SoundAt11

Good to see that the Limba made it all the way over to Finland safely:-) That is extremely beautiful mahogany, it looks like some of the best Mahogany I've seen. Sapele is generally prettier than Khaya. Khaya has the same grain structure as Honduran Mahogany, it's just varies in color more, almost always lighter than the South American Mahogany. It can be yellow, pink, or light orange. I've used the both African and South American for my guitars, I prefer the color of the South American, but it's so hard to locate in wide pieces, so the African is an easy to find substitute that costs less.

It seems like the simplest method would be routing the hot signal from the pickups through a mini-switch before the output jack (or the volume knob) that was pure signal when "off" or run through a capacitor to bleed off a little high end in the "on" position. I'm planning to go with this on my current project as hitting a switch quickly to get a smoother tone is a lot quicker and takes up less control space than a regular 1-10 control pot and knob on the face of the guitar.

Wow! That neck is so beautiful, that's really a perfect job, the colors look so good and they laminating looks fantastic, perfect headstock, no glue lines, totally professional. Sometimes I get bored with mailing out wood all the time, but it really means a lot to actually see it put to use. Knowing the work I put into each piece, even before the ton of work you did, almost brings a teer to my eye to see it again, a little sentimental I guess. I even recognize the fretboard blank, it's got some monster tap tone and smooth as glass, so I know it's going to be an awesome fingerboard. I'm also pretty psyched to know that same wood that I cut up a few weeks ago is all the way over in England safely, that's just really crazy.

That's a great shape, really nice. Let's see what's under that rough piece of Mahogany on the bottom half.

I'd definitely steer clear of Cocobolo. I've never been allergic to anything in my life and no wood has ever bothered me in a year of professional wood work, but Cocobolo makes my skin itchy, even when not touching it, just the smell or oils in the air irritate me and my eyes and nose start tingling.

Those Bloodwood laminates are 1/8" thick, for reference. I've definitely found the quartersawn woods are more sturdy for the thin lams (suprise-suprise:-)).

Get a 3M respirator from your local hardware or home improvement store, $20-30, worth every penny. I cut wood several times a week with it on and have even used it with painting and autobody work and never smell the fumes or cough up sawdust. Here's one thing most people don't think about. When you're done working on the wood and you're putting up your tools and heading back home/going in side. Most people just take off their safety gear when they're done with the sanding/cutting/planing and then inhale tons of fine dust afterwards. Always leave on your respirator and dust off your clothes and arms (I use a water hose for that), and your piece of wood. A paintbrush or handbroom works well for that. Don't take your respirator off until you are out of the dusty area and have dusted your clothes off. Then ditch the clothes and immediately take a shower. And of course, dust off the guitar wood to, you'll probably be taking it back indoors. I've cut a ton of wood over the past year and am OK so far, thanks to the safety precautions. Cocobolo slightly irritates me, from my first exposure, but that's it.

I received a pallet of Basswood last week. So far I've got some 1 pc bodies, 2pc sets, and neck-thru "wings" cut out. Some of this is listed in my Ebay store: http://www.soundat11.com But I've still got plenty of uncut wood left, so if you're insterested in a specific size, just PM me and I can cut to specs and we'll save on avoiding the Ebay fees (or I could put the item in my Ebay store if you wanted). Right now, the boards remaining range from 5" to 9" and are 2" thick at the moment. I will ship internationally to.

I'm going to bet that if it's heavy, it's not basswood. I've been working with Basswood all week and it's the lightest of the hardwoods and extremely soft. If you can press your fingernail into it and dent it, then it's basswood.

I used to have them on my guitar, the part with the hole on it actually rotates around until it lines up with another whole behind it, that's where the string goes through. Just rotate that little metal area above the nut securing it to the headstock and the holes should line up, then they just work like regular tuners.

Why would you want to order the dowels before you find out if you need them? Measure the holes for the mounting posts, then head over to Stew-Mac and you can likely find a tun-o-matic with the same sized mounting holes unless you're just trying to make this more difficult for yourself or those of us trying to offer suggestions. Also, drilling into dowels is very difficult, as you're drilling directly agains the grain, which is very hard. I'd suggest finding a little block of Mahogany and hand cutting your own dowels with the woodgrain running across them. They would be much easier to drill into. You'll want a drill press for drilling those new stop tailpiece holes to. See why we're suggesting a better wraparound, just bolt it on and be done, no waste of time and possibly screwing up a nice guitar.

Your best chance of finding it is in small town lumber stores that may have a couple of dusty old Mahogany boards laying around. I ran across a few short boards of the good stuff last week that have been drying for at least a year after the initial kiln drying.....and bought them up:) These had been sitting there since last year, because I'd passed on these narrower boards to buy the big 16" wide board sitting behind them. So if these 3 boards still remained a year later, you can see how small the market is for Mahogany locally. One of my pro clients is interested in them, but if he changes his mind or I have anything left, I may post it here. Last November, I had some perfect 16 x 24 x 1.75 1pc Honduran Mahogany that I wish I still had, you can't find that stuff anymore, most of the stuff coming out Honduras now is really poor quality for what it's graded as (in my experience), all fuzzy, knotty, and full of holes, and that's from one of the US's biggest dealers at the higher grades, yuck! Otherwise, there's plenty of good African Mahogany out there, much of it weighes less and is as resonant or more resonant and cost less/easier to find, it just rarely looks the same as that beautiful rust orange color that we all associate with the old Mahogany.

I don't think it's too horn-y at all;-) Nice shape, very creative. I don't usually like really radical one, but the shape is soft and curvy, not harsh or pointy, so it's easy on the eyes. I'd suggest some kind of reverse headstock, because it vaguely reminds me of a Strat and the big reverse 70's headstocks just look awesome on those.

Good suggestion on the Baby Grand bridge or one of the Pigtail or Tone-Pro's. Being import guitars, the studs for the wraparound may fit a tunomatic to. I've had two Korean Epiphone guitars that use the same body bushings for the bridge and the tailpiece. To pull them out, I've done it many times: use a claw hammer to pull it out. First, just an exacto knife to score any finish that might be on the bushings (because if you don't, you may chip the finish when pulling out the bushings), find you something broad and flat, like a small scrap of plywood or or something to distribute the pressure from prying the hammer on top of your guitar. Screw the stud in about half way and use a claw hammer to pull out the whole part, just as you'd pull out a nail. Rock the hammer back gently and the bushing should pop right out.

That's an excellent idea, so basically doing the Gibson style "weight relief" holes. I can handle that. I went to the trouble of tracing out my chamber areas last night, but I suppose I'll just do the drilling in that area. I'd actually prefer to have the drill press doing the work instead of a router right in front of my face. I've had too many bits break I was doing the chambering for weight relief reasons instead of tonal reasons. I wouldn't mind a little extra resonance, but this will likely be the hard rock/metal guitar, so making it to hollow wasn't ever in the plans. I suppose I'll take my postal scale along and see how much weight is being removed.

Very spiffy looking, just right. You should be able to get some nice Johnny Lang-esque tones out of it being a thinline with P90's, that being some pretty awesome tone.

Of course :-) Like any of my business wood that I end up keeping, this one had a flaw that made it "unsellable" unless they were building something very specific. It's got a bookmatched knot on either side of the top, however, if I do the PRS shape, it falls just outside the cutaways. That's good to hear, I may go ahead with it then if it's not going to affect the tone. I've been wrestling with the idea of going with some really exotic top wood, but it just doesn't seem to fit my notion of the PRS guitars with their nice figured maple tops, so I think I'll go with it, it's cool, the figuring is quasi-flame/quilt and goes in random directions. One other variable, do you think chambering (ie removing) the Mahogany body would make the top's sound more noticeable? (this is my first topped guitar)

Wow, good choice of woods. Jatoba and Padouk are quite strong (and pretty looking woods). Brazilian Rosewood is legendary. Mahogany, is of course, awesome, I'm using it on my own PRS guitar: http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.ph...c=25427&hl= In my opinion, 1-piece looks better (and usually doesn't cost much more) and if you're someone who doesn't want any glue used in the body, then you won't have to worry about it with the 1-piece bodies. It sounds like you've got a great combination of woods and I'd second PRSman's pickup suggestion, the Duncan '59 and JB would be great choices (the SH-5 Custom humbucker is great to).

For my PRS-shaped guitar, I'm considering topping it with a 1/4" thick set of wild figured Soft Maple (Southern Red, if I recall) that I have laying around. It's pretty wood for sure. However, I haven't really found any info on the sound of Soft Maple compared to Hard Maple. Has anyone got experience with using Soft Maple in their guitars? In my case, I don't particularly want an ultra-bright sound or too much extra weight, but I do like the figured maple look, so it seems like the Soft Maple would be less-bright sounding and it doesn't weight very much either. I'm just afraid of finishing the guitar and it sounding like garbage due to a lousy top Should I simply buy a Hard Maple top instead?

OK, today I got motivated to work on the guitar again. I took the belt sander and sanded down the body edges until they were flush, so the shape is complete (at least on the Mahogany). Then the body was planed down to the proper height to allow for the 1/4" top. The neck cavity was a little too snug in places, so I used a rasp and a file to get the cavity and neck down to where they fit easier (I was concerned about too snug of a joint fracturing the mahogany body, as well as not having enough room for the glue). Right now, the neck fits very nice in the long-tennon cavity and has room for the 1/4" top, plus around 3/16" of clear space below the bottom of the fretboard. My goal is to only have to recess the posts of the tunomatic bridge. Next, the following things need to be done this week. Pick out a top: Still up in the air, though I'm leaning towards a clever idea: flamed Limba! Chamber the body and route my wiring channels into the top of the Mahogany Cut the tummy cut in the back Then glue the top, route, finish, etc..... I'm hoping to have it finished during the month of September, but I'm really only working on it when I get really focused and motivated. The Mahogany Body is around 4 1/4 lbs right now, with only the neck cavity, but without the top. The weight is quite decent and is quite pretty wood with light reflective curls in the background. If I can get it even lighter, then add a lightweight top (possibly the Limba or another lightweight wood), then that will be great. Pictures coming later this weekend.

Sales have been way down lately (back to school, gas prices, vacations, who knows?), so I've slashed prices on most of my items. Many of the items end within 1 day, so if you may need Mahogany, Limba (Korina), Walnut, or Basswood, now is the time to buy it prices lower than I've offered before. http://www.soundat11.com thanks as always

The natural look with the cream and gold looks perfect to me, just finish it clear and it's ready to rock

Wenge is definitely awesome looking, I wish I had a desk and flooring made of it, very classy wood. The only problem I have with it on a guitar is that it's brown and black streaks and as any girlfriend will tell you, mixing black and brown is a fashion no-no ;-) Padouk is definitely high on the list and was the front-runner for a while. While I really like the Zebrawood, I think I'm going to pass on it for this project. Right now, Canarywood is in the lead. After doing some research, it appears to be a monster tonewood, that and it looks very exotic and colorful. It'll be a 1/4" top, so any affect on the tone shouldn't be too drastic.

Just got in a large shipment of FAS grade 8/4 Basswood and listed a nice pair of 1pc body blanks. I should have enough narrow pieces for 2pc bodies for quite some time. It's nice stuff; first time I've worked with Basswood and it's so easy to saw and is easier on my back (when you're lugging around 20 boards, that's important :-) )

Hi Rich, I set the neck onto the body, matched up my centerlines, and traced the neck pocket shape onto the body. I measured my depth based on how thick the neck is and my desired overall thickness (after adding the top, the body will be 1 3/4" thick) and simply routed it down until I got it where the neck fits in there snug and flush. The white masking tape was on there for the routing, since pencil lines are hard to see in the afternoon sun with the shavings flying and sweat in my eyes. The router got rid of most of the material, then the drum cleaned up things, then I used my hand tools and sanding to fix any imperfections. Anyway, the neck pocket is spot on perfect, so snug I can hold the guitar by the neck, it's tight as can be. For the angle, I'll just trace the desired angle onto the neck and shave it down. It's not really dificult, just lots of measuring and marking lines over and over. I rushed myself to get the original guitar done and it had it's flaws as a result. While I wished I'd left it as-is instead of hacking it to pieces, it's done now, so with a great neck and body, I just need to really get it all together and it should be pretty awesome. Good tip on the Canary top, no one uses them, so that definitely interests me. I think if more people saw them fresh cut and how vivid yellow it can be, people would be interested. If I don't use one on this guitar, then my "Project Cheapskate" will get one and possibly a Canary fretboard or neck laminates, as that wood is so ridiculously soft and smooth to the touch. Visually, I think I like the Zebrawood or the Bloodwood best, but I probably need to tap around on a few different tops and pick the deepest sounding one for this guitar, I definitely want more "chunk" from this guitar than "scream".