sunday_luthier

Really nice guitar and explanations about the finish. The one tiny thing that puts me off is the back cavity cover. I think a contrasting white pearloid would have been better. Something about the wood figuring doesn't look right to me... but who cares about back cavity covers anyway :-) great job !

I voted for the Andromeda. Since I primarily look for originality of design, it was either going to be the Burl or this one for me. The Andromeda had more going on : the inlays, sunburst, pickguard,... which is not necessarily what I look for in a guitar, but it all comes together very well. Cheers,

I recently had issues spraying automotive clear which never dried, stayed soft for months, and I got tiny white dots in the finish which I will eventually start over. Turns out I didn't have a moisture trap in my spraying setup (a big no-no that was probably the reason I got those dots). Anyway, I went to my local car supply store to buy some clear and explained to he guy my problem with curing time. Turns out that when they sell you automotive lacquer, they assume you are going to spray it in an spraying oven. I have to specify "fast curing" to get stuff that dries in a decent amount of time. I'm refinishing a Strat body right now and it seems like a big difference from what I had before... i hope it turns out good. Though I suspect I'm still spraying too thick...

I voted for the Humingbird bass, but I wanted to comment on a couple of other builds. Boggs, I really appreciate that your designs are unique and may not appeal to some but they are immediately recognizable as your own. But to me, the use of a "stock" strat pickguard kind of ruins it, especially since it doesn't really flow with the contour of your original body shape. Mefgames, it looks like a fantastic build, but I find it shocking that you don't acknowledge that it's a Klein copy. Nothing wrong with building copies in my book, although it has sometimes been debated, but I think mentioning the name of the actual designer would have been the least of courtesies. My 2cts... Cheers,

Well, I voted for myself, so... thanks to the other guy :-) No shame in losing knowing who I was up against. Cheers,

The Bumble-B Body - Sapele Top - Figured wild cherry Neck - Sipo Fingerboard - Ebony Bridge - Hipshot Baby Grand Neck pickup - Gibson 496R Bridge pickup - Gibson 500T Electro - 1 volume, 1 tone, 1 switch Body Finish - Tainted acrylic Neck Finish - oil & wax Build thread

I aim to please... BTW, thanks for all the kind comments. I sprayed my last coats. After I level-sanded the sealer, I covered the sipo back with masking tape and sprayed a coat of tinted orange automotive lacquer on the wild cherry top and immediately removed the masking tape. I sprayed two coats of clear to "catch up" to the ridge created by the tinted coat before level-sanding with 320-grit paper. Here are the pics after spraying 3 clear top coats : The flashy orange looks that way because of the... flash. It's actually a bit milder. When dry, the dreaded buffing and polishing begins : I started by doing the bulk of the work with 600-grade wet or dry paper used with mineral spirits. I removed most, but not all shiny spots. Since I only have 3 top coats, I don't want to sand through them, so I'm keeping the sanding to a minimum. If I find when polishing that some spots need more sanding, I will do it then. But first, light sanding with 800, 1000, 1200-grade sandpaper with mineral spirits.. After polishing the back, it looks fine (well, in my eye at least) : I started polishing the top before getting called for babysitting duty : It looks like the sanding wasn't as thorough as on the back so I will probably need to sand some more before moving on with polishing. Cheers,

Hi-tone's was a very close second for me, but I had to go with the simple elegance of Simo's design. Cheers,

Slowly getting back to business. Two coats of sealer : Grain-filling on the sipo back. The cherry is close-grained Light sanding with 320-grit. A few tint tests : I wasn't sure wether I wanted to make it blue or yellow... It will be yellow. Cheers,

Done !

This one's called the "Busy-B" Sapele body and neck Neck-thru construction Flame Teak top Fanned frets Individual ABM bridges Grover tuners DiMarzio DLX Plus in bridge position DiMarzio Virtual P90 in neck position Toggle switch and single volume knob Built this guitar a while back but never got around to showing it on PG until It needed a trussrod and fingerboard replacement. The thread :

Oiling her back up. It's a real joy to see all sanding marks magically disappear with just a little oil, the guitar immediately looks like it did before starting the repair : Back view : I glued the same nut back onto the neck : New jack : It will be soon Cheers,

Fretting : Fixing a chip with a mixture of ebony dust and super glue : I felt the flat triangle behind the nut was a bit strange as the neck-head transition. So I gleud a small piece of ebony veneer to make it look rather like ax extension of the fingerboard : I had to scrape and sand the guitar top slightly as I had made saw marks while deepening the last fret slots : I also made a new, bigger jack hole for a new jack plate : Cheers,

Glue joint turned out pretty nice... Not perfect but close enough, considering the neck I had to work with. Neck is straight and the trussrod works, hip hip hurray! After scraping and sanding the neck and fingerboard sides, sanding the top of the fingerboard with a sanding stick, 80-grit to 400-grit. Brushing the fingerboard and sanding stick often to prevent dust build-up and premature sandpaper wear : Cleaning and deepening the fret slots : Cheers,

Got the new trussrod in the mail. Luckily, it's the same length as my channel, so I only need to widen and deepen the channel very slightly for the adjustment nut : Widening the channel at the nut with a chisel : If the rod fits... The nut is even aligned with the former rod's adjustment hole I had drilled through the head. Could things finally be going my way? : Slightly scraping the upper "horn" free of sanding marks : I made a dozen angled cauls to support the neck while glueing the new fingerboard : The angled cauls allow me to somewhat adjust the bow of the neck. I hope this setup will help me get a decent, straight glue joint : Fingerboard glued and clamped :

The problem was actually that the steam deformed the wood. I should have waited a bit before rushing forward, but I didn't. I planed the neck flat again, and this is what I discovered a few days later : Had I waited, it probably would have gone back to flat. To avoid planeing again (and reducing the neck width, I glued a mahogany overlay strip onto the center line and planed that flat : The olf fingerboard was obviously only good for burning now, so I made a new fingerboard (BTW, did I mention it was a fanned fret guitar? All the more fun!) My new fingerboard blank was very slightly too short, so I made a small setup to glue an extension piece :

I built this guitar a few years ago. I installed a homemade aluminium "U-channel" trussrod. After a few years, the neck had acquired a significant up-bow. Adjusting the trussrod did nothing. In fact, no matter how tight I turned it, it would rattle... not good. The plan : remove the fingerboard, change the trussrod, glue the fingerboard back on. The plan is simple, but reality is not. I started by defretting. Then, I drilled a bunch of small holes in the fingerboard to make way for the steam that would loosen the fingerboard glue joint, and started ironing the guitar : I started peeling the fingerboard off with a metal spatula and and angle caul (with a little help from a big hammer). When I was able to remove the trussrod (which was in a sad state), I injected more steam with a piece of electrical shielding hooked to a kettle of boiling water. That helped a little : With the trussrod and fingerboard removed, I was horrified no see this :

Northstar surfer gets my vote. Followed closely by the Lagarto.

Thanks for the comments! I mainly used the chisel for the volute and heel. You can get great control of what you are removing by using your thumb to make a slicing motion with the chisel. I think the picture is pretty clear : I use my right hand to hold the chisel. The left hand holds the headstock while my thumb pushes the chisel sideways to make a slice. This way I can make a very precise cut with little pressure from either the right hand or left thumb. As long as the chisel is sharp, it is VERY easy. And little pressure means very little risk of messing up. I used to use a Dremel with a sanding bit to do this kind of stuff, but the chisel is so much easier to control. As far as scraping, I used the scraper extensively because I liked the challenge of smoothing the body contour this way. It's certainly not the most efficient method, but learned a lot about this tool and got a lot of practice this way. And I must have saved a few sheets of sandpaper. I'm really enjoying this "more shavings, less sanding" method. Although I don't think I'll scrape an entire body contour again in the near future...

Thanks ! Sanding : more sanding : scraping before sanding some more : ... and after yet another bit of sanding, here we are : Now I have to make up my mind about color and finish...

Making progress on the neck : Not a fan of that line where the neck and headstock join. I may do an veneer overlay if it really bothers me in the end. We'll see... Sanding the volute's recurve with a piece of sandpaper wrapped around a big round marker :

Nothing exciting to show... I'm just tinkering... My pickup cavities were so clean that I decided to do away with the humbucker rings and direct-mount the pickups. I made some woodblock-and-foam "springs" : and enlarged the pickup screwholes with the drill press so that the wood screws could go through : After I tested the pickups for fit, I was really happy wih the way the neck pickup was held and place, and with the adjustment tolerance given by the foam. But the neck angle made for a very high bridge pickup. So I have to go back to pickup rings, which is a bummer because I already drilled the holes larger so they won't take the threaded screws anymore. It's no biggie, but I'll have to figure something out by glueing or soldering bolts to the base of the pickup... Anyway, I've been sanding : and scraping : ...and scraping : ... and making dings : ... and fixing them with boiling water and a soldering iron : I now have a body ready for finish-sanding (I'll start with 180-grit) :

Thanks! I used AutoCAD for the drawing,

People need to see this... I hope you know how to play with your teeth (Jimi-style) !!

Thanks for the comments ! There will a pickguard for the switch and neck humbucker, which is why there's a big hole in the top I made a setup to cut the cavity cover with the router. It's a perfect fit. Couldn't have hoped for better : I wanted to make a similarly-styled jack plate. I drilled 2 offset holes for the jack : I slipped a little while drilling and made a small, round jack plate by hand. The fit wasn't great and I had to sand quite a bit around the recess to make it look half-decent. It's a far cry from the crisp, clean look I wanted : :