WezV

Of course - that is option 1

But i dont think it will look good a few years down the line when the wood has settled and will probably show joins - so I am considering all my options.

the idea of a slotted body has the advantage that it will give a neater finish, easier clamping, large glueing surface so i think its worth considering. and it really isn't that difficult to do

I am also considering doing it as wings then capping front and back with 3mm maple

Dude... I had to replace the entire neck. ALL THE WAY THROUGH! IIRC, the top was only 1/4"> Even though I had it clamped/taped to a backer the whole time, I was still terrified that it would fall apart before I got the new neck in there.

So my questions are 1) how thick is the body now, 2) how thick will it end up with a new surround, and 3) are you considering thinning down the Hofner body so that it might work out better?

exactly what I am thinking of doing with this. I have already done a lapsteel with this style of construction - have to bust out the big router but its not bother

not sure on exact dimensions at the moment but should have the guitar today or tomorrow to confirm - and yes, i would thin the back of the hohner down to keep final thickness pretty much as it is now. the only thing that will put me off going this way is if the pickup routes are very deep - otherwise i plan on taking about 3/8" off the back

i know, but not having the joins on the back will give a much neater finish and its not that hard to make a deep neck through slot in a body - didnt you do that from the back to replace the neck on the superthin?

it will also give a much larger glue join and make for easier clamping

so this is a bit daft and it almost makes more sense to start from scratch.

but i have been asked to see if i can convert a headless steinberger style hohner cricket bat into something more like a flying V. Not a steinberger mini v shape but actual flying V styling

so here are the preliminary mockups showing potential sizes and styles next to the source guitars (controls and pickups are not to scale)

essentially I will be trimming the original guitar down to just past its pickups/bridge routes and treating it as a neck through - but am also considering doing it as a full new body so the original centre section can slot into it

I am pushing for the large scratchplate style as it will hide a lot of sins

John Frusciante

is that a rosewood tele on number 2

Have you ever needed that fudge room Wez? My strategy has always been to set all the way forward and use that as the baseline, compensating slightly on the bass side a few mm if the bridge is especially "intonation-resistant" (ABR-1, etc).

i dont think i have ever actually needed it, never had a guitar not intonate. but in rebuild/repair terms i am happy to have a bit of fudge room existing at the bridge end

but there is another factor to consider especially with fender style saddles. putting the saddles 3/4 of the way forward gives more tension on the spring them having the saddle all the way forward. this helps keep them more solid and prevent unwanted vibration at the bridge and i am sure we could argue for a better tonal transfer too

yeah - measure with the actual bridge in place - but remember that saddles should only ever need to be moved back from the nut to intonate properly - so it doesnt make sense to locate the bridge with the saddles set at their centre point as you just loose half the possible adjustment.

i set the saddles at least 3/4's of the way forward when measuring for the bridge location - that gives me most of the backwards travel as intonation adjustment and a bit of forward travel as fudge room

i assume you mean made in 1967 rather than from a 67 reissue.

if so ordinarily you would be looking at about $250 for each pickup, $100 for the switch, $100-300 for the pots

but if they are are still soldered together and you have other parts then what you have is very valuable to someone restoring a 67 strat and i could see it going up to $2k as a complete lot. if you are brave go for a 99p start on ebay, offer worldwide postage - it will find its value - those collectors wont miss it

buy a resonator and a slide

cant really get white metal parts off the shelf - but a white powder coating/anodisation should be possible

your life will be much easier and cheaper if you accept a bit of chrome on certain points - maybe satin finished metal for a nearly white look - i know sperzel do some satin tuners that are very pale

This one kicks ass better right out of the gate than most of my guitars

its the joy of single pickup guitars, sacrifice a bit of versatility for a much stronger and purer tone

Looking good, but how does she sound now all the weight of the Dulux has been shed? Shame that it is probably more work than it is worth to refresh the lacquer.

sounds pretty good - actually quite versatile... and the neck is in really good shape, i can get a buzz free action of 1.5mm at the 12th fret - pretty nice for bass

tbh, i was considering refinishing it - but anybody can do that. getting it back to its naturally worn state was probably more of a challenge

that carved top one is much sexier

This has turned out rather nice - i decided not to go for a full restore - instead i have left it with a natural relic that suits its age

and the unflattering shot to show its pockmarked face

I just figure if I want a guitar to be like an LP I should stick with the joint

juniors usually have full width tenons - gibson did it as a cost cutting measure but i actually think its one of their best features, i think you can even hear/feel the extra resonance when playing a decent junior

gibson left a extra bit of support in the cutaway which never looks great on more modern versions- but its not really needed anyway

surprised a search didnt bring anything up :?

i like using wilkson saddles on a specially made plate - i usually use a chunk of ebony to make the bridge plate

blackmachine guitars use a similar approach which is where i got the idea

on this one i just used screws to hold them in place - its still holding up fine years later but i was slightly worried about potential stripping of threads

so on this one i used small inserts into the ebony plate to hold the set screws

this was the test piece

a bit of nitromors seems to be doing the trick - just a bit left on the sides to do

I have not had strings on it yet but there was a plastic shim under the bridge when i removed it - i will come up with a better solution that that

you are spot on with the pickup construction, it looks basic enough that a play with other magnets may be in order, depending how it sounds.

good news is that my initial test with paint stripper is going well, removing the splatter without touching the red underneath, although the black bits of splatter are being a bit more stubborn that the other colours. i will try a bit heavier later and hopefully have a nice red guitar just in need of a rebuff (fingers crossed!!!)

Cool pickup. Don't know much about these basses. That like the bass version of a widerange bucker?

Chris

prostheta knows more about the pickup design than me... but I do know its not quite like a widerange humbucker (which fender actually did do a bass version of, very very rare they are too).

this has 2 full size coils, but only the pole pieces you can see, the WRHB has hidden poles going in from the bottom. someone can correct me if I am wrong but it effectively makes half of each coil on this design a ghost pickup. its like a P-bass pickup more than anything else wheras the WRHB has two fully active coils, just with hidden poles on half of each coil

Just picked this up of the bay - a bit of a gamble given the paint and not knowing what is underneath

Its an Aria Pro II CSB-380 made in Japan sometime in the mid 80's. the exact model played by Kim Deal on the first few Pixies albums.

now, onto the paint. I actually dont think the person that did this did a bad job, if you like that sort of thing. I dont so its coming off -

the bass comes apart

After 5 minutes rubbing with paint thinners the back has started to come up nice

sadly the thinners are only moving the white paint - so its time to try something more hardcore

thankfully the guitar seems to be in pretty good condition underneath it all so looks liek my ebay gamble will come up good

I am a believer that wood does affect the tone - but i dont call solid guitar body wood 'tonewood', that is reserved for acoustic tops as far as I am concerned. I also dont believe its everything, you can make up for a less than ideal body wood with careful pickup choice. but even if its only 10% of the final sound, that 10% is very important

the main issue i have with your experiment is the mention of a floyd. I believe body wood choice is less important on trem equipped guitars, at least in comparison to a hardtail where the bridge is in firm contact at all times.

also, everything else should stay the same or your results will not mean anything. - ideally it should be two identical bodies which can have everything else swapped over. but then someone would still point out that the time in between sound takes for reassembly will affect the way you play and could account for any differences, assuming all amp settings are identical and all that stuff.

i think fender had a belt sander set-up that was the same length of the carve and rolled the whole thing in on that without rough carving first

they were quite round up until a new member of staff started in 57 who did it a bit differently and the V-profile was born, not on all guitars and not for very long - just the ones carved by one member of staff whilst he was learning as far as anyone can tell. if it wasnt for clappo they probably never would have made a comeback

I have actually played what is believed to be one of the first 57 V necks and it is so pronounced you would have thought they would have scrapped it - but it did feel good and changed my view on V profiles - at least for chord work.

anyway, the point is that whatever they were doing allowed for a lot of variation and the style or carves, particularly at the transitions, does point towards a large belt sander. they may well have roughed in with a duplicarver but i dont think you would get as much variation if you were just sanding off the duplicarver marks. i do believe that is what gibson did though.

now onto the turned neck idea, I am sure its been done and i think it may have been one of the british builders like shergold or similar. I believe it was 2 necks in a single blank, turn the shaft then split down the middle, route a truss rod slot and attach a fretboard. I wish i could remember for sure, but it always seemed like a very silly way of doing things to me

i like the idea of the ziracote on this. generally i agree with john that they are not 'fancy wood' guitars, but ziracote is dark and subtle enough that it will still fit the vibe from a distance, whilst adding a hell of a lot of elegance when viewed closer and held

your only mistake is not making it a mini-V steiny

and if more evidence was needed

depends on the guitar, might be worth making some wooden ones or just modding some standard ones with strips of binding either side

i did some once with two thin strips of binding either side, black pickup ring with a white/black stripe down either side to make a feature out of it

i really like some of the carve on this - flows and maintains definition better than some of your stuff. if the recess around the pickups/bridge was as sharp it would look incredible.

i like the idea of the sound holes and think they give it a bit of a giger esque look along with the carve. the colour helps with this. but the last pic makes me not like the sound holes as much... i think i would be tempted to pour black paint in the holes to get it all even coloured inside to tidy it up a bit

switch position could be awkward but looks good

dont like the volute! infact it shouldn't be called a volute unless is graceful so lets call it something else. your guitar has the mumps, something that seems to pop up here every so often