly, your tone towards me has been fairly negative and I'd like an apology.

skibum, thanks for the links, I've already seen them. I'm using Poplar as the back, and maple as the top.

Help? Will aniline dies stay in the wood when I apply tung oil, or do I need some kind of sealer?

I guess you noticed my bias against Dimarzio pickups and Ibanez guitars. It's funny how your tastes can change as you get older. When I was 15, I thought Ibanez guitars were the coolest. Now, I prefer Strats and Les Paul JRs.

I disagree, hard ash should be fine for a neck. Ever been hit with a wooden baseball bat?

I want to dye a guitar body, but am concerned, because the last time I used a water soluble dye and the tung oil picked up a lot of the dye. Is there a product I can use that will dye the wood and not come up when I start rubbing in Tung Oil.

I read somewhere that alder is the "tastes like chicken" of tone wood. My point about the basswood, is that it seems like most often Dimarzio's get paired up with Ibanez made, basswood bodies with Floyd Roses. I'm willing to bet that is the combo that Dimarzio is voicing their pickups for. I could be and probably am wrong. Dimarzio PAF's are known as "muddy" by some folks (Les Paul players to be exact), and it may be because Dimarzio does voice them for guitars not made out of Mahagony/Korina. From what I understand about Korina, is that tonally, it is very similar to Mahagony, but with sweeter highs.

Weren't those pickups designed for basswood bodied guitars? Personally, I would look at Korina for more of a vintage type tone, but that's just me, and I'm not an expert by any means. Korina + Walnut Top + p90's = delicious tone. Plug it into a vintage Fender amp, and you are as close to heaven as you're going to get.

Not just any old diodes will do, you want to use Schottky diodes. For help on electronics, the best place to start is DIY Stompboxes. They have all the information you need to get started. Read over the FAQ. If you still have questions, come back and I'll help you out. There are several others here who are fairly knowledgable as well (at least they pretend to be , you guys know I'm just kidding). Ansil used to have a diagram up on his site about the Black Ice, not sure if its still there?

I'm making a Blueshawk inspired guitar and have the drawing from a really good guy over the pond (Dave Ormandy at Ridgeway Guitars, check out his Ridgehawk project). Anway, I have a nice single slab of poplar for the back which I marked out the center line on, lined up the center line on my drawing, and taped the drawing down. I then drew in the center line going across the body, and marked both down the sides (so I can line up the drawing after I route out the hollow chambers and glue on the maple) and now I need to figure out how to get the body shape on the wood. How do you guys transfer the shape of your drawings to the blank without ruining your drawing? I will be making a template after I get the top glued on, but for now, I have no plywood, no money, and a desire to at least rout out the hollow portions. Any suggestions?

What if you ran the signal through an inductor? Is there someway to move the wire coil off of pickups?

I've got a Ruby with the Bassman mods running through a Jensen 8" Vintage Reissue speaker in a Walmart speaker cab. This is a great sounding, 1/2 watt amp. A couple of warnings/suggestions: Keep your input and output wires as far away as physically possible from the power wires. If they are too close, or wrapped around each other, you will get extra noise from the power and it may cause oscillation. Buy a couple of JRC 386's (the chip used in the Smoky) and a couple of LM386's (there are 4 different versions of these, seen as LM386n where n = 1 through 4, you want probably 3 or 4, they handle more voltage) and use an 8 pin socket. This way you can mix and match and see if one of the chips sounds better to your ears. Your amp will run cleaner with higher voltage. Use 12 volts if you can. For a cigarette box amp, I honestly prefer the Smoky. Tiny components count and sounds excellent. My next project related to this is to take the buffer from the Little Gem and use a higher wattage 12 volt chip (7 watts).

What if you made the guitar battery powered? Is there a way you could pass only the signal to preamp circuitry and basically buffer the string-pickup system electrically (is decouple the correct term here)? Maybe a capacitor (like on the input of an effect pedal)?

I have an epi LP Jr. here that was stripped. Mahagony neck and nice, fat, maple/alder sandwich body. It still sounds good and plays very well, but it is a cousin of plywood to be sure. When you are talking regular epi's here, you are probably getting plywood. If you are talking the elitest line, you are getting a damn fine instrument, I'm sure. Epi's are good starter/beater guitars, but for the money, I'd go Agile any day over epi. Check this bad boy out: http://www.rondomusic.net/al3000rghtleft.html Also, when an Asian guitar lists its wood as Mahagony, it means Asian Mahagony, which is different from both Honduran and African. Asian Mahagony is much whiter than either Honduran or African. It still seems like a good tonewood though.

That flame is beautiful! I look forward to seeing the finished neck Hyunsu. Hyunsu, maybe its time for you to take a break and east some Pulgogi (pulgoki? not sure on English spelling). Man, I love Korean food. All those delicious vegetable dishes. Especially kimchi. mmm... I'm hungry. My brother-in-law (wife's half brother) is half korean and he cooks for us sometimes. Man. I wish he was here right now. LOL

If you want all the extra options USA Custom Guitars offers at no extra price, go with them. However, if you want something a little more funky (woodwise and headstock wise) go with Warmoth. I have a good relationship with Tommy, have ordered two necks from him, and my loyalty lies there. I'm sure you won't go wrong with either one though. By the way, Tommy also offers neck through now, its just not listed on the USA Custom Guitars site.

I think that Stew-Mac is aiming more towards the professional for these tools than the hobbyist. It seems that professional quality tools are always quite a bit more expensive than entry level tools and the tools themselves are highly specialized in that they are meant to do one job really well. If you were repairing/building many guitars, that tool could potentially significantly shorten the amount of time to do a fret level. I think that Stew-Mac is kind of like a luthier version of Wal-Mart. They have some things real cheap to get you in the door, and while you are there, you are going to pickup glue, etc, even though it is more expensive, you are having an order shipped anyway, and you will save on shipping. Personally, I don't think there are many luthier tools that a luthier couldn't make for himself, given the drive, time, and some experimentation.

Easy, it basically cuts a groove. Having a hard time picturing it in your head? I'll see if I can locate a photo.

hyunsu, I noticed a jigsaw for rough shaping of your bodies, but what do you do for final shaping? Router? Sander? Hand sanding?

I've seen photos where people routed the roundover before they ever cut the body. I'm thinking about trying this method. You do all the routing on the blank, roundovers, neck pocket, and all cavities, and then cut it out. I think it would work very well.