SwedishLuthier

I knew I should have explained those pictures better… The steel slats are in place in the pictures to eliminate confusion (that was the idea, but it might have confused people even more). It is hard to see in the pictures, but I used the part that I sawed away from the form in the cutaway area as the shoe. The pictures showing the guides are shot from were the cutaway screw is anchored, locking into the shoe itself. It is constructed like the forms with aluminium bars keeping the two plywood pieces together. That is probably one of the aluminium bars you think is the complete shoe. The shoe moves very easy without the resistance of wood and steel slats. If I do it again I probably will make it much simpler and testing it thoroughly before using it again. And of cause try the heat gun trick. I totally agree that too little heat is the reason for the cracks I got. Thanks for your advices. I will throw something together to show the progress of my acoustic build in a day or two.

WHOHAA, or as we say locally, tjohoo My own place in the cyber space is finally up. Had to learn FrontPage to do it and thus feeding Bill Gates even more. Have a look and let me know what you think. All opinions are welcome. Help me improve www.peternaglitschluthier.com

Rich, hope that the string length experiments didn’t make you loos interest in this Finally got some pictures up. I would be very happy if someone could help me find out whats wrong The bender http://peternaglitschluthier.com/tools/DSCF0322.JPG the cutaway attachment http://peternaglitschluthier.com/tools/DSCF0323.JPG close-up 1, showing the guides, not very pretty http://peternaglitschluthier.com/tools/DSCF0324.JPG close-up 2 again showing the guides http://peternaglitschluthier.com/tools/DSCF0325.JPG If the guides look a little bended it is because I tried to give them a little smother edge against the parts holding the screw (what in heavens name is that called…) when I first got the problem with the cutaway attachment jamming. I think that some of you are going to say that the cutaway shoe is way to complicated and I am implied to agree. I just thought that it was a good Idea to use the parts cut away from the body form. The idea was that the shoe should follow the original line perfect. In retrospectative I should have used a simpler shoe. I still suspect that part to be the problem.

You can always build up the finish heavily enough to be able so sand away enough on the binding. This will produce a flat surface, but if you look closely (remember that YOU are the one that will look) you will see that that the binding is a little bit proud of the wood “inside” of the finish.

I have to disagree a little bit. I made a weird instrument some years ago. It was a 4-string electric steel string ukulele. The string spacing was perfect for half a P-bas pickup. As a matter of fact the other half found its way into an electric mandolin. Anyway the pickup has enough output to throw the customers Peavey amp into heavy distortion. And the sound is so nice that I’m planning to make a 6-string version of a P-bass pickup for tests in a guitar.

I suspected that it was too little heat. Even though I started with the sandwich in the bender, heating things up, doing the waist and then starting with the lower bout so that the cutaway part should get additional time in the heat. I had thinned out the cutaway part considerable (don’t remember right now, but 15-20%). Heat gun might be something to test. Don’t want to spend the cash on heat blankets if I’m not going to do this on a regular basis. Check Check Check Check This is something that I don’t have in my bender. Maybe I have to add that. What I have in my bender that you do not have is alignment/guiding slots in the bender parts similar to the ones in the “tower”. It might be so that I have to rethink that and make a cutaway press without those . I’ll try to post a pic about that too. Thanks for your help and the mini-tutorial on the use of bending machines

OK, I have also started an acoustic build. Its going to be dreadnought shaped with mahogany back, neck and sides, Sitca top and Ebony fretboard. I’m adding ebony bindings and some more things not decided yet. Neck is going to be attached with a system that is a cross between how Taylor does it and a classical with the heal block extending over the back some to add extra stability. Mould and bender done, sides and bindings bent, kerfed lining attached and sides sanded to accept my arced (domed) top and back. I’m going to try to get some pictures up ASAP, but I would like to get my website up first, and then I have a gig with the band in a few days and then… Someone said that life is that thing that gets in the way when you are making plans to build guitars. Anyway, I have a question to Rich or anyone else that might be able to help: and I’m also doing a cutaway but I got some problems with the cutaway part. The form was smooth and the cutaway press part likewise. But when I used the cutaway press it mowed sideways, jamming the movement up and causing me to constantly having to push thing to the right place during the pressing. OK, that wasn’t very easy to describe, but I hoe that you get the pictures. Have anyone else had that problem? If so how did you solve this? Posted this question at the MIMF forum and got the smartass answer to bend the cutaway on a hot pipe… I also got some cracking in the sides and bindings. Nothing to bad. I was able to glue it up using CA, but anyway. Did I use too little heat (three 150W light bulbs) or do you have any ideas for the next time?

You don’t need ready made dowels. Read post 6 in this thread I have done quite a few of those operations and I have never had any problems with too tight dowel-hole matching. Actually I have had the opposite experience. A dowel that almost had a too tight fit (having to push really hard to get it in/out when dry-testing) slid right in with a few drops of glue. The glue acted as a lubricant. Regarding grain orientation you are completely right. The screws also have much better “bite” in sideway oriented grain compared to digging into end grain. The only “but” is that the described method (post 6 again) works without a plug cutter. But I might actually try that the next time.

It is always better to try to get glue in and clamp it up if you have that much flex. A good glue joint is stronger then the surrounding wood. If you fill it up with epoxy you have to depend on that specific brand of epoxy to be strong. Most are not if you have a glue build up like if you fill a gap with it.

I don’t know because I don’t have experience with that brand. Generally any wood filler are made to do one thing. Fill a hole. They are not created to have the strength to hold a screw firmly. If you feel that you don’t have the skill and equipment to do the drill out/refill with wood fix I think it is better to make a few splinters from high quality hardwood and do the toothpick fix mentioned above. But drill and fill is THE way to go if you have the tools and skill

As redwhite said the thickness of the fret board. You also have to take into consideration the height of your frets and your planed string action. Higher fret OR high action gives you a lower angel. One more factor is also involved. If back side of the fret board is flush with the top at the end of the fretboard (recessed into the surface towards the edge of the guitar) or flush with the top at the edge of the body (elevated at the end, often using wedges under the fret board if doing it Gibson style). I have an example for you if it makes you feel more comfortable: On my first wrap around bridge guitar I did the elevated fretboard thing and used a three degree angle. That was way too much. On one of my latest I had a recessed fretboard neck and the neck angle was around two degrees. If you have drawn it up and it looks right it probably is.

I don’t really know what you think you are missing, but OK I first strap the guitar in place, strings on and reasonably in tune. Adjust the guitar so that the neck is aligned with the beam. Swing the jig over so that the guitar is in playing position. Tune up. Adjust the trussrod so that the neck is as straight as possible. Check the tuning during that process. When the neck is as flat as possible and the guitar in tune, dial in the zero position. Now you can swing the guitar back into working position (at least that’s how I do it) and remove the strings. My neck jig is a little different in that I use the neck support for simulating the string tension as well, compared to Dan Erlewines that use straps and jacks to simulate the tension. So I adjust my supports so that the neck is back in flat position. After that it is an ordinary fret job or what ever you want to do. The only difference I can see from the way you do it is that I don’t set the dial at the headstock. I have two of them under the neck. With your method it is theoretically possible that you get a back bow in the neck and a forward bow in the headstock when removing the strings (I have NO idea what would cause such behaviour but anyway…) and the dial will still show you zero deviation.

Me too. But remember that he wrote that you should really think things thru before starting the first build because it is addictive. So you have been warned. To Melvin: Thanks a lot. Still use that book for reference from time to time. ...and welcome. Glad to see you here.

Do the pickups have adjustable pole pieces (screws visible from the top of the pickup)? If so, and if your primarily problem is the high E, then you can rise that specific pole piece. Just turn it counter clockwise and listen to what happens. I often have to do that to adjust the string to string balance

Well, I saved the picture and blew it up, and it look like he has some string pulling down into the body/bridge. Themusic he plays with it is far out, but i dont think that it will be usefull for anythin else than that drone-type of music. Cant imagine playing a catchy pop-song on it...

Jup. That is to be able to wind enough turns on a bobbin that leave you with less space for the wire compared to the Tele bridge pup or a Strat SC. The thinner wire also affects the tone , but that is not the topic here… Because I'm not sure what peal means I thought it was something a bell did... Pardon my French.. or Swedish or whatever. I meant peel. Kind of a funny type-o when we are talking about pickups and possible microphonics… To peel a pickup is to unwind (or actually most often just cut away with an exato-knife) the wire so that the pickup can be rewired. I saw your winder thread. Nice to see that more people are picking up on winding. Good luck with the pickups.

I’m not sure about that. The colour is a little too red and the grain doesn’t look like the cherry I have used. But I have only used it for one guitar and some desk tops in the kitchen. And all woods vary, I know. Is the wood open grained or close grained? Cherry is close grained and mahogany open. How well did the wood suck up dye? I just imagine that cherry wouldn’t take on dye as well as mahogany. The cherry guitar started with the desktop and I managed to get enough leftovers to build me a nice resolectric. Fixing up the kitchen CAN actually contribute to your guitar building

It looks a little to dark and brownish for cherry. And the grain makes me think that it might be mahogany. Mick, for colour reference, what is the wood that your blank is resting on made from? A camera is most of the time not very true when it comes to colours, especially indoors using light bulbs.

There’s a lot involved in getting the pickups humbucking. When the two signals is mixed the hum is cancelled (plus and minus hum equals zero hum, kinda). If one pickup produces a stronger signal than the other the hum picked up will be stronger and not all hum will be cancelled. To do this you need to do two things: -You need to get different magnet poles “pointed” against the strings and -you need to have the coil reversed. If so, the induced hum will be electrical out of phase. In the drawing of your P90 the resulting upwards magnetic pole is south and the SC is north so you’re fine with that. If you wound one of the pickups reversed you will get at least some hum cancelling. Mind you, P90 traditionally have much higher output. A P90 is often wound to 10 Kohms and a SC to everything between 7 and 9 Kohms*. That will mean that you will at least get partial hum cancellation. Regarding reverse winding, Jason Lollar described it pretty good in his book. You actually don’t need to WIND the coil reverse. You only need to have a “reversed path to ground”. That means that if you wind two coils in the same way, you can connect the starting lead of the first coil to the ground, and the end lead of the second to ground. If they have different magnetic polarity they will be humbucking if combined. *The believe that the output of a pickup is dictated by the DC resistance is actually a misunderstanding. It is the number of windings and the magnetic field strength that produce the electric current that is later amplified. BUT DC resistance is a good indicator of the difference between pickups of the same model. But if you compare a P90 to a Tele neck, one turn or wire around a P90 will be considerable longer and have a higher resistance. Never the less it is only one turn of wire. And will produce (if all other factors are constant) the same current as one turn of wire around the Tele neck pickup Ben, if you are concerned about the two pickups sounding muddy in series, try parallel. That will also be humbucking but with a much more open, singe-coilish sound I have tried CA for potting. It’s messy and you will get a rock solid coil that’s not going to be able to “peal” but it works fine. I have one guitar with a P90 and a standard SC (in fact it is part of my avatar…) and it works fine. Both pickups balance each other fine.

I got one idea reading this thread. How about tracking down thin clear glass, cutting a cavity in the fretboard, putting aluminium foil at the bottom, break the glass into small pieces and put those into the cavity and seal everything with CA? For sure it will take a few applications of CA to build up thick enough, but it might work. If you try this or any other method, please share the result

I agree. It looks very much like walnut. I’m curious. How does the all walnut guitar sound? Is it a walnut neck too? Fretboard? (and type of guitar, pickups etc for reference of cause)

A fret slot NEEDS to be a tad deeper than the fret tang itself. If not you will add up to the small amount of spring back that always exist when you seat the fret. The fret actually need to be pressed a few thousands into the wood (not more or you will crush the wood fibres). The fret and wood together will then try to push the fret out a little bit. Imagine what would happen if the bottom of the fret slot also started pushing on the fret. It would be extremely difficult to seat the fret flush with the fretboard. And Dan Erlewine (he wrote that piece) admits the same thing in the article. So now we know that there HAS to be some clearance between that bottom of the fret slot and the fret tang. How much clearance is OK? Cutting a straight bottomed fret slot on a 7.5” fretboard will give you a fret slot that is something like 0.05” deeper in the middle (only the difference between the edges and the middle, no exact number, had to draw it up with a ruler, I’m at work (“Shouldn’t you be working now”)). If you use a shallower radius that difference will be even smaller. The fret slot that Dan Erlewine tried to fix was about 0.15” deep in the middle; the fret tang can be up to 0.075” tall. That leaves us with an air gap of 0.075”. I admit that that is a bit extreme, but I cannot see how that would affect the tone, durability or playability of the guitar. If it plays and sounds good, everything is good I give Dan Erlewine all credit he deserves for being a great informer and enthusiast about guitar repair. But he has a few ideas that borders to the “voodoo” thinking about guitars. And fillets under the frets are IMO one of them

Do a search for the spray booth. There were a thread about that a couple of months ago. People showed their solutions and you can get your info from there. About how to attach your guitar: Most people hang their guitar from the ceiling. If you have a bolt on you bend a wire coat hanger and hang the neck on that, thru the tuner holes. For the body most people screw a small piece of wood into the neck pocket and attach a string to that and hang the body by the string. Remember to make that piece of wood smaller than the neck pocket so that the paint can be sprayed at the pocket sides. If not that will show up when you assemble the guitar. Also: shave off a little of that piece so it doesn’t touch that edge of the neck pocket so that you can get some spray to “roll over the edge” into the neck pocket. Otherwise you risk chipping the finish when removing that piece. I know that Fender put some nails into the body and lay it on a lazy Susanne type of thing of a jig.

I’ve used it once, but that guitar is sold. Don’t remember the exact angle but it was in the range of a TOM. Like Mattia said, by it and measure the bridge. Then draw it out full scale and measure the angle.

For tools all you need is this: Planes Steel ruler for straight edge A hammer for hammering frets Flat file to level the frets Triangular file to crown them Clamps to glue the fretboard down Needel files to cut a new nut (you will most likely need a new nut) Using spray cans mean that you dont need spraying equipment, but you will have to get some buffing suplies. Add another 80-90$ for finishing. That’s pretty much what I used for my first ten fret jobs or so and it works fine. There are tutorials for the fret job on the main site. On the nice to have list you will find Neck heater to remove the fret board Special diamond crowning tools Specialized nut files If someone brought that guitar into my workshop and asked me to do that job I would charge you more than 350$ for labour only. If you want the pro to pull the nice looking abalone (?) inlays the cost might double. I’m curious. Why would you like to replace the fretboard? If your guitar is the one in the picture I must agree that it is a nice looking guitar. An ebony fretboard will change the sound some, but IMHO it is NOT worth either the work involved or the risk you would take, but that’s just me