Jehle

And judging by "the moth" avitar, I'd say you were pretty tough yourself. From Baba, eh? Do you like your BBQ chopped, sliced, or pulled? White sauce or red? Favorite Football team in the SEC?

If I had a nickel for every time I explain this. "Jehle" originates from Germany and Switzerland. Over there, it would be pronounced "yay-Luh". The "J" is soft. Of course, I'm in the south and that sounds too much like yelluh. Nobody likes to be called yelluh in these parts. Cultural joke here... to be called yellow is to be called a coward. Fake a southern accent and you'll get the idea. So, how I say it is more like "yay-Lee". I should make a web page just for this kind of stuff.

We're zo zilly like that. I feel like I'm in a Zima comertial.

Well, I am still new to this sort of thing, so pardon me if this seems a little too simple of a thing to show off. I just had to use that neck that I used in the logo tutorial. Here's a chance to see the result. Finished the polishing this morning and got the bug to try it out. I'm happy with it. Have a peek at the JELLYCASTER neck replacement.

Of course I'm all for posting MP3's. I'm in the "waiting for weeks while the spray paint dries" phase at the moment. Once I've got it polished up, there will be a new set of pics and an MP3. Most of the free web servers out there are a problem. You have to log in and stuff, or deal with popup adds. I'm lucky enough to have a website that I can post on. I pay for it though.

That happens. Anytime the notes get whacky sounding above the 12th fret it's time for a new set.

I don't know much about tone woods yet, but from what I understand Maple is a very dense wood. At least the sort that you would use for a neck is. I'm not sure how Cypress is in hardness compared to Maple. Does someone have a link to this sort of information? Is there one already posted on the project guitar site somewhere?

You have to admit, Stephen does have a sense of style that's all his own. It's art and it's a bass all at the same time. I wonder what he could do for a guitar? :-/ Just think of it as a 6 string bass with higher strings.

Interesting question, and one that I've only just started to ask myself. I read through your questions, and thought about them. Then I thought, well if I'm really going for a custom instrument, I would think beyond options of an existing instrument. So, to contradict what I've just said, I would probably start with something similar to all of my favorite guitars squashed together. It would be a variant on the venerable strat. A modern classic. Body: probably Alder with an Ash top. Alder for the sound, Ash for the grain. Rout: either front or back... Not sure. Unless there was a way to not rout the guitar at all and have the electronics mounted from the inside. It would be impossible to repair. Maybe just have a pick gaurd made from the same wood on the guitar and have it flush mount? Fretboard: Maple boat neck with a Pau Ferro board. Small frets. and probably around a 10" radius. Electronics: tough one. I like Seymours, DiMarzios, and some of the Fender vintage PU's for different reasons. It would probably have a little of each, but selected or modified so the they don't look that different from each other. Hardware: I don't whammy, stop tailpiece for me. String through. Finish: Burst. I have no idea what kind...

Couldn't help but notice that Dave mentions a "Batocaster". Given the comparisons between baseball bats and early Fender necks... It's so tempting to make a vintage baseball bat with a custom logo. Must.... resist... urge...

Brian, I had two words misspelled in the tutorial on purpose. I was trying to make a point that you should avoid making a STARTocaster with a CEREAL number. I was in a guitar shop one day and there was a guitar in for repair. Nevermind why, but someone wanted to write "My Little Angel" on their guitar body. Instead, they had "My Little Angle". Anyway, if you wouldn't mind, put the misspelled words back in the text. Thanks...

Okay. I've finished writing up and making photos of how I did this. I'm going to email a zip file to Brian so he can format it up and y'all can play with it. In the mean time, behold, the Jellycaster!

Well, I think I've hit upon a formula that works. It's fool proof. Even I couldn't mess it up. Believe me, I tried. Here's tonights experiment. It's fixed to some scrap wood, all it needs now is several coats of lacquer. The trick was finding the right order of inks, paints, and glues to make it all work without self destructing. I'll take pictures of my steps in the morning. In short, here's what worked: 1) Laser printed logo on transparency. Remember, logo is reversed. 2) Fill in the logo with the silver paint pen. Wait for it to dry. 3) With a small brush, lightly cover the silver paint with a coat of matte finish Mod Podge (don't use gloss because it'll eat the paint). Try to be neat, but if you are a little messy, you won't be able to see it in the next step. Wait for that to dry. 4) Spray the decal with a spray adhesive (I used a liberal amount of 3M photomount). 5) Slap it on the headstock and press it down so it seats well. No bubbles. Let that set. 6) Lacquer coat and finish the head stock as usual. The logo is protected by the transparency film. Build up the coats slowly to avoid softening the spray mount (much less risky than disolving the ink of the logo). Presto, nearly foolproof custom logo!

Making the logo is the easy part. Attaching it is quite a different story. BTW, I just noticed that there is a tutorial (sort of) on this topic. It links to the StewMac site here. I like how it says, "be aware that the solvents in lacquer may soften the decal's ink." That's a huge understatement. In my experiments so far, I've had some combinations that have completely melted down. As for how you draw out the logo, that's the easy part. I used CorelDraw 5.0 (really ancient release before the dawn of CD's), and I think BeAR used Photoshop 6. In both cases, we traced around the logo with Bezier curves. Most good quality drawing programs should have them. They may be called splines too. Basically the same thing. Other than that, it's just a print out on a transparency. The silver is drawn in with a silver pen. Once I get the whole technique down, I'm going to make a photo of the process, step-by-step. I want to come up with something that's a little more idiot proof. I'm a newbie at all this, so if I can make it work for me, I figure anyone else can too. Glad you like the logo. It's all BeAR's fault for making me do this.

Okay, so this is very strange. I used Matte ModgePodge for my test, and I did another test last night using Gloss. For some reason the Gloss MP pulls the ink off the transparency and the Matte MP doesn't. This is very frustrating. With the 3 day weekend coming up, I'm going to continue experimenting with different adhesives and sealants until I have the perfect combination. With all of the dissoving ink problems that I've had, I'm probably going to have to coat the design with something before I attach it to the headstock. Plasticoat comes to mind. I've had good luck with it in the past. Or, I may just apply a thin layer of the Matte MP since it seems to be the safest so far. Any suggestions of things to try at this point are welcome.

When I read this just now, I thought you were going to take a picture of one guitar and attach it to another. That would be pretty weird. Now, where did that picture of the blue swirl paint job Jem go to...

You could just have a crappy 1st string. You should change it out and see if that fixes it. Intonate again with a new string. When the strings get old and stretched a lot (from a lot of bending) they have bad intonation problems like you describe. Plus, a new 1st string should only cost you about $1. It's a cheap fix.

Okay... No surprise here given BeAR and I working on the logos. Brain, you have already mentioned finishing taboos about mixing enamel and lacquer finishes. What about the water based Modge Podge and lacquer? Do you have any tips? My testing so far is pretty good, but I used a matte finish Modge Podge, and not the gloss. I'd rather use the gloss finish, so I'm wondering what your experience has been. Thanks.

I'm no expert here, but it sounds like the guitar got knocked over and hit something hard. I would suspect that the neck may have shifted, not bent. Neck shift was (and is) a problem on the 3-bolt necks that Fender used back in the 70's. Not that you have a 3-bolt neck, but it could happen with 4. Anyway, do the strings look too close to one side of the neck? If so, the neck may have shifted and not be in line correctly. You'll just have to slack the strings, loosen the neck bolts a little and straighten it up before tightening the screws back up again. It should just need a little nudge. Any other ideas guys?

That's a good idea, the only problem is that I don't have any CAD software to use a CAD drawing. Do I need one, or are the drawings just drawings? Could I use some demo software to make a print out if not? Oh, and would there be any copyright issues with making measured drawings and plans freely available?

I experimented with the finishing last night. And again, I have some things that have worked better than others. I tried three different things. Here's the scoop: 1) Spray a coat of lacquer onto wood and apply decal to tacky coat. Ick, no! Turns out that both the ink from the laser printer and the silver paint pen dissolve quite nicely in tacky (or even wet) lacquer. In short, this is not a good idea. After all the hard work that you'll put into your logo, you'll ruin it all once the lacquer hits the ink. Time to think of something else. Digging around in my wifes craft closet, I spot a can of photo mount and some modge podge. Paydirt! 2) Use spraymount (a 3M photomount) to attach decal and lacquer over that. I sprayed a good layer of adhesive on the ink side of the decal, wait a few seconds and slap it on to the scrap wood. I let it set while I worked with the Modge Podge (discussed below) and then sprayed an abundant coat of lacquer on top of that. If I were really finishing, I'd build up the coat more slowly, but this is just a test. The results aren't bad. The lacquer did creep under the decal a little, and where it touched the ink it ran just a little. But, I don't like the way the decal looks. It looks suspended above the wood. It makes it look foggy. 3) Modge Podge decal and lacquer over that. So, not too surprisingly, Modge Podge worked the best. Considering that Brian suggests (or at least has a photo of) the stuff in the material finish tutorial, it seems like this is a natural way to go. The logo gets glued to the wood with the Modge Podge. Let that cure up and sand it flat (which I didn't do in this test), and then hit it with a few coats of lacquer. Here's the photo. Nearfield is the photomounted version, farfield is the modge podge version.

Naptha, as it turns out, is what they sell as Zippo lighter fluid.

I would put the bass on top, personally. That may not be the most ballanced way to do it, but my thinking is that the higher up you go on the body, the lower the strings are tuned. There was a fellow, in fact, that built a guitar and bass double neck, but he put the two necks so close together that he could fret and play both the guitar and bass at the same time. He also used two separate output jacks, one for the bass, and one for the guitar. Legend has it that he could actually sound like two different people playing at the same time. Mental... party

Oh, what the heck. It'll be fun to play with. jehle@hiwaay.net

That's a good point about the paper and printers. I suppose anyone that's going to attempt this will have to experiment to some degree then. I spent a lot of time last night just getting the painting technique down. It's tedious work, as BeAR suggests, but it is worth it. I'm going to attempt to attach a logo onto some wood tonight. According to the directions on the Deft spray can, it sets up in 30 minutes, 20 minutes to the touch. How long do you think I should wait before putting the decal on a tacky coat? I figure I should wait a few minutes. If I put it on right away, it might dissolve the inks. Any suggestions from those that have worked with laquers already?