ScottR

Imagine opening a carton of ice cream with chocolate caramel swirls. And you spoon out the first scoop and put it in your dish. and then scoop out a second spoon full the same size and drop it in the spot the first scoop came from. That's similar to what I plan to do - after I've carved it to shape and rough sanded it. In the mean time, get rid of the stupid spoon, grab a real ice cream scoop and fill that dish up. You know what to do with that dish of ice cream. SR

Oh, that made me laugh out loud! Over the years, I think I've become much better at hiding mistakes than building guitars. I did consider a plug but for that small of a hole, with that grain orientation, it would crumble like a cigarette ash unless I made a larger plug. And making a small booboo into a large one just feels wrong. What I'll do, is find a similar piece with regards to grain and markings and cut a scoop with a palm gouge. I'll take a scoop out of the area surrounding and including the hole, (previously filled with sawdust), add a dab of titebond and press the replace scoop into place. Since the surface of the scoop is larger than the underlying body, it tends to hide the glue lines better than a plug. As far as welcome to being you old buddy, a few observations come to mind. One, based on your avatar, we look a lot alike. And I've just heard recordings of your voice and we sound a good deal alike. You live east of the large city on the east side of MO, and I grew up east of the large city on the west side of MO. My son grew up in St. Luis. But I've never driven a big rig. Cheers! ScottR

Nice upgrade. much more clarity in the new pups. SR

Glued up, out of "traction", and the edges have been sanded flush. Next I can locate the bridge and rout control cavities. You may notice an extra hole or beauty mark near the string holes. One of my bigger fears came true whilst finishing the string holes from the back side. First the bridge was located and screw holes drilled. Then the bridge body was mounted and the string holes were used as a drilling guide. It got flipped over and using the pin guide technique to locate the outside two string holes. My fear has always been getting the pin in a screw hole instead of a string hole. There is not a lot of visibility under the guitar while trying to line up a string hole, and sure enough I finally caught a screw hole.. I drill the outside two string holes and then mount the bridge to the back buy using the same sized drill bits as pins in the outside two holes and again using the string holes in the bridge as the guide on the back as well. This time one of the outside string holes lined up to a screw hole in the bridge instead. I'll fix it once the surface of the back has been carved down to its final level. I had an offcut of EI rosewood from the neck that just fit as a cavity cover. But I didn't like the grain direction compared to the black limba. So I took another neck offcut that had been laminated, and bookmatched too, and sliced it in half with my handy dandy new bandsaw, and glued up yet another bookmatch. This gave me a piece big enough to orient any way I wanted and copied the grain pattern of the neck. SR

Hahaha! Oh, it's not all.... Really nice job of bookmatching, by the way. SR

I see aliens in that bookmatched burl. I always do. SR

WOW! That's completely lovely both to hear and to see. Bravo Andy! SR

Welcome to the brotherhood. There's no way to stop. In a few years you'll have more high end custom guitars than you'll ever need and still ideas will fill your head with new combinations of shapes, woods and electronics that just must be built. And that's a lovely number 1. SR

I am soooo looking forward to this. And like everyone else mentioned I can't help but notice each stick of wood could be a poster child for its species. Pure luxurious wood porn. I can't wait! SR

Amen brother! I'm enjoying this one already. SR

One thing I've always meant to ask, and then always forgot is how do you avoid scorching the wood using your iron on method of binding and veneering? Does the glue melt at a much lower temp than the wood scorches at? And your iron is adjustable enough to account for that? SR

That's a philosophy I'd never considered! I cannot argue with it at all. That's an absolutely beautiful build, and it just screams precision. Well done sir! SR

That's really true, isn't it? It's kind of the root of why we all do this. Thanks John. SR

Why thank you sir ! SR

Snazzy is a great word! I haven't seen or used it in ages. Thanks. SR

Yeah.....it's a warm fuzzy mojo thing. the perfectly sound, tried and true method of gluing wings to the side of a through neck blank doesn't make me as warm and fuzzy as totally encapsulating the long tenon inside the body. And I do so like to have fancy as hell tops all carved up into organic shapes. I am reluctant to give up that real estate to a neck blank, even if it's crazy multi-layered. I have considered going @Andyjr1515's route and totally encapsulating the neck blank between the top and body but extending it all the way out to the bottom edge. It would involve buying longer neck wood stock, and I'm not sold on how I'd like that look compared to the edges I have now. Not that you can see the wood on most of mine, since the front and back burst meet at the edge and don' allow much wood to show through. I just like that mojo I get from the extra long tenon construction. Mojo:, can't see it, taste it, or touch it, but it makes me feel better building this way so it must exist. SR

I do indeed. SR

Very nice indeed. I take it he liked the P-rails through his rig? How did you like them when you were putting the build through its paces, Andy? SR

Thanks gentlemen. This option has been staring me in the face for years before I saw it. I used to use bits of urethane squeegee rubber which worked well too, but the screws would tear holes in them and destroy them. Problem solved. Note the torx heads on those screws....I love those. No more stripping the slots like on standard and phillips screw heads. SR

Time to move on. I cannot route for my pickups, but there are a number of things that can be done. I took the screws out and separated the tops and made sure the gluing surfaces were flat. I repurposed some bobbin clamps to make bench dogs to hold the guitar shapes still whilst sanding. Then routed pickup wiring channels. Then glued the top on. My wife came back from shopping (of course) at this stage and glanced over....twice and said "that looks like it's in traction". "Damn honey, what an astute observation". That's not at all far from the truth. SR

Yeah, I can get it in my local hardwood shop, but never in guitar top condition. It might be fun to do it anyway and fill all the splits with turquoise. SR

It got rescued from being BBQ smoker wood. Some of its plainer brethren made me some delicious baby back ribs yesterday. SR

Looks crazy good Andy. I'm a big fan of your offset sound hole rosette/decorations. SR

I mentioned earlier that I tested the new band saw by slicing off a piece of mesquite. And I was practicing finishing techniques, This is that slice with worm holes filled with turquoise chips and finished with that epoxy resin table top finish. The wood has a crotch feather figure and the entire thing is chatoyant. SR

Still no pickups. I've about got myself convinced it's a bad idea to route them before gluing up the top. the only plus is not having to fit a template around the neck. In the meantime we had an eclipse in the neighborhood yesterday. I was about 100 miles away from totality. I did the pinhole in cardstock thing where the sunlight shines through the hole and the bright little image is in the shape of the eclipse. While that was going on, I noticed the leaves in the trees were creating little pinholes for the sunlight to shine through as well. The tree shadows on my driveway were made up of images of the eclipse. WE were in a zone that saw 90% coverage of the sun. After it was all over the shadows went back to looking like a tree. SR