ScottR

So is the Tineo that finely grained, or is it the look of the paint sinking into the pores that does not appeal? SR

Those look great. Seriously, nothing about the blue bothers me even a little bit. SR

That's a flip-flop--thongs are smaller. Either way, a koozy with a handle is a fine idea. SR

I'm assuming it was not dry enough either. I was cutting fret slots in my garage in the direct sunlight to begin with. That black wood did get hot. I cooled it and covered it at that point.....but I did notice that was when the demon began to stir. If I ever start building more than one a year, I think I'll have to build a slotting rig like yours or more likely like that slick little rig that DemonX made. Radial arm saws are hard to find these days. SR

Yours were apparently good enough to keep. I got mine at Lowes. SR

I thought you were going to paint this....er....or is that what your are saying? SR

That's exactly what I thought! I took both of those guitars name's in vain......uh, quite a few times today. SR

A very interesting by-product of clamping a wet fretboard between 1" thick pieces of clear acrylic is you can see what the clamp location does in terms of uniform or not uniform pressure. Those clamps were cranked as high as I wanted to get them. I had a little daylight left....and I was not going to be gluing up my fretboard after all.....so I surfaced the top a little-to 120 grit and rubbed in some mineral spirits to see what I might expect out of the quilt. I still am pretty sure the carve will get below these splits, which means the quilt will change too. Not bad....there may be a little seafloor in it, but we'll see....later. SR

I used the off-cut from the headstock angle for a caul. Part of the reason the original glue up slipped is I checked and found that I did not cut as much angle as I thought. I thought I had 15 degrees and it was about 11. So I re-cut the angle and trued it up but that left the off-cut at a slightly different angle which made the whole thing want to slide....and shear the toothpicks. the brads fixed that. Edit: I have since learned that using the offcut on the bottom will give parallel faces for the clamps to push against, which is a much better method of clamping.-SR I picked up some clamps with a Y-foot which I think I like. I moved on to slot my fretboard while the HS cap glue up was curing. I glued it up at noon and was hoping I could take it out of the clamps and glue up the fretboard tonight. Two things worked against that. By 6:00 the T-88 was stiff but still a little tacky to the touch. It may have been fine to unclamp, but during the slotting of the fretboard, the ebony cupped too, just the like the HS cap did. I could go back to the sanding surface and re-flatten it....and may still, but first I'm having a go at un-cupping it. I soaked it in hot water and then clamped it between two 1" thick pieces of acrylic. You can see the curve here before adding pressure. SR

My trussrods from Allied came in so I measured out and cut my trussrod channel. I fought ebony all weekend. The headstock cap glue up cupped badly. You kind of expect that or something similar so I glued up pieces that were about 3/16" thick. That left me room to flatten it out after taking it out of the clamps. The cupping was so bad that the glue joint failed under the pressure of sanding. I glued it up again with medium CA and continued leveling the piece. I set up a piece of half inch acrylic on top of my iron table and glue sand paper to it to use for my surfacing agent....a poor man's thickness sander as it were. The stupid thing broke one more time but I finally got it where it wanted it. BTW a plane make a great sanding block for truing up surfaces for clean joints. I drilled some hole in the waste area to hold the plate in place during glue up. I decided to use toothpicks for guides so they wouldn't interfere with the cauls. Silly me. They sheared right off from the clamp pressure and angles. One of the great things about T-88 epoxy is its long open time. I was able to drill out the toothpicks and replace them with brads and clip the ends to the proper length, and a little more glue and reclamp. SR

You don't give enough details to give an answer tailered to your specific case...but I can give you a general type answer that I bet will cover what you are worried about. There are plenty of painted guitars on the market that have filler in them. Assuming your mistake did not damage the guitar structurally, and you use a filler that is not going to loosen or fall out, your guitar will still sound like a guitar with filler in it. Depending on what you've done, there may be better solutions than filler. If you are able, post a pic and we can give you some real advice. SR

Oh there's no doubt that it is going to look sweet when finished. It looked pretty damn good half way there too. That fibre matte looks to be thick and bulky and yet it seems to have conformed to those compound curves nicely. Is it really that conforming or is that just a testament to your skills? SR

I like the way your threads start out with the contemplation of a single piece of timber. You said the pointy stick was going to be a lazy build......how much time are you allowing for this one? SR

I dunno Chris. That looks exactly like aerial shots of the Carribean Sea floor. Obviously not what you envisioned, but very cool for a nautical themed guitar. SR

Now I'm really loving the carve. I kinda hate to see you cover it up. Excellent supply of "fuel" or "builder's reward" you have on hand as well. I'd say you have the building basics covered nicely. SR

Okay, I can see where those carves are going now. Nice, I like that. Carry on sir. SR

I like the wood choices and the subtle contrasts of browns- it almost looks edible. I like the way the neck to body transition looks, although I wonder if it doesn't feel a bit thick where it closes with the body. I think I like the way the carve is going, although I'm not quite sure I can see where the the rear of the treble horn or the front of the base horn is going. I'm looking forward to the progress on this. SR

Dude that is wicked. And I love the way it looks like a whole different guitar when flipped over. Sort of a yin yang thing or the icons of your conscience, an angel on one shoulder and a demon on the other. SR

I think David has it right. His soft areas being more absorbant than the hard areas by virtue of having open pores. If you picture wood grain being visible by virture or the orientation of open pores and pores being tubes like a straw. Figuring is what you get when those tubes are orienteed in a wave pattern (amongst many others of course). When the wood is milled, those wave top are cut off exposing the pores in varying patterns along with the sides of the tubes at vaying angles which reflect light at varying angles and absorb at varying rates. All these variences create the dark and light dye absorbtion and the flip and chatoyance that makes figuring so cool. The blotches are softer open pored areas. Or at least that's the way I understand it. Bottom line is bleach won't help or change it. It is literally the way the tree grew. SR

The other side of that coin is to build you a library of pre-set codes (cut files is what I'm used to calling them), and save them all. At some point you'll probably have most of your variables covered...at least for surfacing a scarf joint. I hear you about one offs. Be real useful for lots of 40 though wouldn't you say. SR

I've been making whole necks from jatoba which is similar in hardness and weight. It makes a heavy neck which I offset by making a long tenon and spreading some of it to the body. Since it is so strong and stiff you can go quite thin without sacrifing strength and stiffness which help reduce the weight. So my opinion is it would be fine for a whole neck. Of course I may be the only one that says that. Most will likely tell you to use it for lams and fretboards. SR

Actually.......now that I think about it, it would be even safer to turn the neck over, jig it to clear the angle and use your CNC. Do you have enough Z-axis clearance to do that? SR

Very nice. This is starting to look like a signature style for you. I looks like you have mastered tru-oil and that bridge bothers me not at all. I love all the flowing lines in you design(s). How does the phat cat compare to normal shaped P-90s? SR

McMaster-Carr rocks. I like your sled. SR

Those are sweet. I've got a bocote fretboard that started out looking just like that. It has darkened so much over time that it looks a lot like cocobolo. Not that looking like cocobolo is a bad thing. SR