zyonsdream

Well I have to say that sanding on plywood is rather easy and standard tools like bastards work excellently so a beginner could get away with buying a coupe of home depot style rasps which would be a way for them to save a little cash on their initial tool investment. So far, I've basically used a few bastard files and my random palm sander. The plys look rather cool and interestingly enough they actually feel rather smooth. There are some voids in the plys so it will be necessary to use filler but a few spots of matching filler and you could actually do a trans finish. I think the side grain looks sort of interesting. However, I plan to paint this one a solid color.

I don't like the inset under the bridge but the trem looks nice

Your solution to throw epoxy over everything is expensive and inelegant. If you're going to coat the guitar in that much plastic/glue, why not just build it out of acrylic? Using stable wood is a more effective method than the one you describe. I'm not coating the guitar in epoxy, I was just mentioning that BCR did it with their platinum series guitars. That stuff was like a plastic coating. I'll use regular good ol' wood filler like I'd do with any other imperfection on a guitar getting a solid coat of paint. I took the clamps off the top this morning and took a quick shot. Obviously this piece doesn't have the best grain pattern but I've seen some plywood with wild grain. The wings are hollow. Once I pick up my new router I'll be able to knock out the F-Holes.

True. A manufacturer can't produce a quality instrument on a repeatable basis using wood that isn't consistent. That may not hold to the same degree for someone making a 'one off' instrument. How much that does or does not hold, I guess we'll find out when this experiment is done. Sorry but I'd have to disagree with you 100%. If mid price range companies can do it on an assembly line basis then a high end shop could do it without issue. There are a lot of companies making guitars out of plywood right now and they will sound consistent with each other. How stable does a solid body need to when when it's slathered in a ton of epoxy filler and then an acrylic or poly hard coat? No humidity can get in so temperatures shouldn't be able to affect it. Also, I'm sure we have all built guitars out of the same billet and experienced drastic differences in each one when it came to the way the wood acted. There really is no absolute consistency in a tree! I'm also glad to see we are getting a plywood base counter part into the mix! This is getting fun.

Well I couldn't get any legible information off the remaining piece of plywood but I figured with all your guys expertise we should be able to figure out the grade. Sorry, I had this plywood lying around for the last year. Here is a shot of the top while I was voiding the cavities for the hollow wings. here is a side view. At this point I'm gluing the top on so it's three 3/4 pieces and each peace is 5 plys of wood. As you can see there are some voids in between the plys so filler on the sides will be a MUST but really, a little bit of wood filler is not bad! So, we can see that this isn't furniture grade lumber by any means but I'm not 100% sure on how bad it is. I know the full sheet was about $12.00

it didn't work out too good for BCR with the artist series but the BDSM pickups are junk to begin with.

High dollar manufacturers don't use low grade wood because it does produce lesser quality instruments. Quality is consistency. Properly dried, instrument quality lumber is more stable than lower grade wood or plywood. It is also easier to carve etc. Those are desirable qualities. I don't deny that pickups, scale length and bridge type have as much if not greater effect on tone as the wood used in construction, but there is a definite effect. You seem to be intimating that the use of high dollar woods is a conspiracy theory to extract more money from mindless consumers when plywood is just as good. That's a little bit tinfoil hat style isn't it? My thought is that the saying "You get what you pay for" has survived so many centuries for a reason. It's true. Well that’s why I’m doing this build…to see if a plywood guitar built by a custom builder can yield a high quality sounding guitar. I’m not saying that manufacturers of high quality instruments only use specific woods as a way to milk customers. I’m saying that consumers are accustomed to seeing “ash” or “mahogany” and less apt to think “plywood, poplar, Basswood” can make a good guitar. If PRS said, this is our new plywood guitar; people would blast it without even trying it or just assume it was a cost cutting measure. So essentially I’m saying that there is a stigma with the consumers around these types of woods and if Fender could still get 1K for a strat and use plywood I’m sure they would but the market wouldn’t sustain it. Ultimately it comes down to the craftsmanship put into the guitar concerning stability but this will end up coming down to raw tone out of a plywood guitar. I would agree that a solid wood would be best for a carved top so using pine for this experiment would be reasonable but I wanted to use the worst wood just out of curiosity and pine has been done before and has obviously been proven a success.

There will never be an end to the debate on tone simply because tone is different to every person. I also like that we are three pages in and everyone is sharing their opinions in a positive manner. That’s why I like this forum. I echo the concerns on using plywood for the neck and I think the only way to do it without it being completely subjected to humidity is to epoxy the hell out of it and then hard coat it. I’m not saying it isn’t possible without epoxy but the added strength won’t hurt and if anyone has ever sanded the paint off of a BCR platinum series guitar you’ll know that they even epoxy’d the bodies before painting them. I’m not really worried about stability with the body. Soft wood is used a lot and with a hardcoat most people never know. Poplar is really soft and I wouldn’t suggest an oil finish on it! As long as there is stability within the neck pocket then there should be no body issues. I’m looking to complete an oil finish on the body just to see if humidity causes a lot of issues with the body itself. Inside the wings will remain raw (just like on a standard semi-hollow. I’ll find out what grade I’m using in a few hours and then I’ll post it. Just not sure off the top of my head… I just know it’s not furniture grade and it’s not chip board.

This is my point exactly. I personally feel that wood makes little difference in the overall “tone” of a SOLID body instrument and the pickups, pots, wiring cables and amps really shape the overall tone of a guitar. But, a lot of people think high dollar manufacturers don’t use low grade wood because it produces lesser quality instruments and not because of the stigma off attaching the “plywood” name to their guitars. So you are basically saying the same thing I am but I’m not going to stick high dollar pickups on. I’m going to go with a middle of the road (no more than $45.00) pickup to make my comparisons from. My guitar is also going to be semi-hollow with a 5” wide center core that extends the entire way through the guitar. This construction will help test the rigidity and stability of the plywood and the open air wings will help to show some of the natural acoustics that a semi hollow has. With the center core, it’s the best of both worlds –to me! In my world the best tone comes from a slightly over driven blues guitar so that’s my aim. Unfortunately the motor housing in my router shattered and the clutch went out causing the router to vibrate excessively so I have to pick up a new router on pay day so for the next day or so my progress is stopped!

Well, I’ve got the body glued and rough cut and I’ve been cutting out the wings with no machining issues so far. The plywood I’m using isn’t the chip board kind but it is not high quality stuff. I’ll get the info off of it tonight and let you all know what actual grade it is. I know when I got it the whole sheet was really cheep and it’s absolutely not furniture grade ply. I’m not seeing any real issues with machining and for stability, well, it’s going to be a semi hollow guitar so that should really show us how stable the guitar will be. I was going to go with a set neck and I’m still debating on using a ply neck so building two necks might just be the answer for me. As for the new builder…that’s sort of why this build is being done. Should a new builder use lesser woods on their first build to avoid spending extra money and will it cause more issues than it’s worth and will it have the possibility to yield a well playing well sounding guitar? Those are really the answers I’m looking for.

Anything built with limba is a step up from the rest! Build fast, I want to see it done... I like the shape too. It's sort of Ibanez looking.

If manufacturers could use plywood, get a great sounding guitar (if you cover them up with solid colour paint not many people could tell without removing pickups etc) and DRASTICALLY reduce their costs and increase their profit margin, of course they wood. I'll take a bet I can, in a blind test with a construction grade plywood guitar and a solidbody using proper, instrument-grade lumber guitar, provided they have the same pickups, tell them apart. It's about disclosure. The company would need to disclose the type of wood they are using. Every add you see about a guitar tells you what it's made from because traditionally they are made from XX and XX which is socially accepted from the music community and when it is different, the noses go in the air and the potential buyer says exactly what you said. I can tell it's plywood. Well, I've played plywood (with maple necks) and I didn't know until I took a look into the cavities. If you doubt that it's possible to get the same tone from a plywood guitar then I invite you to experiment right along with me and build one for yourself. It's going to be super cheap. Hell, I had the plywood in my shop already. Under $100.00 for the whole thing for sure!

The neck will be made out of the same stuff as the body. Cheap multi-ply plywood. I'll likely soak it in epoxy to make it a bit more rigid but we'll see. I'll stress test some of it raw to see how much it will flex once I have the neck blank glued up.

check out the martin stratabond necks - high quality plywood admittedly but definately plywood I bought one of those and ended up taking it back. After about two weeks the neck went haywire on me and back bowed like crazy. The composit body didn't sound that great either. Very little projection. I didn't count but it was supposed to be 100 pieces. I never really thought about doing the neck with ply but I can see how it would work. If it ends up being crap I can always build a maple neck for it. Sounds like a plan!

Actually, I was thinking about going natural with it. Clear filler with a clear coat just to show what it’s made of. Surely people will scoff at the fact it’s plywood and then they will have to eat crow when they play it. I might even leave any of the blue lettering on it that the manufacturer put on it to label it.

There are three schools of thought 1. The type of wood you use affects the overall tone of the guitar in the most significant way 2. The electronics (pickups) affect tone and sustain more than the wood itself 3. The type of wood isn’t too important but I won’t play a guitar out of lower priced wood just because it seems cheep. I believe that electronics play a bigger part in tone shaping than the actual materials that the body is made of. If you check some of the recent threads debating this; the common theme is that plywood bodies are used in beginner models and by lower quality companies for a reason. It’s obviously a cost cutting measure (more expensive guitars cut cost by using a laminate top instead of an actual top) but I’ve owned a few plywood bodies and I’ve noticed that they are not all bad. The ones I’ve owned have been primarily guitars to play metal. Metal usually doesn’t have a tone of midrange and is somewhat scooped so the average LP lover might not like the tone these guitars have had. I don’t think that tone was a result of the wood but more so by the electronics put into them. Building a crap neck and my own pickup would essentially give you a guitar that would measure my ability to build a guitar and make it sound good. Most of your standard plywood bodied guitars have a maple neck and a rosewood board because regular rock maple is cheap and Indian rosewood is reasonable compared to the alternatives. I’m going to use a middle of the road pickup that I get off of EBay or something. It wont be a major name brand pickup (to mirror what a smaller manufacturer would do on a mass produced guitar.) The pickups I build on my own are super distortion types and sound great. I want to prove to myself that middle of the road components and trash lumber can come out together to make a guitar that most anyone would think the tone was great (regardless if you like my shape or not.) My overall goal is to mirror the tone of a BB King Lucille.

Well I’ve decided to put my curiosity to work. With the increased discussion on using junk wood as a viable substitute for well known and accepted lumber I’ve decided to make a guitar out of junk wood. I was going to use run of the mill pine until it was posted that Fender has used Pine for years. I noticed that ply wood had been really put down so I’m going to use good old fashioned plywood to build the guitar. I’m not going to used high quality Burch laminated plywood. I’m using the low grade home depot stuff that comes in big sheets that’s used in construction. That’s pretty much the bastard child of trees! I’m going to use standard maple and rosewood for the neck, just because plywood could not be used to make a neck. I’ve glued two ¾ pieces of plywood together to make the body. I’m going to hollow out the wings leaving a solid core and then I’ll use a thinner piece for a top. I’ll be using my Mutant Jazz body shape that’s semi hollow for the test. I’m going bare bones with a wrap around and a single humbucker. Most likely 25” scale but I’m not set on that. I might go short Gibson scale with it. When it’s done I’m going to give it to a 3rd party person that I know who runs a studio and I’m going to have them record some honest side by side examples with a guitar of much higher class with similar configuration so I can have an honest comparison. I know this has been done before and it will not squash any debate but I’d like to know if building with lesser materials can yield a high quality sounding guitar. I feel that most manufactures don’t use this type of wood simply due to the stigma and not due to the sound they can get from the guitar. I got started on it last night!

Hearn's hardwood in souther PA. They are expensive but they have good stuff. I ake a trip down about once or twice a year for supplies. I painted it because the treble side maple had very little BE in it once I thickness sanded the top and it had almost zero quilt to it. It wasn't my choice to paint it but the left side looked great and the right side looked bland. It's my fault really, I didn't completely thickness sand before I glued the top on because my planer tends to get temperamental with thin wood. I plan on making another one that will not be painted. I have a couple nice pieces of exotic around that might make excellent tops. I believe I might make one with a Canary wood top. Edit: I also forgot, When I replaced the lacewood center I used a walnut back but I also used a scrap piece of ambrosia maple so the center piece looked out of place with the BE maple. This was truly a salvage job in all respects.

I'm going to watch the progress on this because after the one I have on the table right now, I'm building a guitar out of softer woods to see what the tone would be like. This debate will go on forever but for myself, I want to put it to rest.

not to change thr topic bu I've been thinking about trying an invisabolt guitar just for the knowledge. Has anyone played one or tryed building one yet? An invisabolt might be an alternative to the set neck and still allow you to retain the bolt on feel.

Can easily be done. You can glue a tennon onto the bolt on neck or just glue it flat if your pocket is tight. I did the later of the two here http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.php?showtopic=36712

I like the headstock. It isn't the best one I've seen but a good recognizable headstock goes a long way in product recognition.

I thought about doing some odd style F holes but I decided that going traditional would sort of seem even more extreme given the styling cues of the guitar. It sort of kept it grounded for me. Stone finishes are really cool and relatively easy to do. I've been getting a lot of interest in them and been doing a lot more of them for people. The color choices are also growing and once you hardcoat them, they are just as rock hard as any other hard coat. Use a matte finish though as a gloss finish makes the stone look fake. Thanks for the feedback.

Well in my world of pointy guitars, the ES335 has always stood out as a rounded design that I always liked but...I just had to make an ES335 inspired pointy-ish guitar. It was originally slated to be a walnut back-side and maple top with a neck through lacewood neck but it ended up being something completely different due to a massive hidden crack in the lacewood. Here is a picture of the inside To keep everything lined up I traced my template and then marked a few places to make sure everything would line up when it came time to route the edges. After routing out my cavities I glued the maple top on, lined my template up and then routed the body. I originally wanted to clear the guitar and keep the wood natural but I wasn't happy with the treble side maple. It just didn't have the same quilted birdseye that the other side. I also hated where the treble side of the fretboard met the body. I like the whole fretboard to sit down farther but I was willing to deal with these defects just because it was my first attempt at a semi hollow body. Then, when I was shaping the neck, it happened, I small crack started showing up and then a big crack showed up! The neck was junk and unfortunately I had already shaped the heel. There was no way to salvage the body and make a set neck or bolt on. So, I threw it in the scrap bin and there it sat for almost a year. A week ago I had a little time and went back to this build. I sliced the wings off and replaced them onto a solid walnut center piece with a maple cap. Then I decided to have a little fun with it since I really didn't have a neck ready made for the job and I didn't want to put any more money into it than I had to. I found an old 24 fret neck from a PBC guitar and decided to make it into a set neck. I reworked the headstock to make it my own shape and then used hardware i ha around the shop to finish the job. I used an old chrome cover over the Guitarheadz active pickup and an old chicken head knob just for fun. The TOM bridge worked nicely on it even though original plans were to add a floyd to it. A semi hollow with a Floyd...would have been cool, maybe next time! Since the guitar ended up being a learning expernece for me and somewhat a hodgepodge of parts I decided to give it a funky finish. I always wanted to try a stone burst so that's what I did. I started with the green center and burst it with black stone and then used acrylic matte clear coat. I decided that it would be fun to break out at open mic blues jam night so I set it up for some George Thorogood slide guitar! The original shape did end up getting distorted a bit with all the rework so I included a shot of the template too. He is the final concoction . I still have to get a battery box for it. I know it isn't the best execution but some feedback on the shape would be cool!

looks like a top notch professional build but dude, take some time between builds and get the weed wacker out!