SwedishLuthier

And testing on skrap...

Really nice look there with the with plastic parts. Just for reference: Mojo has white P90 covers http://www.mojotone.com/guitar-parts/pickup-covers-p-90/P-90-Soap-Bar-Pickup-Cover-White-50mm#.VAsDCEtfF0Y Soapbar, yes, dogear, no If you like, please show a bit of your vacuum forming. The link you posted leads to something quite amusing, but not to anything related to pickup covers...

First of all: Welcome to the forum! I don't think that you are doing anything wrong here, starting with cheep instruments and learning on them before moving on to more expensive things. Just a thought on the static you are hearing: When changing the bridge, did you connect the ground wire? How is the static if you touch the sleeve of the plug when connected to the instrument? Better or worse?

If you look hard you can almost see the doughnut from the LMI jig in this picture from my review of that jig. : I don't think it is totally impossible to use something like that. You might need to set the bit to a greater depth than on the sides, but if you have a flat arm bevel (myself I cut them in a smooth curved shape) the offset in cutting depth is constant and you should be able to do it with only minor touchups in the transition area. You might get a better view in this video At around 1.00 you get a good look at the rub collar/doughnut

The birch was quite easy to get a nice finish on, It was pretty rough to resaw by hand, but other cutting and sanding was OK. The wood itself has a some tiny internal cavities almost lite very short hairline cracks along the burl pattern that is impossible to see before you start to work it. They are thin enough to fill with the try-oil but they were a surprise to me. The look is spectacular, especially if you get a piece lite this that also has som flame in it. I know that the old Swedish guitar maker Levin (started at the turn of the last century to ca 1973, actually bought by Martin Co in 1969 and made Martins for the European market for a few years...) used flame birch (no burl) for backs and sides for their high end instruments in the 30-50's. I would love to get my hands on some "plain" flamed birch wide enough for guitar tops. The Swedish guitar builder Robban Sarling of Ares Guitars have used quite a bit of Birch and according to him the sound is quite similar to the sound of Maple.

Your right, calculation! So the pickups arrived today. Got them installed and the guitar up and running. The sound is nice, even though I think I could have been able to give the guitar a slightly better "bite" with my own pickups, but alas, no time to redo it. Maybe we can upgrade the guitar later on... Here she is in front of her sister: I just have to give her a final set up, have a quick photo session for the web page and then its time to hand her over to the customer.

You're a nutter... and I mean that in the most wonderful of ways that leads to extremely cool guitars! Can't wait for this. One thing I'd wish you'd try though is bending the tops over the arm contours. I've never been a fan of arm contours that carve through the top wood. Got a bending blanket? It's pretty easy. Chris Thanks, on the nutty part too... I know about the arm rest, but the idea was to intentionally show the back wood, behind the tuners, at the arm rest and at the high fret cutaway. I think it will be a bit more visible when it is finished and I can take better, full on pictures. I just hope the customer will like how it turned out. I actually gave him the option to have the top bent, but he opted for this look. I've had that bubbling experience too. That time I mixed way to much pigment into the mix (I made a calculus error...). For the "painting process I would like to try a filler, like some epoxies can be thickened with. Especially if I wanted just make an empty case and not encase the pickup totally. For now I just have thrown the batch away and waiting for a new shipment

Very clean work Carl, looking great

I still suspect bad or only partial curing (Not curing completely before I took it out of the mold?) or something like that. Thinking about it, if it gets hotter than usual, it should really mean a faster curing process that normal, which suggests that that last idea might be totally wrong... Taking them apart is a good idea. I might do that. Anyway, its the first time it has happened, I have order a new batch of resin, will test it without pickup parts first the next time I have to cast pickups and se what happens. The EMGs left the US on Thursday so they will probably arrive end of this week or beginning of next week so that I can wrap things up and hand it over to the customer. One of the pros of switching to EMGs is that the wiring will at least be quicker... The Ebay seller actually knocked down the declared value on the package (for the customs) from 230$ to 59$ without me asking for it. So if someone in the EU would like to know were I got this from just PM me. That reduction of declared value is of cause not legal, but with world wide free shipping and (hopefully) low import taxes I got those pickups really cheep

This is a special casting epoxy, or maybe I should say "resin", a German brand; Artidee. I have used that brand for all my casting projects and never had it get as hot as it got with the test mix i did later on. When it works in a more normal way it might reach say 50-55C, not rally hot, more like nice and comfortably warm. The test I did might have come up to 70-80C or even higher. i still thing I got a bad shipment. I have ordered a new batch. I'll make sure I make a test I go on and use it for anything that is going to be used.

Curtisa: We decided to prioritize sound over look. The poles will look a bit out of place, but not worse than on a Strat with an angled HB in the bridge Mike: The epoxy is pretty much as-is after curing. When heated it will disintegrate ranter than go soft, unfortunately.

Scott: Thanks, I'm actually quite humble to be invited to this fine bunch of builders. I mean, Roukangas (it was Juha that invited me), Mitchihiro Matsuda, Linda Manser, Tom Ribbecke, Mikael Sandén, Nik Huber, Teuffel, Manne and the list goes on. So for anyone in the area of Berlin at the time, make sure you get there, It will be Guitar Bonanza! Original: I'v never had this problem before. I mixed up a test batch and it got quite a bit hotter than usual, so I'm assuming I got a bad shipment of epoxy. A little teaser for the show guitar maybe? The body is 2/3 done, the necks are semi done, the heads are already joined to the neck blanks and shaped, currently doing the fretboards. So I've come quite a bit on my way, but I need to finish it and buff it and get it set up and all... And I have the usual bunch of repairs coming in with a steady stream, so I'm very happy to pass on a bit of the profit of this build to EMG...

Shoot! I checked on the pickups today after about 20 h of curing, and they warped! They look like something out of Willie Wonka's factory. Either the epoxy was a bad batch or I must have made something wrong while mixing (have not happened before and I have made at least 10-12 pickups like this). And I'm getting close to my personal deadline for this build as I need to start the next one that need to be done in the end of November as it will be a showcase for the "Holy Grail of Guitars" fair in Berlin in mid November. To speed things up I recommended the customer the EMG 57-8 and 66-8 as those are "PAF-ish" and available in the soapbar shape I already have routed the guitar for and I will probably get those in quite fast. Any other recommendations from the board? EDIT: I got in contact with the customer and we are going with the EMGs. Got them ordered and now I can concentrate on the show guitar for a few days

Anyway, won't be any funky colors visible in the end. The epoxy just arrived and I aim to finish the pickups today. First, get all things you need together. This stuff cures in 3-5 minutes so you don't have any time to run around looking for something you misplaced (some crappy pics here, apologies for that) The epoxy itself, black pigments, a micro scale, mixing cup, some mold release wax (more on that later) sticks for stirring, brushes (more on that yet later) and lots of cover on the kitchen bench. This is messy stuff. First batch, 20g epoxy base mix in a good amount of pigment. The first layer need to be super-black. Mix well. Then add 20g hardener and mix for 20-30 s (no pics, this need to done quickly then I "paint" the bottom and the walls with epoxy to form a "shell". The epoxy is low viscous in the beginning and just keep running down to the bottom, then comes a "sweet spot" for maybe 10s before you start to drag strings of half-cured epoxy around and ruins it all. Next small step is to remove the epoxy from the tips of the divots for the screw. This usually makes for a much cleaner alignment between the pickup bobbin and the mold Heres a trick; use the mold release wax and rub that into the threads of the pole screw you will use later on. Then insert them "backwards". This plugs the holes so that the epoxy cannot run into the pole screw holes. And the release wax stops the epoxy from grabbing the screws. Nifty as Frank Z might have said. Next a small batch of 10+10g and some pigment is mixed. This is poured into the bottom of the "shell" and the pickup is placed in the "shell" and aligned properly. The rest of the epoxy is pored in the mold to hold the pickup in place. the lead wires are pushed inside the "shell", well outside the path of the hole for the fastening screw that is going to be drilled later on... A bigger batch of 25+25g is mixed and poured and the pickups are left to cure for an hour. this really crappy pic shows how flexible the silicone mould really is. This of cause makes the extraction of the pickups from the mould much easier. And there we have them! A freshly moulded pair of custom pickups. I'll let them cure completely over night before I trim the edges, drill the fastening holes, clean up the screw pole piece holes and try those babies out.

But don't they look great in their state of grand weirdness?

TNX. I try to share as much as possible as I hope that in the end it might help somebody to avoid a few of the misstakes I have done

Hm, I dunno... Maybe, maybe not. I tend to go for light weight hardware as my feeling (no science anywhere around that statement) is that lighter instruments make for more resonant and better sustaining instruments. But there are the granite guitar fender made in the 70s that was reported to have sustain to the next week. Anyway I feel that the extra mass added by the tiny little wings on the frets might or might not make a very big difference.

Looking good. Google drive and/or this forum software doesn't allow direct linking. I tested linking to a few of your Facebook pics and that seemed to work, se updated post above. The trick is to use the "Image" funktion and paste your picture adress in the pop up field.

What you describe is more or less the old time bar frets used around the turn of the last century. Frank Ford covers refretting a bar fret Martin here. The patent you linked to are a totally different animal. I imagine that it would need considerable force to press one of those in from the top. Sideways mounting would be my choose for those frets. At the same time I see something I interpret as a "depth stop", so that there would be a bit of metal protruding out from the fret on the top of the fretboard. I think that in that case somebody is trying to invent something very complicated to compensate for their own bad fretting technique... I don't see the patented fret addressing any *real* problems that a bit of practicing can't overcome. Regarding your original idea, I don't see why it shouldn't work. The tangs were probably introduced to keep the frets from popping out of the board as the glues we have today weren't available. So probably a metal barb (the tangs) were introduced. Why we went from the bar frets to modern frets I cannot say, maybe to save some material? Or possible that the modern version just covers up any tiny mistakes in cutting the fret slots? Anyway, with modern production methods, and modern glues I cannot se that it wouldn't work. On top of that is would be easier to bend sheet metal to conform to any "non-straight" fretting method (I didn't mention True Temperament, did I?). Using stainless steel should also mean the refret issues should be minimized as refretting a board with glued in bar frets might mean you had to scrap the board altogether on behalf of some massive chipping, or having to stand some nasty fumes created by heating the frets to soften the glue.

No problem. How did you got the TT fretboard? Direktly from the guys in Stockholm. They have been om my case to use those board for some time, but they are way to expensive. I would also love to see some of those pick guards you mentioned. You can either use the gallery function on the forum, or as we old-timers often do, set up a photo bucket account and link to the pictures/embed them And BTW: Welcome to the forum!

He he. Seems like Carl has done some code-hacking again as there used to be a PM button in each post ... I'm editing out some content of the first post to not upset any patent holder. To send PM, click on the avatar to get to the presentation page of each member and you will find a PM button there

PM me or an admin what you want to do to the post(s)

winding adapting the base plates (the "recipe" calls for a base plate) ​using four wire cable as it is not possible to go back after the pickup is molded and if the customer somewhere down the road want a split sound this is a bit of insurance. checking that the fit in the mold, and there I had to halt for the day. I thought I had enough epoxy at home but I must have finished it all. New epoxy on its way but I will have to wait a few days for it to get here. so no more updates for a few more days, again...

So, pickups. As this will have angled pickups I got some extra work to make the bobbins for this. I have 7 and 8-string bobbins, but all of them have to short string to string spread. At the same time I have bobbins that have the correct string spread, however those are only 6-string bobbins, what to do? This is what I do. I start out by grabbing a few bobbins with the right string spread from the drawer with scratched or dented bobbins, three screw bobbins and three slug bobbins of each string spread, as I'm using 53 mm spread for the bridge and 50 mm spread for the neck. I put tape and a few guiding slugs in one of the bobbins I cut up the two other slug bobbins and use the third bobbin as a guide, both lengthwise and sideways. when it all match up I use the trusty old super glue to glue them together. The tape prevent the guide bobbin to be glued to the others. I do the same thin with the screw bobbins and now we are talking zebra pickups deluxe. 3/4 black and 2/4 creme... Two keeper bars are hacksawed to pieces and carefully aligned before we're off to the winder

You need to make sure the ground wire get in touch will all of the base plates, a bit fidgety... But it is almost invisible when all base plates are installed then the moving top parts need to be installed. These contains the tuner part and can also be slid back and forth to adjust the intonation. Cut the nut and stringed her up Done the adjustment and tried it out. I thing I will stick to 6 strings also in the future, 7 at the most...