brian d

FWIW, I think that tuner position can affect the perception of tension of the strings and the way notes will bend. 1) On a strat headstock the string travels in a straight line from the bridge to the tuner. If your tuner postion dictates a deflection of the string from the nut toward the tuner (e.g. gibson 3x3), you get more friction at the nut and you may percieve that as the strings being more taught. As you bend the note, you encounter the friction which you may feel as a tighter string. Of course you can have a 3x3 headstock which keeps the strings going in a straight line - your headstock will have to taper to accomodate this. 2) If your tuners are further from the nut (e.g strat high e string compared with Gibson e string), there is more string that needs to be stretched to reach the same tension change for a bend, so the deflection needed to bend a given pitch will be greater. Compare regular strat headstocks to reverse headstocks. If you want undeflected strings, then on your plan (or on the headstock paddle) draw in the straight line continuation of the strings past the nut along the headstock. Mark in circles for your tuner posts just to the sides of those lines (as the string would wind onto the post - remember it doesn't go through the middle of the post). Note the distance from the centre of the posts to the tuning pegs. Now you have the limitations of the shape of your headstock. I hope that wasn't too confusing. Brian. As a minor side note, FWIW, I have read that "dead string length" [from nut to tuner or from saddle to string anchor] can actually affect intonation. My understanding is: the higher the action is, the more the deflection is when you fret a note. This will sharpen the note and affect intonation. The more dead string length you have, then the change in tension will be less for the same amount of deflection, so the affect on intonation will be less. Some of this would be compensated for by the intonation adjustment, but as the string height and thus the deflection changes along the neck, this adjustment wouldn't be perfect all the way down the fretboard. Compare this with number 2 above, where you need a greater deflection to get the same change in tension where the dead string length is longer.

Beeeautiful Stu and Deano. Looks like a twin sister for yours, Stu - but at least this one isn't built backwards. Cheers, Brian.

I couldn't go past the working man bass. It showed creativity in addition to technical skill. Same can be said for Hooglebug's Sakura Svelte - his shapes and use of carving are inspired and inspiring. I'm just lucky that I didn't have a finished guitar this month....although it looks like there's not going to be an "easy" month in the near future. Brian.

If we're discussing the October GOTM entries, can I be the first to say that I really "dig" the working man bass. (pun intended). Very creative, imaginitive and great execution.

That natural coloured quilt top is superb! The figure just jumps out at you. Did you do anything to highlight the quilt other than clear coats? Brian.

Rick, how does your router jig work? I have been building a jig to use with a small belt sander for single or compound radii. I have started rethinking it to use with a table router, but if you've already got a successful design, I'd love to get some ideas from you. Thanks, Brian.

Thanks for the descriptions of paisley Ben. I particularly liked the one as the Zoroastrian symbol for life and eternity. I'm going to ignore the one about pregnant leeches. I am drawn to the shape for a few reasons. It reminds me of one half of the Yin/Yang symbol, it reminds me of the shape of a drop of water and at the same time the shape of a flame. If I were to get soppy, I would say that it is like the shape of a teardrop. It also reminds me of soundwaves, with the top being like a sine wave and the bottom being part of a wave with a longer wavelength intersecting at the tail and at the tip of the horn. Bottom line....I just like the shape. Cheers, Brian.

I'm no expert on Strats, but I'm concerned about the description in the original post that "the end result leaves my neck slightly crooked so my high E-string almost hangs on the edge of the fretboard". Wherever the screw holes are, I would have thought that the heel can't be placed in the pocket at any other position than where it should be....maybe the screw holes won't line up, but I don't see how the neck can be in the pocket and still have the the neck crooked. Maybe there's a lot of slop in the pocket that allows this? Guitarman, maybe you could post a photo? Brian.

Thanks Geo. I'm planning to put in GFS Dream 180's and a Graphtech Ghost piezo pickup. Cheers, Brian.

And there was me thinking I had made an original design!! I guess there's nothing new under the sun. The body shape started off as a "paisley" type shape tweaked to look more like a guitar, and then the headstock was designed to mimic it. I hope to have the "ventral fin" demarcated more to accentuate the paisley shape. As I have never seen a Tokai Talbo, I'll keep thinking that I've done something a bit original Thanks for the compliments, Alex. Brian.

Waiting for paint to dry on the Lahav build, I got stuck into the Goncalo today. I drilled the pilot holes for the posts of the TOM bridge. I took the measurements from the Stewmac Fret Calculator for determining where the holes need to go. They better be right! I also drilled the pilot holes for the strings through. I kept them as pilot holes at this stage. I wanted to get those pilot holes drilled before carving the top - just in case. Do you think that it's better to drill the final holes for the bridge and top and back ferrules before or after the finish? I'm going to finish in Tru-Oil. After that I went to work with the angle grinder with a flap disc for the rough carve of the top. It was a great, albeit loud, procedure. I am really pleased with the result. I felt like Edward Scissorhands just sculpting away. I went over the body lightly with a hand held belt sander after the angle grinder. And here is the result. You can again see the difference in colour between the freshly sanded Goncalo and the wood that hasn't been touched. It takes a couple of days to get to the rusty colour. One last shot for now: Brian.

A bit more progress with the repair today. I sanded the paint level, went through to maple in a couple of spots, so did another couple of coats of paint. I used the same paint as the rest of the neck. I sprayed the paint into a plastic cup and painted it on with a brush. This paint allows 1-2 hours between coats, but at least 24 hours before sanding. It may be a while before I get back to it. Here's how it is now. Couldn't do much else with the guitar today, so I continued with my other build. It was a very productive day for it. Brian.

Thanks jm. If it's true that you learn from your mistakes, I've learned a library full on this build. I took the clamps off this morning. There's a bit of excess glue, but otherwise it looks like a tight joint. I've since done some sanding with 120, 240 grit paper and 00 and 0000 steelwool, and put a couple of coats of paint. I think the repair will be invisible - just see the telegraph lines (is that what they're called?) of the laminations which were there before the break. Cheers, Brian.

I PM'd waylay, but I'll reply here as well in case anyone's interested. I was very happy with the results. The most difficult part of the process was getting the aluminium angle flat. First I planed a large piece of wood to use as a long sanding block, then I put 80 grit paper on that, and held it in a vise to run the alminium over it to get it dead flat. I have it now as a tool I will use on all future fret jobs. The actual fret levelling was quick and pretty much foolproof (as long as you realise that the strings will be useless afterwards). Crowning took a bit more time. I set the action lower than the theoretical norms and still had no buzzing. I am using heavier strings than normal (12-52 flatwounds). On one hand I think that all else being equal the action would need to be higher as the strings are thicker, on the other hand the thicker strings mean higher tension and as the mass is greater the amplitude of the vibration can be smaller for the same loudness, so maybe that's allowing me a lower action. It's a good straightforward technique. I wish you luck with it. Brian.

Yep, had me quite distraught. The crack was at the back of the headstock where I had laminated some Goncalo Alves after thinning the maple face too often. I hear that a titebond joint is stronger than the wood itself, but the crack was awfully close to the joint. I think that having a stronger joint actually causes a stress concentration near it, compared with a homogenous material. I couldn't see any maple in the crack, so it was a crack in the Goncalo, not at the joint. After masking on either side of the crack (minimise glue cleanup), I used a skewer to push titebond into the crack, and flexed the headstock backwards and forwards to pump the titebond into the crack. As the crack was in a position that I didn't have parallel sides to clamp against, and I don't have any friendly plastic, I used cauls to direct the pressure of the clamp in the right direction. I'm going to leave the clamps on until tomorrow and then not touch it until Tuesday....just to be on the safe side. Just to make things more "perfect" I found that our dog has chewed through the GK cables that I haven't used since December. No-one in Melbourne has them in stock, and I'll have to special order one, so I'm going to have to wait for that to really put her through her paces anyway. No damage to the workshop gear, although some pencils and spare exacto blades got knocked off a shelf. The roll of the door ended up just resting on the bandsaw. Moved it away very quickly. Cheers, Brian.

Your welcome Mick. I hope it works out well for you. I strung up the Lahav today. I needed to set the curve of the neck....couldn't get into the truss rod nut! Spent an hour or so cleaning out crud from the truss rod access and inside the nut. finally got it going. yay! Then I went to plug her in and did a really stupid thing....I rested the guitar neck against a desk....just for a second....just to get a cable. Murphy's law, the guitar fell and cracked the headstock. Went into the workshop to get some titebond and masking tape and the bloody #*!! roll-a-door on the workshop came off its rails and came crashing down. We were planning on knocking it down in a couple of months to do a renovation at home (complete with a new space for my workshop), but it was so frustrating. I got the door back on to its rails, but it doesn't open and close easily. The only compensation is that for a brief couple of hours, the guitar played smoothly and buzz free all along the fretboard. Now I'm going back for the repair, then I'll have to wait a couple of days, then refinish the area, etc. etc. etc. Brian.

The length of the neck through is the total length of the guitar including the headstock. Adjust as necessary if you're doing a scarf joint headstock. brian.

1) no problem with a TOM bridge on a flat topped body - the bridge and tailpiece are only held in by the posts, nothing else touches the body anyway. 2) The thickness of your body shouldn't be a problem as long as your neck screws are long enough. If not you can a. get longer screws, or b. thin down the back of the guitar (I wouldn't cut it, just thin it out something like this warmoth contoured heel ) or c. countersink the screws as much as you need to and use neck screw ferrules instead of a plate. c. will give you the option of carving a comfortable shape for the heel, which you may want so that it won't be too bulky with that thickness body. 3)For an accurate neck pocket look at Koch neck pocket or Myka neck pocket jig. Keep in mind that as you are using a Tune-O-Matic bridge, you'll probably need to cut the neck pocket with an angle. Make sure you draw out the plan full size to see what angle you'll need for the height you want of the fretboard above the body. Good luck, Brian.

I've been PM'd to extrapolate about the crowning process. FWIW, here's what I did (which is nothing special really). Levelling takes away all the markings from the top of the frets - that way you know all the frets have been touched, and should be level to each other. Now that you've gone to all that work to get the frets level, you want to make sure that you don't change the height of any fret at all - you just want to change the shape. The levelled frets are flat at the top which means they won't intonate properly, and could potentially ruin the strings. I marked all these flat fret tops with a marker. The idea now is to file the fret crown so that you leave a thin line of marker right at the top. The fret crowning file will start to take away from the wider edges of the crown before it gets to the top. Keep watching while you crown the frets and stop when you see that you're left with just a thin line of marker. In some areas I found I had more control with a 3 corner file - I could watch the line while working from either side of the crown. After that I polished the crowns with 00 steel wool to remove the scratches, and 0000 to polish them. I'm still pretty inexperienced at this, so there may be better or more efficient ways. After I re-setup the guitar I'll know how well this worked for me. Cheers, Brian.

(Thinking out loud....) OTOH, many bolt on necks have shims to adjust the angle, which amounts to the same as an angled heel. While it is true that there may be a slight gap at the end of the tenon to the end of the mortise at the top, you won't have lost any significant structural integrity as that would have been end grain to end grain anyway - a weaker join - and the side grain will be virtually unchanged giving the same strong join. If the tenon goes all the way to the pickup, then there won't even be an aesthetic issue. I take everyone's point and if I was cutting a new neck pocket I'd angle the pocket. However if you need to make adjustments after the pocket is cut, adjusting the heel angle is way easier. DAMHIK. regards, Brian.

Sorry to hear the bad news. My prayers are with you. Brian.

Check this out OLF fret levellers thread I did a similar thing with a long aluminium angle (hit all the frets at once) a few days ago. my build thread If you need more info, just ask. Brian.

Picky, picky....It'll be much less noticable anyway once the back develops buckle rash. Brian.

Shiny! Great work Albertop. I've liked the stuff from Guitarfetish too. Nice folk to deal with, and great value for money. So what's your next project? Brian.

Goodonya Mike! After seeing that last entry of yours in the GOTM comp, I'd say you have what it takes to set yourself apart from others. Good luck with it. Brian.