ScottR

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

Yeah........but Wow! SR

Very cool. Congrats Mike! SR

It makes the LAG look large enough for little people to sleep inside by comparison. SR

I did my first with Acrylic lacquer. It took a better part of a year for it to stop doing that. Nitro will keep shrinking for 6 months or more but stops taking impressions in a couple weeks as a rule. SR

It sounds so profound when you put it like that. SR

It sooo does! One of the younger ones. SR

I call it "Still Life in Silence". SR

I'd add to the LOL icons....but that describes mine as well. SR

Pickups did not ship....... Test on scrap. I can't tell you how valuable trying new techniques can be. SR

I'm pretty sure what is named pine in Australia is a different tree that what is named pine in North America and Europe. That said, I'm loving this! You found a guitar in the street. SR

This sounds familiar.... Time for testing new ideas on scrap. SR

Amen Brother! SR

When I saw the notification I was thinking I remembered you got a Grizzly. And this answers my next question. Gotta go find something to cut.... SR

I did cut a few slices of an 8"x8" piece of mesquite like it was slicing a ham. SR

You know, that Craftsman served me well for a long time......RIP. Some initial observations on the Rikon. 1.75 HP seems smooth and powerful so far. It has a quick release for blade tension. Guide bearings are toolless. I'm not sure yet if that will turn into a pro or con. They are also spring loaded to push away from the blade. So you have to hold them in place and lock them tight enough to hold with a thumb screw. Fine adjustments might be easier if the bearing didn't have a spring pushing it away from the blade. The fence is very nice. All the factory pre-adjusted settings are spot on . It says 14" but the throat is 13.5", and re-saw capability is 13"......much more than my Craftsman at 6.75". So far so good. SR

No pickups yet. I set myself up for a four day weekend and find myself at a near standstill on my build. On the other hand my new bandsaw arrived. That was quick. It's amazing what you can get at Amazon these days. And it was 200 dollars less than anywhere else I found it and delivered free to my garage. Suddenly I did have something to do. First was getting 285 lbs. of bandsaw out of the box by myself. I managed to get that done, and got it assembled onto the base and upright. And then spent most of another day setting it up and playing just a little. It's a bit bigger than my old....dead.....Craftsman 12". I located where the pickups would be if I had them, and screwed the top to the body where the pickups routes would be. You know, if I had pickups on hand to verify that the routes would be correctly sized. I decided to cut a piece of topwood offcut into a useful test piece on my new bandsaw. Then I tested the color combination I'm planning to use. This is just dye and sandback and then flooded with tabletop epoxy to seal and grainfill. I intend to spray a lacquer tint over that to get to the final colors. It should end up looking very deep. And, oh yeah, did I mention my new bandsaw? SR

Hahaha. That's how I fixed my bandsaw too. SR