spyykko

Hello folks,

after about 40 months of being In Progress, I finally managed to finalize this guitar.

Final specifications:

* Cedar (cedrela odorata) body, flame maple top, cedar-maple laminate neck.

* Macassar-ebony fret board, 25″ scale, 22 medium-jumbo frets

* Duncan JB + Jazz -pickups, 3-way switch, volume + push-pull tone. Positions: neck HB, Neck SC + Bridge SC with in phase / out of phase selection with push-pull -pot, Bridge HB.

* Hipshot hardtail -bridge, strings through body design, Planet Waves autotrim-tuners

* Acrylic finish

I'm really satisfied with this guitar. It plays really nicely, looks great and has all the features I need.

I had some roadblocks along the way, but I learnt a lot while fixing the mistakes I made. In my future projects I still try to pay more attention to every single detail. Nevertheless, this is by far the best and challenging build I've made.

a teaser:

More pics here

-SeppoP-

Hello,

I'm going to Beijing China to a Business / leisure trip next week. Does any of you know any good places to buy guitars and especially guitar and bass parts in Beijing? I'm looking stuff in the lowest price range, not western made high class products.

-SeppoP-

Hello

I'm in the process of trying to figure out how to make the best logos and I'm interested in how companies make chrome and gold logos.

I don't know how large companies make those chrome / gold logos*, but they can be fairly well replicated with ALPS / OKI DPxxxx -series MicroDry printers. These printers have both gold/silver ribbons (silver as in regular Fender logo) as well as gold / silver foil ribbons.

These foil colors can be printed on normal water-slide decal.

Please google "decals on alps printer" for more info.

* Edit: My best guess is these type of logos are made by silk screening with special inks.

-Seppo-

I haven't used cedar personally, but from what I've read here it is considered a soft wood. Since it's used for soundboards on acoustics. I guess I was wrong.

Yes, it's soft - but so is mahogany.

Minkälaiset hinnat niillä siellä Hakalassa on?

Oon tässä yrittäny vaan löytää suomalaista välittäjää mistä sais kelpo hinnoin soitinrakennus laatua.

Onkos muuten Cedarilla suomalaista nimeä?

Originally Jester asked about one local wood supplier. I'll answer in bad english, so no one will feel left outside of the discussion.

Prices at Hakala's are competetive, but the wood is not necesserily tonewood-quality. They store all wood indoors, but they aren't allways seasoned after kiln drying, so at least I have always kept my woods in storage for at least a couple of months before starting working with them. Cedar for this project costed around 40 euros.

The usually have great stock, but it varies a lot, so it's not a bad idea to give them a call before visiting. They are opened only on weekdays 8-16, but the owner may come to serve you also on other hours and on weekend, if you warn him beforehand.

Cedar is in Finnish seetri.

When you say 'Cedar', you mean Spanish Cedar, ie Cedrella Odorata, right? If so, especially with some maple, it'll be more than tough enough for even the heaviest commonly used electric guitar strings.

Yes, same stuff! Finnish luthier Juha Ruokangas uses spanish cedar in some of his models and he seems to be extremely satisfied with cedar's tonal qualities. Actually the body outline of my work has been stolen from his Duke model.

The wood by the way tastes extremely bad. I have had to learn to work my mouth closed while sawing and sanding. Otherwise you'll taste the wood in your mouth many hours after leaving the

Looking good!

What gauge of strings you're planning using on this? That neck might not hold up too well on heavier strings.

Might I ask where did you get that top? Locally?

May I ask what makes you doubt the strenght of the neck? Since it's a laminate construction to me it feels more sturdy than e.g. the mahogany neck with rosewood fretboard on my FlyingV.

Woods are all bought locally. Cedar and maple are from Hakalan Puutukku in Lahti, and ebony from SoitinrakentajatAMF.

-Seppo-

I need the dimensions of a flying V...please!

I just need it as a reference for my project axe...thanks in advance!

Check this out:

http://corvette-summer.com/images/58gibsonv.TIF

-Seppo-

Hello all,

Here you'll find a few in progress -shots of my latest project, an carved top guitar with cedar body, flamed maple top and cedar/maple laminate neck. I've had very little time to work with this, so it has progressed really slowly. I had some troubles in the beginning, like I had to make a new top and new headstock, but at this point I'm quite happy with the state of the project.

Specs:

25" neck, cedar-maple laminate, ebony fretboard, ebony headstock veneer

Brazilian Cedar body, flamed maple top

Hipshot hardtail-bridge, Planet Waves locking tuners, 2 x humbuckers, 3-way blade, volume, push-pull -tone with coil split

Visit my gallery

-Seppo-

i will eventually have the tailpiece cast in brass once my mate is set up to cast it. at the moment i can get it cast in aluminium for free, so beggars can't be choosers! unless i can convince my wife that i NEED a milling machine

How have you planned to smooth out your cast? I don't think the cast will never be smooth and accurate enough to be used as guide rail without some machining, so i think you'll have to start buying roses for your wife anyway

I agree with Ron about the issue with travel, and using dissimilar materials.

Otherwise it looks good for being a prototype. Keep up with your work and post more pics as you progress!

Is anyone aware of a UK source?

I tried googling with with "EMI shield paint" and found this: www.tbaecp.co.uk

Their's ECP552 seems to me very similar product as the M.G. Chemicals' counterparent.

Hi Im new and looking for help!

I have access to a CNC machine and would like to create a carved top body for a variax transplant.

How would I go about doing this? would i need to create the drawing in CAD and then somehow create "g-code" ?? Is there anybody who would be willing to provide me with code?! or create something for a price?

How do you convert CAD drawings to g-code?

waiting for account to be upgraded! could i create a body from the templates in the downloads section?

What kind is your mill and what is it capable of doing? Is it only a 2D machine, which can do pocketing and 2D routing or can you use it to machine 3D contours as well?

If your machine is a 3D mill, you'll need a 3D CAD model of the top. Modelling a carved top body is a tedious job, and requires right tools. Most of the 3D CAD software really can not handle this type of complex surfaces, or at least the surfaces can not be easily created with them. The 2D body outlines at the download section will not help you very far.

After you have your model you'll need to use a CAM processor to convert the cad model to G-code (or what kind of code your machine accepts). There are several brands, but Mastercam is maybe the most well known.

If you want to save time, don't go with the CNC. You can carve the top with help of some power tools in a couple of hours, but you'll propably have to spend several days just to make the 3D CAD model (depending of you previous CAD-experience). If you just want to learn to use your mill, or you are planning on manufacturing several identical bodies then go for it. Remember to post pictures of your progress to all PG readers.

Besides, CNC is ment for mass production. I really can't see any reason why to use it in one off production (besides the fact that playing around with different gadgets is so much fun).

You'd be hard pressed to find someone who can do a gapless inlaid top without the help of cnc. That's just one of a few examples where you'd need the assistance of cnc on a small scale.

Sorry, I really ment to say i can't see any reason to use 3D CNC in one off production

More simple (2D) works like inlays can be done with relatively simple machinery and software and more importantly spending much less effort to modelling/drawing.

The most impressive has been Myka (king of the jigs) Guitars' duplicarver...

Ruokangas guitars' website used to have a picture of similar piece of equipment, but it was raised to almost horizontal position, like old fashioned parallelogram drawing boards. It seemed to me a much more ergonomic than the table top -model. Too bad the shop tour -pictures have been removed from their web site.

Just in case no-one realised. THe sites I gave showed plans and materials to build your own CNC machineries for <$100max...

One limitation I see has been finding reasonably priced 3-d CAD software that you can turn into g-code. It seems like if you really want to design something with complex 3-D shapes (like the arch of an archtop or a compound radius fretboard) you need pro versions of CAD software that all cost between $800 and $1500.

I'd not try to make a 3D modell of carved top guitar by modelling it to a 3D CAD from scratch, no matter how expensive the system is (currently I'm using SolidWorks 2006 at work). Instead I'd carve a physical model of the top from soft wood or styroform (or anything that is easy to work with) by hand and have it 3D scanned. After that I could make some modifications, mirroring etc with cad, but these type of complex shapes are way easier to do by hand than by a computer. Besides, computers tend to kill your creativity, somehow you get better ideas when working with your hands :-)

What comes to the cheap(ish) CNC routers, they are hardly ever suitable for such a demanding job as carving the top. They are ment to be used in easy tasks in 2D (routing or drilling PCB's or name plates etc.) or in 2,5D (routing pockets of different deapths by gradually taking off more and more). Cheap controllers are simply not powerfull enough to move all three axes accurately at the same time.

Besides, CNC is ment for mass production. I really can't see any reason why to use it in one off production (besides the fact that playing around with different gadgets is so much fun).

--

Seppo

Design Engineer

Also, the diagram on the Lollar website for a P90 doesn't show any spacer at all. Is one necessary? Does it have to be metal? What gives?

Either way, I've got enough spacers for the humbucker sets/bobbins, but I have none for the P-90s. So I can either make those out of plastic, or wood, or I'll have to order 'em from StewMac or something.

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Here's a piece of information about the P90 bobbin design. Hope it helps!

Link

I'm needing it so that I can have a guy cut it out on MDF with a laser cutter. I don't have the resources to make the nice straight lines that I could get with a CNC.

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OK, that explains it. If you are using laser, then you'll probably need the dxf -file instead of dwg.

Here is what I need:

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There you go (a metric dxf-file, 68KB):

http://seppopyykko.net/roska/bassokaula.DXF

or DWG 40KB

http://seppopyykko.net/roska/bassokaula.DWG

Allthough I really don't understand why it had to be drawn with CAD, you had everything to draw it by hand to a large sheet of paper in five minutes.

22 fret, Fender spec necks have an overhang with the 22nd fret on them. The bridge to end of neck pocket distance on both is exactly identical.

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This is true in most cases. However there are exceptions, like some stratocasters equipped with neck humbucker and 22 fret neck. If I remember correctly there is a list of these exceptions at Warmoth's www-pages.

--

Seppo

Question was asked one to many times. Mattia put together a great list for you folks.

Here is the link-Supplies

Peace,Rich

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Thanks a lot! I honestly tried to search first, but for some reason I missed this.

I've been told that in Europe (especially in the Eastern Europe, e.g. in former Ygoslavia) grows a lot of good quality spruce and (flamed) maple. However I have found only one european supplier for tonewoods, Riwoods in Italy.

Are there any other good suppliers for tonewoods in Europe? It seems a bit stupid for me to buy my flame maple top woods, or birdseye neck blanks from the States, if I could get as good stuff from Europe with smaller shipping costs.

All links to good european tonewood suppliers are greatly appreciated.

--

Seppo

Awesome work, a beautiful instrument and very thorough documentation! Can't wait to see it finished.

--

Seppo

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Well, I personally use a software that no one has ever heard before. Its called Pro/Desktop. If you want I can mail you a copy.

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If I've understood correctly Pro/Desktop is some sort of an educational version of Pro/Engineer. Even though there are some features that are quite superior in PTC's software compared to others, are there other facts (like ease of use) that makes me stick with SolidWorks.

Actually, I've started my CAD-carreer with Pro/E and haven't really missed it a day after changing to SW :-)

BTW, have you already modelled your guitar top? If so, how did you succeed and what tools did you use (surface modeller?)

--

Seppo

all of a sudden there is this new CNC machine in school and turns my CADCAM files in reality.!!!Ash HK 

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You lucky dog, I wish I had the possibility to use such a machine!

Just out of curiosity, what cad software and cam processor have you planned to use to generate the toolpaths? I have tried to model a carved top body with SolidWorks with very little success. Can you suggest more suitable software?

Also, what kind of fixtures will you use to attach the body blank to the router's table?

What comes to the veneer, save it for your later projects. Guitar building is highly addictive, so I'm quite sure you will come up with plenty of plans to use it while CNC'ing the first body.

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Seppo

Iam quite good with CAD but cant imagine how to realise the carving and the whirls with AutoCAD?!

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Do you have an access to use a CNC router to make the carve with, or some other specific reason to draw the curve with computer?

I see no reason to make cad drawings if you eventually will do the carving by hand. Just practise the carving using soft, cheap materials (scrap pine, spruce) as long as it takes to learn to do it perfectly.

Normal mechanical design CAD softwares like AutoCAD are ment to be used for drawing straight lines and arcs, not complex free forms. If you must do the drawing with a CAD, I's suggest some software with good surface modelling capabilities.

--

Seppo, mechanical designer

well cad wont let you just print and tape the paper together

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Some printer drivers have this feature.

Personally I have used "Print Window" command to print the templates on two DIN A3 sheets.

Hi, well I know that this question depend of many things but,

how much time or weeks has take to build a guitar aprox (like strato, jem, etc).

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I spent approximately 75 hrs building my first strat. Almost half of the time was required for final sanding and finishing and still I should have spent more time for the paint job.

My second guitar, a set neck FlyingV required 10hrs less, despite the more complex structure (you live, you learn). Actually I documented every working hour from my both the projects to my website, but the document is in finnish, so it probably won't help you much :-)

You can never compete with big industrial guitar factories with quantity, so I think this question is quite irrelevant. If you build guitars as a hobby, why hurry. And if you want to make it professionally you should concentrate more to quality (and fullfilling your customers' needs) than quantity.