guitar2005

The ferrule that goes in the body is loose? I fix that with epoxy.

Tru oil is not hard like lacquer and personally, I'd only use it directly over wood.

Screws will hold Mahogany just fine.

The longer the scale, the higher the string tension. That does affect how the strings react when plucked in terms of volume and resonance and has a definite effect on the sound of the instrument, just like different string gauges affect the sound.

25" is my go to scale length for my guitars. I prefer it to shorter scales for soloing because on say a Les Paul, your fingers start to get crammed up at the 17th fret and up. At the other end of the scale, near the nut, the slighly shorter scale than a strat helps because I can reach a 6 fret span more easily.

Agreed. For a thin (under 5mm) laminate, it shouldn't be a problem. In saying, one method to reduce warpage on piece is to cut it 25% thicker than you need and joint it after. The initial cut will introduce the most amount of warp. Then, you correct it with the jointer.

I'm at the point where I need to decide whether I want to glue the neck in or bolt it in.

What do you guys think?

-> Is 3" of surface enough to hold a neck down? ( I think its enough but if some of you have tried this, I'd like to hear from you)

-> Should I just bolt it in and not worry about it?

I haven't drilled the neck mounting & ferrule holes yet so there's still time to go one way or the other.

Scarf joints can be intimidating and there are many way to cut them. I found that what works best for me in terms of speed and precision is to rough cut it on the bandsaw and clean up on the jointer using an angled sled.

I might do a thread about it some day but I think that some here do the same thing.

That truss rod looks nice. Where did you get it? I need to order about 10.

You know you have good stuff when it says "Quility guitar parts" on the package

I really like both guitars. Hard to decide, really.

Here we go with the re-sprayed gold, binding scraped and 10 coats of clear. Its a lot better but the binding could have been done better. I'll shoot a few more coats on the sides to make up for differences in level between the binding and body.

With binding, some imperfections can be un-noticeable with another finish but with the metallic finish, I learned that I have to step up my game on the binding front. I learned a few things here and will definitely do better next time.

Why a Makita bandsaw? They're overly expensive and you could do much better with something like a Grizzly or Delta.

Well, most of you guys dont make extreme shaped guitars as i do. With pointy guitars, there is a lot more runout on the edges of Vs and explorers due to the angle of their points. Even with a brand new router bit and going slow you still get tearout on some areas.

I should show you my "off the router" V bodies. I have two right now and they both have minimal sanding/cleanup to do.

I use my thickness sander and finish with sandpaper wrapped around a piece of MDF with laminate on the sandpaper side.

For the sides, I've never had to go to 80grit. 180 max but I take thin passes on the router and try to use a sharp bit.

I've had to redo a few fretboards on maple because of this. Rosewood will show as well.

A bigger dot is possible, depending on how off you are.

I'm working on a P90 project and intend on screwing them into the wood with a piece of foam under the pickups.

In terms of how to cut the pickup routes, just cut them the way you'd do any other route: Template and router.

I'm using Mohwak rich pale gold. Its a great product once you know how to apply it. The best strategy that I found so far is to lay a couple of coats normally, level and then, mist the gold color over the levelled surface.

That's awesome! Its all about perseverance and trying, experimenting until you get it right.

Everything is a learning curve. For the life of me, after 9 years of building guitars, I still don't have a system for producing consistent finishes, but I'm getting there.

A wood grain finish would have been easier. Black and gold seem to be the hardest so far because they show every little imperfection.

Well, what I feared was going to happen, happened, even though I was careful. While scraping, I hit the sides of the body a little and it shows, even with a cost of clear. There's some grooves that I can only fix by filling and re-shooting.

The real bummer is that I'm out of the gold color and my supplier will only have it on the 25th of october That's a real setback. When I get it, I'll re-shoot the sides and mist over part of the front where I can see one spot that is a little darker than the rest because I had to fix the carve in that spot. There aren't as many coats of gold in that spot and it shows.

That being said, the top looks great with a shot of clear over it.

I hate finishing.

I ended up levelling it because I was worried that the orange peel texture would show through a clear coat. After levelling it, I misted it until the color looked uniform to my eyes.

I have a silver strat that I cleared without levelling 1st. We'll see how both come out. It will be a good comparison.

I'll be clear coating it this week, as soon as I receive my headstock logos from "Scary Creative".

Yes, gloss clear over the gold.

There is a bit of orange peel on the gold base. Should I level it or clear coat and level after? I'm worried that levelling the gold metallic will screw up the color.

When I run my fingers with my eyes closed, its really hard hard to discern uneveness.

Actually, I think I see some of what you see. Paint and harsh light will show the tiniest variation in your curves and arcs and transitions. A natural finish probably would not have shown what you are seeing. If you make the transition area of your recurve wider, you find it easier to keep uniform....or at least I do.

SR

Its weird... I see an imperfection, then as I get closer, I can't see it anymore and I start wondering whether its lighting or a reflection. Change the angle slightly and you can't see it anymore.

When I look at other carved top teles, I think that this one is nice but I'm having second guesses right now. I tried to get a natural flow.

I've been working on this one off and on for a while. The body is Alder with a cherry top. Its my first attempt at a carved top and its not 100% perfect IMO. What do you guys think?

I still have to scrape the binding off and hope that works out well.

Building guitars is all about learning, mistakes, starting over and junking hours of work. If you're not ready for that, then yes, you might as well quit now.

I've redone a guitar three times, cut necks up, redone inlay work, fretboards, nuts etc... I've learned a lot from those mistakes.

If I were you, I'd email StewMac and see what they say. Their customer service is very good and they might be able to find a good solution for you.