ShadesOfGrey

I had a huge shock today.. I was getting along nicely with the finish of my rhoads V the past few days, until it fell of the hook 30 minututes ago. There are a few places where the finish was dammaged but a few more coats might repair or camouflage it at the least. However, the end of one of the horns got dammaged pretty badly, chipping some of the wood. You cant realy see the chipping in the picture, but it's there. A small comfort is that none of the wood actualy broke of. This realy sucks, and right now I'm at a loss for the best wat on how to proceed. The crappy part is that I was doing the last coats, planning to do the wetsanding of the coloar coat tommorow. But I'm thinking.. sand the damaged area, either superglue/titebond the chipping or use the 2 component epoxy based wood repair/filler kit, tape off the surrounding area and use a bit of primer, and redo the colloar coats? Or is there an easier way to do that?

You are just going to have to do a test on some scrap wood and see how it looks.. That is always a good idea, though it seems I'll have to wait till monday annyhow since now it's raining, and tommorow seems to have pretty high chances of rain too. Did a bit more googling with better succes, if the results are anything to go by, between 40 and 50 is ideal and up to 60 is okay. Guess I'll use the inbetween time to do more sanding or work on the neck or something Ehh, the climate here is pretty much fail, but at least it doesnt rain quite as much as Britain

Google and forum search werent very fruitfull, so I guess I'll start a topic to ask this. Now, it's commonly stated that air humidity plays a part in spray/rattlecan application. Basicly, high humidity = bad. Now, what I'm missing is some numbers of what would be a (too) high humidity. Basicly, I have a bunch of acrylic rattlecans made by Motip. I have to spray outside on my balkony as I dont have a spray booth or any suitable inside room. My air humidity sensor on my balkony tells me the humidity right now is between 65% and 70%. Weather forecast expects between that local % for the coming days until tuesday, which will be expected to be about 50% for tuesday & wednesday. I guess 70% might be a bit high-ish. But still acceptable? But if even 60% is too high, I'm kinda screwed as far as the climate here goes, as even in the middle of summer humidity will be expected to be between 60 and 70. So anyone have some thoughts on the issue?

I've mailed my order to the guy from toolsbazaar for a 2nd hand Stanley #5 Jackplane. He told me he'd be away till monday next week, but I'm very..hmm..anxious about the thing. Especialy considering the mahagony planks I sawed today need some trueing. Don't have acces to a bandsaw, so you can guess what the results were. Not that it matters, since I'll be gone from tommorow till sunday / monday myself, but still A guitar you made for her! You probably shouldn't make a pointy one with bloodsplatters or skull decals, unless your one of *those* kind of couples

I'm actualy considering Stanley. Are they realy *that* bad now, or do they just need a bit of tuning and preparing love? I don't mind putting a bit of energy and time into my tools, as longs as it won't let me down regardless of the care I put into it. Those UK links look very good, but it doesn't seem I can get very far without a credit card. Silly how a aftertought can become a major obstacle for getting this project done succesfully =/

Thanks for your replies everyone I just noticed that I started the topic in the wrong forum. Should've been in T&ST, but oh well.. I kinda forgot to mention spokeshaves, since even though they are different tools for different jobs, they're usualy bunched together as a single category. (or maybe I'm just ignorant ) Anyhow, I live in the Netherlands (E.U.) and getting quality specialality tools is somewhat a challenge. Despite living in one of the most modernised / high population density countries (twice the population of NY city, about the same total area of Maryland)on this side of the globe.. Disintrest for crafts and D-I-Y, coupled with lack of suppliers of tools, woods, finishing materials, and even complete instruments, underdeveloped 2nd market.. It's a small miracle if you can find what you are looking for, and even then you'll pay ultra premium prices for it.. (and add 19% sales tax on that).. Also, the difficulty of tools and supplies having different names in different languages, and different brands usualy too.. Anyhow, rant over, and back on topic. I've been looking at Veritas, and they sure do look affordable. However, there seems to be only one supplier in the nation, and the only thing they have from Veritas that looks like what I'm looking for is a low-angled spokeshave. However, they care other brands too. They have Lie-Nielsen (a bit too steep for my budget) Stanley (been adviced to avoid it..) Also, they have brands that I'm unfamilliar with some that are (quite) a bit cheaper, too cheap to be true but.. Kunz, Clifton, Record, and Anant. I don't mind a tool that needs some care and tuning, if I would appreciate and understand my tool better that way. But there is a difference between a tool that is unusable out of the box but is a great quality tool if you take care of it, and a tool that needs constant readjustment and tuning and will still be a P-O-S regardless. So I guess I'm going to look at other suppliers in Europe, mainly UK and Germany, and watch the 2nd hands here even though it's probably futile.

Hi all! It seems that I need / could realy use a plane. Now I've been browsing around speciality stores and webshops, and I'm a bit overwhelmed by the different types and sizes I can get. For obvious reasons, I can't exactly go out and buy all different models and sizes. As far as I can see, I just need something for trueing / joinging laminates and surfaces, and for getting the contours on the body. However, I realise I may need one for different jobs too, like say thicknessing and and maybe radiusing / contouring the neck. Dunno if thicknessing is essential, and if radiusing or contouring can only really be done with a plane.. Anyhow, I need some input for type and size for one or two planes that serve me for any job I need for the time being. Also, does anyone know if Ibex is a good plane brand?

Thanks everybody!

Hi all! Let me start with that I pretty much searched this forum and many others, and even Google wasn't really helpful. So apologies if the answers are right under my nose. Also, some questions might be excessively obvious and stupid, but I'd rather be 100% and safe then 90% sure and 10% in danger. I am pretty much a total beginner when it comes to guitar building or woodworking. I do believe in 'safety first', so I'm not going to start with my project as long as there are certain concerns that I'm uncertain about. So 'kay, "what are those stupid questions the guy wants obvious answers for?" I hear you asking. They are mostly concerning air / breathing safety. So I bought some of those disposable white dust-masks a little while back. I know they only protect against dust and really against vapors, and seeing as I want to invest in good protection, I was thinking about a more permanent (cartridge) respirator. I don't know if there are models that protect both against particles and vapor, if they use different kind of filters, if there are filters that protect against both, what kind of model / brand is good (that is available in the EU), and so on. Is it even possible to protect against chemical vapors from finishing without using a full blown 'hazmat' type closed oxygen supply? Also, I am going to sand the old finish on one of my guitar bodies. I take it that the main safety concern here is particles, not vapor right? Also, about dust collecting.. can I just use a good vacuum cleaner for a few small projects, or do I *really* can't go without a professional dust collector? Are the paint flakes very airborne? Or do they just drop to the ground without much ado? When finishing the guitar with paint / lacquer, is particle or fume protection the key? It's important to note that I don't plan on using a airbrush or paint gun. It'll probably be a spray can or hand painted finish. I doubt that aerosol fumes are very healthy though. How long does it take for the workshop to be safe for breathing after sanding or sawing? And after finishing? Is it safe to breathe unprotected during curing? So, taking in account that I'll use a breathing mask, safety glasses, muffin type ear protectors, do I need any other personal safety objects? Gloves? Liquid resistant for finishing and chemical type jobs, pig-leather for woodmanipulation? Safety shoes? I have a pair from my old job, they are a size too small and thus very uncomfortable though.. Coveralls? Craftsman's Apron? If woodsplinter raining isn't a big issue, I'd rather just put on the headgear & my bandana and do the whole thing motorcycle shop style Anyhow, thanks to anyone that can clarify this a bit.

Thank you I thought about going Gotoh before I posted this, but with so many different brands and types out there, any differences between quality just isn't that obvious.

I'm planning to do a tremolo to hardtail/stringthru conversion. One of the things I'm unsure about, is what kind (brand) of bridge I should get. It definitly should be a black string-thru (tunomatic), but with so many brands out there, which one should I get? I'm going for quality here, so price isn't a factor, unless you'd get into the exorbitant more $$ than you should spend on one piece of hardware teritory. Edit: It doesnt neccecarily have to be a TOM style one, bridge saddles are okay though. As long as it's a hardtail type string-thru

After some deliberation, I think I'll replace the neck annyway, seeing as I wanted to change the headstock, have some different inlays and probably even add a new fretboard or ebonize it. So I was looking at Warmoth, and I have an idea.. The original guitar is Alder body, Maple neck and a Rosewood fretboard. Pretty standard so far. What I am looking at is.. a Mahagony neck with a Purple Hearth fretboard, or Purple Heart Neck with a Ebbony fretboard. Would there be any issues in using those combinations? Will a Mahagony neck be unbalanced on a Alder body? Will either combination brighter or warm up my sound, in your oppinion?

I'll add pics later, but after removing the neck, the screw shafts (both neck&body) are actualy indeed threaded. I also found out that it's not so much the neck angle causing the weird screw placement, but that whoever was in charge with screwing the head to the body realy needs to do a better job. Damn, only thing I can do to salvage the body is refilling the shafts and redrill i. And that's not even looking at the neck, if I'm going to replace it later on or not.

Thats a relieve. So it's basicly scraping, some compressed air and/or vacuum cleaning? Is this going to be one of those goggles/mask jobs? Unthreaded? That's a relieve too. Guess I'm just a silly noob I just hope it didn't cut into the wood anywhere. So I have another question.. When converting a tremolo into a hardtail/string-thru, is it absolutly essential to use the same kind of tonewood as the main body, or can I use a bit of mahagony for extra punch?

I see Pretty colours I've had it for as long as I've been playing.. about 6-7 years should be right. That stuff has been there as long as I remember. It plays well as in, a fast comfy neck that I'd rather not replace. Though, it has serious fretbuzz/dead strings above the 12th fret, and doesn't have enough room between the fretboard/strings as a properly aligned neck would have.

Hi everyone! So basicly I have a guitar lying around which plays and sounds rather well, but is really in need of some crafting love and a slicker/more modern appearance. In other words, it's time to pimp my guitar. However, before I start, there are some questions/issues that need to resolved before I'll be even thinking about planning everything out on paper. I've searched for every question beforehand, so my apologies if they've been asked and answered before.. For starters, I have no idea what the hell is infesting my tremolo and electronics cavity.. It's much worse in the electronics cavity.. My instincts say it's mildew/fungus growing. Though it could be any number of things. Anyone have a clue what it is, and how/if I should remove it? On to the neck: After checking it, my neck definitly is suffering from back bow. However, I'm not quite sure if it's just angled wrong, or if the neck is warped. I doubt pics would help a lot here, but here is the screws being..well..screwy It's not as noticable on the screws facing the neck, though the screws facing the body definitly arent right. Is there any way to tell if a neck is either mis-adjusted or simply warped? I also expect the screw cavities to have some (obvious) tearing. Can I fill/repair the tearing with (epoxy) resin or something simmilar?