mledbetter

You're better off posting sketches to the "in progress" section and you can get everyone's feedback. It's a good place for "what do you think of this" feedback.

I have no idea.. Bottom line is.. if it's a 25.5" scale guitar, then it's exactly 12.75" from the 12th fret to your bridge.. Take neck heel dimensions, pickup dimenstions, bridge dimensions, lay them out and the body can be whatever as long as it accomodates everything. I think most body blanks are 20x14x1.75.

(i wasn't trying to be a smartass btw) That answers your question about the oak.. no one uses it.. your other questions though are scattered all throughout the place. Most are fairly common beginner questions. Some are too broad to answer.. Just lurk and search around for a while and you'll find a wealth of knowledge around here. Best tip i can give you is to buy a book. Melvyn Hiscocks.. it's the guitar bible.. takes you through design, building, etc...

go here...

Man that Ruetz J1 sounds really nice. I toyed with the idea of building an amp for a while.. then guitar building seemed a lot safer Did I read right you want a 1-200 watt tube amp??!! My main amp is a 15 watt job and I user an attenuator on it! You can deafen someone quite adequately with a 50 watter.

i saw somewhere.. can't remember where.. but someone took a flat board and glued squares of sandpaper to it in ascending grits.. then you just keep the nut flat against the sanding board.. seemed like a great idea.

On this forum.. a builder with a site called Soulmate Guitars For a more generic shape Carvin sells prebuilt necks where you just add wings.

Yeah the "melts" Those are neat looking. The flame idea is pretty cool. Would be neat to dry fit your inlays, then dye them separately - do a yellow to orange fade on flames made out of quilted maple.. then inlay them into a dark stained contrasting top.. then epoxy and clear the whole thing.. that would look killer.

Also invest in a good strap. Those nylon jobs you see everywhere -- i can't take em. I have a nice leather wide strap with locking clips, about 4-5 inches wide.. I played a friends 6 string bass the other night for an entire 2 hr gig and never once had an ouce of pain.. You have to distribute the weight properly.

I bet it won't. By the time you do cavity routing, pickup routing, trem routing, tummy and forearm contour.. you'll be pretty lightweight.. if you need more, do the monkey grip Les pauls are generally mahogany with a maple cap. If you were really worried about weight you could do that kind of body, and you could hollow out chambers underneath the cap. I think though with that style body you'll be fine. Ses pauls are almost 2 inches thick and the lower bouts are huge. Also the neck is mahogany.

This is funny.. it's a question that initially makes people go huh?? did he just ask that?? but there isn't a ton of info on it and I know a lot of grown adults that take their guitars in to be changed.. baffles me but maybe it's because they have LPs and they get tired of the bridge falling off!! Here's what i've done and I never have unwinding.. 1. put the string through the bridge and run it through the post. I have the post positioned so the string goes through on the right hand side and bends back through towards the bridge again (6 inline right handed) 2. My trick for getting the windings right is I hold the string down on the fretboard with my index finger, then with my other fingers I pull the string up high, about 3-4 inches off the fretboard. This does 2 things.. 1 it puts tension on the string for winding, and 2 it makes sure you have enough string to get several good winds around the post. 3. I wind with a 2 dollar crank string winder. Or if i misplaced it I do it the hard way. 4. The post. Make sure after the first wind that the string runs under each wind before it so as it goes it's being forced down toward the peghead. You want a downward angle on the string anyway.. Letting it crawl up the post is asking for trouble if you dont' have string trees. 5. I get 5-6 good winds on each string, less on the bass string and probably more, 6-8 on the high E. Tips.. change 1 string at a time, starting with bass. After it's tuned to pitch, gently pull on the string, tune it to pitch.. repeat until pulling no longer gets it out of tune. If you have a trem, you could yank back on the trem instead of pulling the string.. Now.. if you're using a locking trem.. Change 1 string at a time still.. Tune to pitch.. You may have to torque down the springs in the back somewhat if you're going heavier string gauge.. but you don't have to work so hard at the stretching part. Just lock down the nut clamps (that sounded painful) and there shouldn't be any stretching to speak of.. If there is the fine tuners should work just fine. Dont forget to center out the fine tuners too before you start of you may find yourself at the end of their travel and have to restring again. Hope that helps some.. who knows, maybe some others wondered and were afraid to ask.. -m

LOL.. don't feel bad. Judging by your avatar i assume you're an ibanez fan. I've had friends that thought basswood was the only thing guitars were made of. But yes, mahogany is great.. 50 years of les pauls can't be wrong!! If you stick to an ibanez type body style you could get some really warm raw tones.. i would imagine kind of SG like.. Les Pauls have way more body mass than the modern soloist/double cut style. There used to be a JS model made out of mahogany back in the day.

Cost ends up being about the same. Finishing through roxy and the neck itself is more expensive than warmoth BUT USACG doesn't upcharge for a flat radius and the neck back contour I want where those two options would cost me an extra $70 at warmoth. They come out to be only a few dollars different. It really just comes down to the fact that I like USA's neck construction and how they feel and I like the fact that wamoth has in stock bodies that I can purchase. ← A buddy of mine just ordered a bass body from Tommy.. they were on a 2 week turnaround which isn't bad. A month or so ago, they were saying 4 weeks on just about everything. It's nice not to have to wait but as javacody said, they will really get you exactly what you want and if you're waiting for the neck.. why not way for the body too

Unless you have a good reason to use it, i'd stay away from teak. It's a challenge to finish and just wouldn't make that great a tonewood IMO.

I haven't attempted that though, but i believe that the USACG folks are ex warmoth employees.. If you're getting a body with a standard strat pocket you should have no problem. You might want to call Tommy at USA though and get a quote on both.. might be a little better price getting both from him.

Welcome. Neat project. i'm a married dad of 3 kids so my hat is definitely off to you my man.. Teach them all how to build and you'll have a ready made workforce

I also like some of the wraparound style stopbar bridge/tailpiece units. Allparts has a ton. The standars LP jr type, they have one that looks a lot like the PRS unit. There is a wilkinson one that is somewhat adjustable, and looks like a really low profile. Probably wouldn't even have to do a neck angle. Pick up one of those and a set of locking tone pros studs off of ebay, you'd have a killer setup goin on.

Godin.. Put the guitar on a perfectly level surface, drill your string channels from the back using a template. Get a little level and if you have a perfectly vertical area on your drill, tape the level to your drill seriously. But if you go from the back, you can screw the holes up a tad under the bridge, no one will see them. I think someone mentioned before, but you could only drill half the depth from the front and back ane let them meet. If your holes are off even slightly, it won't affect how they look on the top and bottom. Worst case is you might have an uneven channel in side and have to be careful how you put the string through. And honestly, you can get a pretty cheap drill press from grizzly or harbor freight or something. <100 bucks. Would be worth it as it appears you're not going to stop at one or two guitars.. (who does) A drill press will save you a ton of time in screwups, but also it's just faster for drilling all your assembly holes.. and also for cavity routing, you can do 99% of your work with a forstner bit and save your router bits. Might have to step up to the next size drill press.. The 1/2 hp motor isn't bad but the table is only 7" diameter which means you can only get 3.5 inches into the guitar. They have a radial arm drill press for 169. A drill press is invaluable though. Don't forget also the robo sander. It's a little drum sander you can chuck in your drill press. For shaping a figured wood top, the robo sander is awesome (25 bucks). No tearout whatsoever. It has a guide bushing so you can do body shaping with it. ok. my sales pitch is done

I think the steinbergers by far are your best bet. Can't imagine how you would hide any other type of tuner. With the steinbergersm, you could route out a cavity, and replace it with a wood plate thick enough to mount the steinbergers on. Then the string would come through the body and into the steinbergers which would stick out the back but further toward the strap button where they dont' get in your way. Then thee is no plate to remove. no one would ever see them unless they saw the back of your guitar. The steinbergers have to have enough room above and below to work properly though so hiding them totally would be a feat.

i'm having a hard time understanding quibbling over 100 bucks for the gearless tuners?!?! I mean you're talking about speed loaders, steinberger bridges, wanting to be modern and contemporary and not old fashined.. Those things don't add up to cheap. Spend 100 bucks on gearless tuners and you can use a 30-40 dollar hardtail bridge adn save all around. OR engeineer a way for the steinberger tuners to go on the bridge end of your guitar and feed over a tune-o-matic saddle or something. All kinds of ways you can do something "different" but the only way to do something inexpensive is to go standard. That steinberger ball end holder works in conjunction with their headless neck piece.. I'm not seeing how that will help you. You have to be able to tune your strings. Bridges with fine tuners have to have a ball in them (unless they are floyd style) but all your other hardtail options with fine tuners require the ball end of the string. So you would be back to double ball strings. What you probably need to do is lurn on ebay and look for one of those musicyo steinbergers to go on sale, buy it, and harvest it for parts.

Those wayne videos are awesome.. I learned a lot early on watching those. Before i get the stew blade i'm going to have a local machine shop make me one out of a plywood blade. 20 bucks for the machining. With a decent but cheap plywood blade and the machining you could have a standard size blade ground to size and have less than 40 bucks into it.. no stabilizers, standard size..

Yeah, you don't need a high end saw.. even a cheap mitre guage will be accurate enough. most 99 dollar table top saws are adequate.

you could also use saddle height screws.. any music store should have some of those. Ones for bass saddles should be about the right size With a knurled post, all you need is some friction to make it stay on. In the past i've tricked a knob to stay on without a screw using a little snip of flat rubber band.. just slip it in the knob as you put it on the post.. or if it's a split post, put it in the slot and put the knob on with a slight twisting motion.

Yeah, as long as you know ahead of time.. A lap steel is insanely easy to build.. why not give it some shape. Go 8 inches wide and make look like a small explorer, or vee.. Check out some lapsteel companies for design ideas. You can do whatever you want with it.

add a couple of springs, tighten the back till your trem is pulled back and locked.. or get a stabilizer bar like a tremsetter or something to keep it from moving, then you effectively have a fixed bridge. If it's a recessed trem and you do the spring method, you may need to stick a shim of wood in the recessed cavity for the trem to rest on or you'll need a lot of tension to pull it all the way back.