jimmy g

Concerning the lacquered headstock, I just finished one. Musicman's are like that. i just taped off from the headstock side of the nut slot and covered the rest of the neck. Make it pretty or whatever to match a volute if you've got one - or not. I used Satin lacquer so no real buffing was required. Tru -oiled the neck.

Nice work!

I agree Wes. Nice work indeed.

Thanks. I know it's a little bit generic, but I couldn't think of anything else to do for the headstock. If I tried something intricate, I knew it would screw it up and waste an entire neck.

I do the same thing Jessejames. I'm a sucker for shortcuts and "temporary" jigs. This whole guitar was made with half-assed jigs. I'm lucky it came out this well. The finishing is where I always mess up. If I spend time preparing jigs etc... Instead of plowing right into it, I'm sure it would come out better and probably faster too. Who's in a race? I think I am sometimes.

I was afraid something might happen like that. They're Gotoh 510 - really nice, actually. Hopefully they'll stay tight. they are now. Time will tell.

Walnut top 1/4" from oregon wild wood. It was flawed, so I got it for $20. Score. White Limba body. Mohogany and maple neck. This was my first angled headstock, so it didn't go that great. This was the second attempt. I've done a bit of polishing on it since (15 coats of tru oil) and it came actually pretty well. Nice and straight. I also added binding for the first time. It was difficult to do in a shop that's 30 degrees. I had to heat it up by the propane heater. I need some practice with it. No breaks, but it could be better. Finish was: Target WB amber shellac (3 coats), scrape the binding... Target WB sanding sealer - two coats. Then, about 10 coats of Target WB lacquer. Great stuff. Notice the 6 in line tuners... I had a set that I bought a while back and never used them. I made a 3x3 guitar and it's all I had. I looked at them on it and I kind of like it, despite the backwards right side tuning.

I blew out my top horn on a white limba body a few weeks ago. Not quite as deep as yours, but still really bad. You might have already thought of this... I matched the grain with some body offcuts, cut the damaged part off (parallel to the grain) and glued a new piece on. Rough cut to shape, then rout the template again. Endgrain is hard to rout. Careful of how aggressively you feed the body.

Impressive work, forgery or not. It looks like you could probably make anything you like.

Great build thread!

Refinished with Target WB lacquer. Great stuff - dries quickly and sands easily.

Awesome build/destruction thread. It's hard for me to go back and screw with something that might turn out mediocre at best (why do I try to build guitars, then), but this looks promising. And it's been cheap and inspiring. I've got a beater kit guitar that's either getting burned this winter or turned into something playable. I've never bandsawed a neck off. Looks satisfying

The tuners are pretty nice - GFS. No funny gears or anything like that, at least not yet. A hell of a lot cheaper than the Sperzal/Schaller M-6's. They're even staggered so you don't have to use string tees (if your angle isn't enough).

I'm unhappy with a few witness lines in the finish, so it's back to the shop. Here are a couple of pics of the headstock/neck. Dusty. Needs a little cleaning and some wax, but...