Norris

Great results on all accounts!

Did you heat the binding with a hairdryer to help it round the tight bends?

I got a small gap on the first bit of binding that I did - on my neck. The second bit of binding around the headstock went a lot better because I took my time, made sure to heat & bend the binding well before I got to it with the glue line, and ensured it was correctly held before moving onto the next 6" section - using cable ties where tape or clamps were impractical. Ideally the binding should naturally sit close to where you want it and not be trying to pull away too much, before you glue & tape/clamp it.

Very nice work though - I love the colour

White stove knobs get my vote

Maybe bury them in the back garden for a couple of weeks to gain some patina to match the rest of the aesthetics?

Very neat. Lovely router work

19 hours ago, Andyjr1515 said:

Excellent progress, @Norris. Projects always seem to accelerate from this stage on....   Can't wait to see the finished article!

Nor me! Thanks for the encouragement

Then last night it was finally time to fit the fretboard

First I drilled four 1.5mm pilot holes in the fret slots, dry clamped the board in place to make sure everything lined up (remember there is a slight twist warp on my board) and then tacked the board in place with some panel pins through the pilot holes. Then having prised the board back off, I applied some tite-bond and got busy with the clamps

And there we are up to date. I'll fetch the clamps off this evening, then it's time to fit the dot markers.

Another progress report for the last week - working on the neck.

I cut down the truss rod fillet I had prepared from an offcut of the neck, leaving about 3-4mm to shave off and making a little rebate to give some clearance for the internal thread. Then I glued it into place with epoxy and clamped it over night.

After 24 hours it was set

Then using my new shinto rasp (nice!), a small plane and cabinet scrapers, took it back level

Have you any offcuts of the top piece big enough to make a headstock veneer?

Great update. I should be making my first nut soon and will be checking back here

Ash, certainly in my very limited experience, has a tendency for texture. The darker grain tears out easily whereas the lighter grain is a lot tougher. The texture allows for effects like the black & blue guitar, as you can either dye black/sand back/dye blue, or use a black grain filler - using the small grain height difference. Sanding back also depends on the openness of the grain i.e. having areas where the dye will soak in more than others, to leave pigment when sanding back. Although you might be able to emulate it to some extent, to get the very stark difference in the black & blue guitar would really require ash to achieve.

If course, I am a complete newbie at this so I could be wrong, but this is my experience having worked with ash a bit, and having prepared a few dye samples. NB: I am still not getting quite the effect I am hoping to achieve (a more even, translucent colour), as the lighter & darker areas of grain do not take the dyes I have been using to the same extent - and I have tried both water & alcohol based dyes. I may end up spraying it with a tinted lacquer.

I cut a piece of 3/4" MDF large enough to fit 6 sheets of sandpaper, then used spray mount adhesive to stick them on. After fixing a batten on the back, I could clamp the sanding table in my workmate. It does flex ever so slightly, but with some scraps of wood strategically packed underneath that can be minimised. I initially used too fine grit sandpaper, which was taking forever, but got much better results after swapping it out for 300 grit.

Then after 3 to 4 hours of sanding, using pencil squiggles to check, you end up with a very flat surface

Not much done this week, as it's been busy with other real-life stuff

Anyway I did clean out the binding glue from my fret slots. I thought you might like to see the tool I made from an old craft knife to do it

It would also be useful if the slots were not quite deep enough, as it's a very effective scraper.

I ground off the bevelled edge completely, rounded off the tip, then used my smallest Dremel grinding wheel to put in the hook. A quick few wipes with some wet & dry paper to de-burr it, and it's ready for use - with a ready made handle

I look forward to when you set it to gas mark 11

Try removing the "s" from the "https" in the link - that sometimes helps when embedding a video

Lovely bass, although I think I would be scared of snapping the horns off

I see what @ScottR means about wizards. It's like if Harry Potter played bass guitar...

Great job on the fitted case too!

A minor update from last night's class. I spent about an hour filing the truss rod adjuster hole - not much to show. However then I spent about 15 minutes drilling 6 holes that have transformed it from a plank of wood into a neck

I'll press the ferrules in properly later during the final fit

First trial fit of the Kluson tuners and they line up, no gaps - result!

Thanks for your kind comments . Back to the usual glacial pace of progress now though I'm afraid

Thanks. The neatness of the work is down to this rather nifty birthday present from my wife. I may look a prat, but can see what I'm doing!

The glass lenses are steamed up a bit as they had been in the garage overnight

A little bit of fettling with cabinet scrapers

Then I trimmed a rebate into the top, glued in some binding & scraped it down

Then could finally set about binding the headstock

This was using the offcut from the fretboard binding, cut on the bandsaw - lucky it was pretty much perfect height. It also involved a lot of use of Mrs Norris' hairdryer to heat the binding & make it more flexible

It blended quite well at the top

And then scraped down, we are up to date

The fretboard binding should match nicely when it is glued, trimmed & scraped

I'm quite pleased with myself about that. It should look great when the veneer is dyed

I had a week off work and made a bit of progress. I've quite a lot to update, so I'll try to keep it short.

I started off by routing the binding rebate around the body - allowing for the drop top carving to come.

Then I set about sorting out the headstock - which is holding up the rest of the neck

First I created a template from card, to the existing size of the headstock

And marked out the thickness of my binding

Then I used a craft knife to cut the template down and then used that to cut out the veneer

I knew I'd find a use for that gadget that lurks in the back of the kitchen cupboards. I steamed the veneer for an hour

Then used the clamping caul that I made a few weeks ago to clamp it into shape overnight

I held it in position with a couple of tacks - I drilled holes in the caul to match & allow for a bit of adjustment

(Yes I know the pin in the end position is a little short of the mark!)

Then I applied a bit of titebond

There's quite a lot going on with that headstock. How have you constructed that?

I managed to get hold of some "Light Fast" wood dye of unknown origin - it's some that my instructor has had laying around for some time. I have put it through the same regime as the other test pieces and...

There is virtually no change in colour (the darker area at the bottom right of that photo is shadow from the quick snap I took this morning)

I think that ends my testing, For my build I will buy a couple of the available shades of blue light-fast dye and get mixing.

Conclusion
Inks come in a great range of shades and if you are careful/lucky in choosing a (relatively) light-fast shade you can get great results. Proper light fast dyes are a bit more expensive and are available a much more limited range of shades, but don't run the risk of fading.

I did have a look around online, and the closest I could find was a reel of 3mm 3D printer filament i.e. the 3D equivalent of a printer cartridge. Probably not thick enough for you, and only available in round section - but it was fluorescent orange.

I wonder if you could get one custom printed. However it's very unlikely that any 3D printer has a bed long enough, but you could carefully join several smaller lengths together with acetone. It wouldn't work out cheap though. (Kind of clutching at straws here!)

It would probably be a lot easier to use a faux binding - paint it on!

When I did mine I just used a router side fence & some careful measuring - obviously while the neck side was still square

I have been told that if you carefully run over your frets with a wax crayon before spraying, it makes it easier to clean them up afterwards. Obviously I've not tried it, as I'm still a little away from fretting my first board

1 hour ago, 10pizza said:

Not sure where you're strap button is going to be. Maybe you could drill through the upper horn to the pickup cavity from the spot where you're strapbutton is going to be. it would need a longer piece of wood to be glued back in, but then you can cover it up with the button.

Ooh great thinking. That might just work