SD83

Depends on what you mean by "heavy". I agree with Keegan, 8-9 seems comfortable to me, maybe up to 10. If you look like Kerry King, I guess 12 or 14 would be no problem either I just finished a maple baritone, just over 7 lbs and it feels like a toy to me. On a strap it feels like it weights nothing at all. I guess I'm one of those who want to "feel" the instrument...

I voted for dayvo guitar, with Jadens being close second.

Two pieces I cut off of a plum root, might be the most beautiful wood I have seen yet (not counting pictures). 10x36 cm (10mm and 6mm thick) each, I'm thinking about cutting another two pieces and IF I manage to dry them without cracks (which I doubt) I could join them to something like this or I could just make a bunch of headstock veneers from them

It took me a while to realise I was reading the same thread, different language as half an hour ago... maaaan, I'm tired Anyway: the neck blank looks great, can't wait to see it shaped. Nice choice of "inspiration" also, and aiming for a Metallica-sound is always good. The only thing that confuses me is that on your pictures, your Wenge looks very different than the pieces I worked with.

I can say that it's one of the prettiest wood choices for the whole guitar i've every seen. I totally agree, looks great...

Guitar 1 update: Electronics work, strings are on, tuned... I took it with me to my bands rehearsal today and the sound was... different. Very unique sound to me, "sounds like a Meshuggah guitar" our guitarist said and I'm fine with that. Definitly a cool sound. It weighs 3.3 kg (1 kg less than my bass, feels like a toy-instrument to me ), broad neck and very slim body, great balance both sitting and standing, I'm very satisfied. Pictures will follow soon, maybe I'll try and put it on the GOTM vote and see if I can get one or two votes

Bass 1 update: After my attempt to put a veneer on top of a non-flat bass, I decided to leave it as it was, attacked it with a sander to get a flat surface and called it "done". So "Experiment 1" failed, but "Experiment 2", the new tuners, worked perfectly, and it sounds great. So now I have my first 8-string bass, and the octave strings really add so much to the tone... I'm definitly building a better 8- or 10-string once I have the money for it. Tuning is kinda hard with these new "tuners", but they work great, totally stable, I'm really suprised how well they work Bass 2 update: Applying some more clear coats, screwing half of them, sanding, sanding, sanding well, not half of them, but some were rather bad... a small close-up

Looks like this will be a much closer decision than last month "The skull" - I like it. The top looks great but the skull knobs... no, I don't like those. "Toneflow" - Wow! Only two reasons why it didn't get my vote: e-cavity cover & there is a bass in the competition which I like at least as much, so as a bassist... "The Pablo-Saurus Rex" - reantel called it an "awesome 80's guitar" and that's exactly why I don't like it... "80's", the colors. Cool project, but not for me... "Finkelstein" - Good work, but honestly, the swamp ash & the pickguard just don't look good at all to me "Zebra from hell" - Yeah! The cocobolo accent is a bit much for me, but the rest seems very cool "Uli's" - Got my vote. Beautiful shape and what a great top... the neck-body connection looks a bit weird (that piece of wood doesn't seem to "belong" there) and I'm not sure if I really like the gold hardware, but OMG, the shape and that top... can't stop looking at it. Oh, and I'm not a fan of the red side markers, but who cares "Mtawarira" - I agree with most of the others, maybe a bit too much, but still a great instrument. Definitly among my Top5 this month... so many wonderful instruments "Natty LP" - Another reason why it was such a hard decision for me this month...

That b&w ebony looks incredibly great! I also like the new headstock design, doesn't look as bulky as the old one.

I don't like the last one, but the first two look great! The second one to me looks like a spider or something from Starship Troopers, cool stuff!

Guitar 1 update: Still has no strings and soldering has to be done (I hate that part, seriously, that's the worst part), but my friend visited me today , took it... "finally a decent sized guitar" (obviously, those were not his words, no reason to speak english here ). Guitar 2 update: Headstock and neck are now one piece of wood, the PU-cavity is ready. I just don't have any pictures yet. Bass 1 update: I disassembled my old ultra-cheap 4 string and sanded down the paint, changed the shape a bit... and now sand again to stain the back & sides black and put pomelle mahogany veneer on top. Bass 2 update: Cavity covers are done. Not perfect, but not nearly as bad as I expected. Changed the concept to a 7 string. Why will I build a 7-string bass? Because I can. Sunlight makes the colors seem... different The back

Looks cool! The color change on the headstock looks a bit weird from behind, but I definitily like the rest of that guitar (including the 7th string ) Too bad there seems to be no place to buy bloodwood within like 1000 miles from my home... it looks so great!

Damn, those first builds look fine... mine looked like this: Pickup has been replaced since, and there are many other flaws (most visibly no neck PU and no cavity-cover) but it works great since more than one year, I recently had the chance to try my friends BC Rich Widow, took it... and put it away two notes later. I just love this ugly beast because it is mine. But the second turned out 100% better, and number 3 and 4 look promising

Voted "Any other extreme metal". Opeth, Vader, Nile. But I like lots of bands that don't fit in there... Motörhead, Dream Theater, Chili Peppers... And one of the greatest bands ever, Unexpect!

carousel: Nice work, great looking top. I would be proud if my instruments would look that good KingsX: That is one weird headstock you got there, but the neck looks beautiful. As does the back of the guitar (including the cavity cover... could have been better, but I still prefer that from any white or black cover). But I never liked flat tops... ihocky: obviously a nice piece of work, I just don't like the shape at all... low end fuzz: I would have used a headstock veneer (the woods look really good but they just don't match with the body front & fretboard), otherwise I LOVE the body & headstock shape and the woods avenger: Great body shape, cool woods on top... I just don't like the look of the backside. Marcovis: Nice work and the neck seems to look great. SJE-Guitars: This one would have gotten my vote. If it wasn't for the headstock... unlike some others, I prefer woods AND shape (including horns & cutaways) to those of any other instrument in this vote. RFR: OMG... that top looks incredible Swedish Luthier: The cavity cover looks kinda out of place, but all together a close second to SJE-guitars baritone. I just can't stand the headstock of that one, so this one got my vote (I could look at the back of the neck forever...). Hydrogeoman: Telecaster shape... and as soon as I see this shape, I don't like what I see. Beautiful neck. foil1more: Is that gold hardware on the last pick? If so, I'd say it looks much better with what is shown on the first picture. I just don't like the pickguard. Otherwise, nice work!

WOW!

Update on the 6-string bass: another view of the top And another full view

Wow! I love the look of this guitar, great work!

I'm still in love with this design. Obviously inspired by this which still looks 10.000 times cooler.

Beautiful wood... I love that limba Some plum from my girlfriends garden... all about 1 meter long and 10-12 cm wide, cut in October, so I still have to wait a while until I can use them. those will become fretboards one day and those a one-piece neck and the other one some pieces for a multi-piece neck (too much sapwood & some cracks which you can't see on the picture) (sry for the bad pictures... crappy camera)

A little update: Poti-Knobs are still missing and the PU-cover is not really finished, first bumps are already there yet it's about 10.000 times better than the first instrument I've build, and I'm using that one for over one year, rehearsing, gigs, studio... in a first test with strings, it sounded pretty good, but I couldn't really test distortion cause I only tested it acoustic & played over a small bass amp. A 6-string bass I'm working on... no reason to start a new topic as the progress will be rather slow as always (I should think about changing the title... can you change the title of your own topic? gotta find that out...). Not much is done yet but glueing the veneers on the three pieces of the sandwich after sawing them out. Electronics- and battery-cavity are already there, as well as the neck-pocket and one PU-cavity (I just realised that this picture was taken before that was done). Wenge-Walnut-Wenge body with Makore-Ash-Makore(2x)-Ash-Makore veneers, PUs will be two EMGs. No idea about the neck yet, but it will most likely have a multi-piece neck. I wanted to try continious backplates on this one (as well as trying the veneer-stuff, which worked... OK but the mistakes will be invisible anyways due to shaping etc.), but I will try that again with another wood. Wenge looks great, but hard to work with Luckily I got some pieces left from sawing, so the back cavitys will get matching covers, I will also try to sand down to pieces to about 1mm or less and make PU-covers of them to have it look like it's pretty much one piece. A wenge fretboard would be great for continuing that, I will think about that at a later time.

great looking instruments! I love the look of the Mahogany/Padauk/Mahogany neck and that Wenge-top... just beautiful woods and great body shape.

4 frets which are rather pointless anyways because they won't be used 99,9% of the time. Honestly, the only reason there are 26 frets and not 22 or 24 is simply that I had exactly 26 frets lying around.

It looks bigger than it acutally is on that pic (4.8cm at the nut)... huge hands --> huge neck Fret access is good (seems good to me), at least up to 21st or 22nd fret.

Not much progress over the last months, but a little update: not much work left to do except for some fine-tuning and a cover for PU and electronics cavity. Oh, and poti knobs. And a new string/set of strings because I broke one when tuning the guitar "right" for the first time... The other pic is from my old Stagg-Bass... it didn't even have strings and only one PU for about a year now and it was horribly ugly (black with lots of scratches and all that...) so I decided to sand off the paint and change the shape a bit. I'm not sure about the color of back & sides but I think about staining them black. DARK black, so you don't see much of the grain... which doesn't look that bad, but it's a 5-piece body I got some pommele mahogany veneer here, so I will try to glue that on top of the bass. Im thinking about making a new neck also because a)the headstock is really ugly and b)it has a small crack near the headstock. On the other hand, I really like the look of the fretboard and the overall feeling of that neck... If I do make a new neck, it might be a fretless. Maybe.