Narcissism

Looking at what I have for tools, I'm going to have to put this on hold for a while. I really want to joint the top pieces, but I really should let the wood get aclimated to my area. So right now its book clamped between two boards of MDF.

Then there's the neck. I have the headstock blank sitting here, and I have the neck blank sitting here. I keep reaching for the miter saw, but then I keep going back and saying "I really should be doing this with a band saw." I also keep getting confused, because for some reason I'm having trouble imagining the whole process of cutting the angle, flipping it around and gluing it back on...

There's also the scarf joint. I've done one before, but it came out like crap. I have a jointer now, so I can do it correctly, but I don't know how to get it across the blades at an angle like that, safely... so I gotta figure that out before I do anything.

After the bandsaw work, its smooth sailing, and I can do everything else with the jigsaw, router, and handtools!

I disagree.

Deal with it.

I stopped listening to them after the record after Natural Science came out. I did like them... but their prog rock became too scattered for my taste.

I also read the drummer's book. Did you know he hates his fans?

I have no reason to support a band that doesn't support the people who put food on their table.

Rush?

Bah.

For anyone who's interested in photography,

Direct Sunlight (blue skies)

Indirect sunlight (overcast)

These are with a touch of mineral spirits to show off the grain. I think this will look pretty nice with some sort of dark color for the endgrain, and deep red as the setting... though I'm colorblind, so that could turn out in a way I don't want it to.

Drak, I'd like your opinion if you're watching, please

I really liked Dimebag's lagatto style. However, I'm going to have to go with Alex Skolnick.

My Burl came in today. I'm pretty excited to start work on it. I'm going to cut some pieces off the edges of it first and play with those for a while to test out the jointer on before I joint the center pieces. I have plenty of material to make a headstock veneer with this as well.

Here is the whole top piece in its original state on top of my body blank for reference

Bookmatched with the body outline drawn in with pencil

The Pictures don't do the top justice. Its a rainy day today, so I'm not getting any good natural light, and flash needs to be used. I'll post better pics as the build progresses.

The top itself is .60" thick, or 11cm. I still need to plane the back side though, so it'll probably drop down to .5" thick.

I'm super happy that my measurements with the body and the blank turned out exactly as planned. The "knots" are where they're supposed to be, and when I joint the center edges, they'll be exactly where they're supposed to be. All the tiger striping is where its supposed to be as well. I'm also very pleased with Oregon Wildwood for supplying me with this wonderful maple burl

I'm making two necks out of it right now. Its pleasant to work with, doesn't smell too bad when cut, and mine has a nice high pitched tap tone to it. The tap doesn't sustain too long, but it still sounds nice.

My corvus was made of cherry. It was pretty bright n' snappy. I think it would have made a better slap bass.

The top's pretty interesting. I see a person sitting with their hands together, and the vag looking part is the part between the hands

Looks like a nice clean build so far. Thanks for sharing

And welcome to the forum!

PS, bass players are strange folk anyway, maybe he'll like it just as is.

da bomm bomm bomm bomm

People are strange, when you're a stranger

*trails off*

I like being a bassist

I never thought I'd be so interested to gather up my glue scattered throughout the house for a photoshoot. I'll describe it:

Standard titebond in a little bottle

Some Loctite superglue (gel form)

Some Loctite superglue (not gel)

Some kind of epoxy... the cheap kind from the hardware store that sets in 10 minutes

Mystery bottle of industrial glue from a lightbulb factory that spontaneously combusts when applied to cotton... its more for show than anything

Elmers standard glue (for holding templates on a piece)

Hmm. When I go through it all, I have a lot more than the two bottles I was thinking of lol (titebond & epoxy)

Well, it seems like SGs are going to be the thing pretty soon here. I have one in the works, the Hand of Doom SG looks like its nearing completion, you're building one, someone just built one out of pine, etc.

The goal for mine is to get it to balance well. I don't really care for the thinness of SGs, so the one I'm building is gonna have some girth to it, and the headstock is going to match the Les Paul that I'm building. I guess they're sort of "Gibson Twins" lol.

I always expect your builds to be different from what they seem. I personally don't like the jack location, but apparently you do, which is cool with me.

My RG used to have a single coil in the middle. I took it out when I replaced the pickups with the EMG 81/85 set. Ever since I did that, I've missed having that single coil in there, and I've seriously considered buying EMG's single coil pickup, and installing it in what is now the RG-RR. If I don't like it, i'll install it in the strat build, and put a pickguard on the RG-RR to cover up the single coil cavity.

I donno, headless corvus, country rhoads, dovetail neck joints, curvy bodies, and other outside-the-box ideas in general. Its what I expect from your builds, and I enjoy watching all of them The Westone Dynasty was the only build I lost interest in, because the theme seemed consistent with normal builds.

The nut on my input jack comes loose all the time. It drives me nuts. I never thought to just put a washer or a nylon nut there. Thanks for the ideas!

I moisten the surfaces before I glue them. My dad taught me to do that. He's been building tables and using titebond for years, and all the tables he kept are still around. The nails holding the corners together failed before the joints holding the table top together, so I'd say its worth trusting. titebond is water soluble as well... so moistening the surfaces (not soaking them, but dabbing them with a damp papertowel till they change color) may weaken it, or it may wick the glue into the wood more.

Whatever, none of my joints have failed, including the endgrain joint on my rg-rr.

If you want an example of obnoxious amounts of wood, with no disrespect toward low end fuzz, I'll have to point to this build:

http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.ph...st&p=465064

I have a lot of respect for that build cuz I totally couldn't do it, but yeah... Thas a lotta wood

I don't always know what to say in build threads because I feel like a Steve jobs broken record. But I do take a lot of interest in your builds. I'll be watching this one especially when you start the carves and the neck!

Hey Blackdog,

This is the one I plan on carving the top on! I looked through a bunch of redwood tops on oregon wildwood, and I ended up checking out the maple burls. I think I chose a pretty sweet one that should match the contours and shape of the body, especially after the carve. Its going to be a pretty shallow carve, as the top is only .25" thick (approx 5mm). I could also drop top it. We'll see how i feel when it gets here. All I know is that the pattern on it is perfect. We'll have to wait and see how i feel about the color.

There will be pics!

The neck joint will be a gradual heal. The gibson ones feel OK to me, but I'd rather have that nice gradual feel, rather than something that feels like an acoustic. We'll see. I'm still picking out my woods, and after that i'll decide on how I want to put it all together.

I think he likes to build more than he likes to play. I was the same way last year. Then I couldn't build because I moved, so now I play

It explains why I like the JEM Universe 7 string so much. It has a very flat back.

I've given myself some time to calm down, and I'm ready to start on this again.

I went out and bought myself a nice maple burl. With some advice from Drak's builds, I tried seeing the guitar in the wood. I ended up picking something from Oregon Wildwood. Using photoshop, I was able to make a clear template and drag it over parts of the picture of the different burls that I wanted to buy to see if it would look good on the instrument. We'll see how that worked out when it comes in around Wednesday!

I'm still looking for a fretboard right now. I do like Ziricote, but I don't know if it'll be too loud as far as patterns and stuff go. I need something to offset the color balance between the figured body, top and headstock. Once I've got my top wood and fretboard in, I'll have something physical to lay out in front of me and I'll be able to choose what I want for hardware and binding!

That's why you should get one that's not worth that much. That way you won't be tempted to sell it! At least that's how i'd be doing it. I like having something around to personalize, change and customize. Right now that something is a dresser.

I get that too. I'm pretty sure that's normal drainage. Its linked to the same set of muscles you use to pop your ears.