Mitch

Very wise

Although people have been doing intricate work with wood long before CNC machines

Rough it with the router and tidy it with charp chisels

And I think you could possible rotate it 90 degrees the curve of the knight could be made to follow the curve of the guitar...

Yeah thats a good idea. If you plan to do this then I would make the guitars a little bit longer behind the bridge.

Would higher resistance effect how well it stops buzzing or is the resistance to small to make any difference?

I dont think soldered copper tape has nearly that much resistance.

Do they all have a kerf that's the right size for cutting fret slots or does the blade thickness vary from make to make?

My first guitar had a more warped blank than that and i had few problems with it. I think If you feel strongly about it then give it few passes with a thickness planer if its not to wide.

From a playing point of view a rounded in back is more comfortable (I saw some basses in a guitar shop with deliberatly cupped backs) but it can make rounding over a little uneven and the routing templates might not stick down properly.

You might not even have any of these problems as you only have a tiny bit of warp.

Pictures would help

Just a little update. Got the drill press out yesterday to drill the bride post holes and wouldn't you know it. My drill press is dead!!! Going to pickup another one tomorrow if its in stock.

No way! How did that happen?

Motor will switch on but not engage.

It's ok though. Bought a better drill press today. It was an early father's day gift!

I did that with my dads thickness planer. He wasn't too happy.

I Searched copper tape and it came up with loads of stuff. Some for making guitars and some for repelling slugs. Same thing though.

http://shop.ebay.com/copper%20tape?_from=R...tape&_naf=1

EDIT: I wouldn't reccomend getting less than 6ft for 1 guitar.

I tested the tape with a multimeter and the adhesive is conductive.

The slug tape is inexpensive do you have the brand name available. It would be nice to have a cheaper source.

Also I have seen aluminum shielding tape. All electronics has some Look here 36 yards 2" wide for a good price. If you don't have to solder the shielding together you don't need to solder. The point at which you attach your pot to the body becomes the ground connection to the shielding tape. They have other sizes as well.

Err. Ebay brand. Mine cost about £4 including postage for 4 metres of 1.5" wide roll. The price has gone down since then though.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SLUG-TAPE-COPPER-TAP...Q2em118Q2el1247

I think that's the one I bought. I think the adhesive should be conductive on all slug tape because if it's not then it wouldnt work. I'm not sure how it works but aparently when the slugs slodge (what word do you use for a moving slug?) onto it it gives them a tingle which is like when aluminium foil touches a metal filling in your mouth or something.

Anyway. Even if the adhesive isn't conductive you can just solder the bits together like i did just in case. It shouldn't take you 5 minutes.

Just a little update. Got the drill press out yesterday to drill the bride post holes and wouldn't you know it. My drill press is dead!!! Going to pickup another one tomorrow if its in stock.

No way! How did that happen?

I spent over an hour yesterday trying to figure out how to get a 13-degree scarf cut into the wood when the tools all come at it from the wrong direction. With a fantastic amount of jiggery, I managed to cobble together a prototype that will do it. Now I just need to make it bigger & more sturdy.

How do y'all manage to do it without sawing it by hand?

http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.php?showtopic=30212

http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.ph...mp;hl=scarf+jig

Loads of information on that second one.

Pinstriping onto natural wood doesn't sound very appealing visually.

Corvus doesn't sound very appealing

I wanted to vote for Mitch but the headstock and control layout put me off. It could have used some dye, too.

I did use dye. I sanded most of it off though so it just stayed in the grain.

dayvo: Very clean looking build and very nice deep shiny finish. I think it could have done with a bit more of a carve though and It would have been nice if it wasn't so heavily based on a les paul so there was a bit more originality.

Jaden: Nice build. The maple has turned out well though I personally wouldn't have chosen that colour and the head shape is a bit weird(Like mine I suppose).

avengers63: Nice top wood and I love the headstock inlay as well. I am undecided whether I like the blue or not. I don't really like the colour of the back plate.

low end fuzz: Good all round build and I really like the headstock inlay. All that browny colour just looks a bit odd. I can't put my finger on it. I think there is just a bit too much going on with all those laminates.

chops1983: Amazing guitar, Got my vote. It's kinda like a modern variation on a classic archtop design with the body shape and reverse headstock and i love it. Clean, nice wood, great finish, A lot better than my second build is! (mitch-o-caster) I would change the knobs though.

i think that fretboard would really confuse me but it is fun in a retro kinda way. i suppose i wouldnt be any more confused than i normally am on a fretless

have you considered that movement in the wood may cause the metal to protrude over time

Yeah. I remember reading that in melvyns book. It says the wood will wear away at a different speed to the metal. If it's not to late then I would replace the copper bits with wood(And possibly the inlays but i'm not sure).

The neck looks a little wonky too. I would re drill the neck bolt holes.

I choose bocote.

Good luck with the neck John. Don't worry too much. Making necks isn't really all that bad but it makes the build take quite a lot longer to make.

As long as you keep reading melvyns book and and ask questions on this forum if you are unsure about anything then you should be fine.

Nice wood choices by the way.

if you want a cheaper option than sheilding paint you can use sticky backed copper sheilding tape which you should be able to get from gardening stores fairly cheaply (though it would probably be called slug tape).

I looked up the slug tape which was a good idea.. Except you want a conductive adhesive to make sure the tape makes a complete circuit. I guess a bit of solder will connect the strips, but is it worth it.

I picked up some conductive paint finally and I believe it will go much further than any tape roll so the cost is relative to the amount of shielding you get.

I tested the tape with a multimeter and the adhesive is conductive.

I was suprised at how much tape i used for my build (about 2 and a half meters) so yeah. It probably does work out about the same. But i was just trying to show that things not designed for building guitars can be used to build guitars

How does the Mitch-o-caster sound Mitch? Looks good.

It sound great! Its fairly smooth sounding and quite trebley. You can't get as much bass from it as my first guitar(cherry body maple neck) but I prefer a more trebley sound. Overall I think it's a pretty good guitar as long as you dont mind a huuuuuuuuuuuuge fat neck(Fattest neck I have ever seen on a guitar).

Have you checked your yellow pages/phone book?

Thanks for the replies guys, great info. I've been looking for local sawmills but I'm having trouble finding anything nearer than about 60 miles away! (most make fence posts and such). It seems to me that wood is something you want to see before you buy, seems a bit far to go on the off chance of finding what you want. Any one know of somewhere that sells these woods in North Wales (Bangor/Anglesey area)?

I'll make sure to let you know when I sus this better, I really do fancy trying building a guitar with British wood. Support your local trees!

All the british wood I used was grown within 50 miles of here.

I'm lucky as I can acctually see the woodyard from my house.

I would look on the internet for wood suppliers. I found out that i have about 3 woodyard within 10 miles of here. If the woodyard isn't acctually listed as selling planked hardwoods then try them anyway. The woodyard that i get my wood from is listed as a firewood seller but they acctually work as tree surgeons (thats where they get most of their buisness so the wood is cheap) and most of their stuff is planks.

This is my second guitar and first GOTM entry.

I call this guitar: The Mitch-o-caster

Uk cherry and UK sycamore laminated neck.

UK ash wings

Indian rosewood fingerboard

7mm Paua abalone dot inlays

25.5" scale length

22 medium wide frets

A fairly fat neck

Through neck

Wrapover bridge

1.5" thick body

Kent armstrong humbuckers with coil tap

1 master volume, 2 tones and a blend pot

Bound fingerboard and head

Carved top, belly carve an "M" carve on the top horn

French polish

Gotoh tuners

Chrome hardware

if you want a cheaper option than sheilding paint you can use sticky backed copper sheilding tape which you should be able to get from gardening stores fairly cheaply (though it would probably be called slug tape).

How many octaves lower is a bass to a guitar? Wikipedia says it's 1 but if it is then what is an e to e baritone guitar? Baritone guitars have a pitch imbetween a guitar and a bass or so ive read (read it in dan erlewine's how to make an electric guitar play great).

But dan erlewine also says baritone guitar is another name for 6 string bass but a 6 string bass is the same pitch as a normal bass but with 2 extra strings right?

Confused.

I think we have walnut as well.

The body of my first guitar was made of uk cherry and all but the fingerboard of my second guitar was british wood.

Ash, cherry, beech, sycamore, a little bit of maple, poplar, lime (also known as basswood), alder, elm (became almost extinct because of dutch elm disease) and oak can all be found in the uk.

Beech and oak are faily heavy so its best not to make whole bodys out of them but necks out of oak and tops out of beech should be fine.

Sycamore is closly related to maple and tonally is about that same and colour wise maple is a bit yellowish and sycamore is more grey.

Cherry is great for necks and bodies as it is similar to maple and is easy to work.

British ash tends to be heavier than swamp ash and others but is still perfectly useable in guitars.

I don't really know anything about fingerboard wood but i know yew and hornbeam are very hard but im not sure how good they would be on a fingerboard.

I would definatly reccomend using british wood for a guitar and it will more than likely turn out a lot cheaper.

Hope this helped and good luck.

If your worried about it just use mini pots. And you can also get pickup selectors that are just a little box around 1cm x 1cm x 2cm underneath rather than the bigger ones with the external leaf contacts.

But if your one of those people who likes to make exact copys of guitars and needs to get exactly the right components then I can't help you there.