Ledzendrix1128

For the bass im building i plan on inlaying maple fret markers into the maccassar ebony fret board. I plan on doing it rather soon actually, the fret board is comming in the mail tomorow, so maybe within this week ill get some pictures up.

conisdering you dont want to use spray cans, (about 5 bucks a can, if your figure around 5 cans total that 25)id say thats fairly reasonable. i mean, if you think about it... its gonna cost them quite a bit if they are used to clearcoating cars and you come in with a guitar body. plus, you will get a professional quality finish from them, something that you cant garauntee on your first go round at finishing a guitar. If it were me id use rattlecans, but id say 60 is fairly reasonable if you dont want to have a go at it yourself.

When i get around to inlaying my headstock i think this will be the method i use. To me, an exacto blade and a tiny chisel would be far easier to handle accurately than a dremel. I also (for some reason) get more joy out of using hand tools than power tools.

i got pretty decent results using the duplicolor line (found in the automotive section of walmart - very cheap by guitar finish standards) They offer a lot of different colors (metallic colors, color shifting kits, primers ect.) and they also offer clearcoat. On the can it says that it doesnt require buffing, which is somewhat true, i got a pretty shiny finish with no buffing, but buffing would definately help it, im just too lazy. Anywho, goodluck with whatever you decide to do. - Louis

i voted for the cigar box, thats just too original with the bolt bridge.

except its an epiphone... I wouldnt personally waste my money on that, but you know what they say, ones mans junk is another mans treasure

haha, yeah im putting in 2 graphite rods already, Ill most likely end up adding maple underneath. I guess I shoulda planned it out a little better, I did think of it, i just figured there would be no problem about the height, until i started looking at pictures of about every neck-through guitar having a raised neck plane. I just havent seen this issue talked about too often, so i overlooked it. - Maybe Ill Laminate walnut underneath the fretboard to compliment the stripes in the neck (who knows it could be one of those "yeah i meant to do it" things") And btw, the problem i had with the neck your referring to was just a measuring error, the back had a smaller measurement than the front bc the bandsaw wasnt straight, so theres no need to add anything there

So i noticed on most basses that with a neck through it isnt just the fingerboard glued onto the same level as the bridge. I was wondering if it was necessary to make the bridge on a lower geometric plane that the fingerboard (not real sure if im explaining this right). BRIDGE___________FINGERBOARD VS __________________________Fingerboard Bridge______________/ I hope you guys can understand it, its kinda hard to explain... but my question is... do you need to raise up the fingerboard with a flat mount bridge, or is that only necessary with angled necks?

Good news now... turns out the bandsaw wasnt perfectly straight(normally bad, but in this case its not) so i was taking measurements off the back of the neck thinkin theyd be the same... today i took measurements on the front and it turns out its thinner only by a hair... So i think it should work out alright.

and it produces cooler waste than a rasp... you jsut get dust with rasps.. with spoke shaves you get those cool strips... good for starting fires.

ok sorry,heres some specs for you Router im asking for - Makita 3612 - woodshop teacher recommended it and let me use his personal one for this bass and i really liked it (3-1/4 HP) Bass Specs - Neck - 24 fret 34" scale 5 peice maple/walnut (neckthrough) Fret board - Macassar ebony (15" radius) Neck re-enforcement - 2 graphite rods and one dual expanding truss rod (ordered from LMII today!) Body - Ash Pickups - EMG PJ set (complete with pots, jack, and power supply) bridge - hipshot 4 string "C" style bridge (black) Tuners - hipshot (black) black straplocks and to top it all off... im gonna turn my own knobs out of scrap walnut on the lathe.... thats what i plan so far... of course they are ALL subject to change. And zoso, yeah ill most likely use rasps... but you cant really see the back of the neck... its a little over 1-3/4 thick... so i need somethin to take off that maple pretty quickly, Im thinkin spokeshave to chunk out the wood fast... then switch to rasps. plus ill need a spokeshave to do some of the contouring on the top anyway (and various other wood projects im doing)

Yeah this bass has a LOT of influence from various different styles.

One of the cool things about school is that you have access to some really great equipment. So I am gonna take full advantage of this. This is what ive done so far on my neck through bass project. I am pleased to introduce to you, Brooke. Hope you guys like it. I should be making daily progress, although it will most likely go slow now bc of "holiday" break (your not allowed to say christmas). Keep in mind this is rough shaped... i sanded a lot, but there is still a lot of shaping to do. Im gonna try to put a fairly deep carve on the top, and still have to contour the neck (asking for a spokeshave and a router for christmas).

yeah thanks MG, i got shop next class period... im in government now... so ill just use this time to think about my options. As much is I dont want to, painting is an option. I could get an oil drum and do a full body swirl... what do you think? lol

yeah i was thinkin about that... but it was also nice just to run it through the planer to get everything flush after i glued the wings on.... if i contoured the neck i could do that, id have to hand plane it right?

Beer hunter, is that a grizzly kit? It looks like it... if so, how does it sound? Im looking into buying one

ok, i looked at the string spacing on the bridge i was gonna buy, and it lines up with the guitar with room to spare. And i figured out some good news, the template i layed on the body was a little bit bigger to accomodate room for error, so thank god for that. Ill look at the actual bass and take some more accurate measurements tomorow... but now i feel a little better, i think its gonna fly.

hahaha, alright, ill talk it over with my shop teacher and see what he thinks... he seemed to think it wouldnt be a problem about the overhang of the strings, but then again i dont think i explained it to him clearly... ill just do some studying and think it through and figure out what would be the best approach.

hahaha yeah, thats why ive been asking about reglueing the wings and all that

yeah, ill think about it... i jsut gotta figure out if it will be more time consuming to patch it... or resaw it... cuz i have the body and the headstock rough-shaped... so im gonna have to work around all that ...to tell you the truth i AM leaning towards patching it because it is maple and its not gonna be that noticable

no i mean, if you think it woul dbe best to scrap the neck i could... i got enough maple left over to make a new one... but im just wondering if thats the best solution and how would i go about re-clamping the wings (thats probably the least of my worries and its probably in here somewhere i know)

what do you mean by graft. If your saying to glue a strip of maple... (and no i havent profiled it yet) i was thinkin about that. but then i started thinkin of maybe overhanging the fret board a butt-hair and then sanding it down so its flush with the neckwood that i screwed up. im gonna figure out the exact spacing of the bridge im lookin at getting though... do some drawings and see how it looks. But i kinda wanna avoid reglueing it cuz i dont have the scraps from the wings anymore... i used them to practice carving.

so i was rough cutting everything on the neck of my neck through bass project, and i cut everything about 1/8-1/4" away from the outline.... but the paper i taped to the neck somehow slid to the left (im pretty sure i had it lined up but i guess not lol). My questionis... i can still get it lined up straight if i reduce the width at the 12th fret to 2-1/4 vs. 2-1/2 inches... in essence this error will take about 1/8" off either side. Im also gonna put the fret board on soon... which im gonna overhang a bit to get some width back. Do you guys think that a width of 2-1/4" at the 12th fret is enough. nut width = 1-1/2 inches.. and i havent gotten a bridge yet... so i could get a closly spaced bridge and that should help the problem too. I already have the body shaped, i suppose i can rip the wings off... cut a new neck and reglue it if i have to. But its so close to the right width it kinda pains me to do that. Any input on this little predigament i got myself into? thanks alot, Louis

I did this on the Les Paul i did the same thing to. 1) sand everything down 2) coat with primer and scuff sand it so its level, then do another coat of primer 3) spray your base coat of paint on ( i used platicote flat black spraypaint) 4) do the swirl (i used plasticote flat black and blue) 5) clear coat with poly urethane. If you have a copmressor i dont know what to tell you as to what to use. I used minwax clear gloss polyurethane. I got this finish done for total (including 4 cans of poly) for around $40 at walmart. AVOID GLOSS PAINTS.. they usually have a laquer in them that makes a film in the water. stick to flat colors, and dont worry.. the clear coat makes them glossy.

I would be very interested to see this. I was thinkin you were talkin about doing a holoflash top with swirled back and sides, but this could be cool as well... the only thing id say is DEFINATELY test this out on scrap. I would be afraid it would be extremely busy-looking. Thats gonna be a helluvalotta colors between a flash and a swirl