charisjapan

No plug, no terror (of severely botched job or severe bodily harm), and easy-peasy!  Nearly forgot about this "option!"

Took it down to 0.1mm ... should be flush (or thereabouts) after paint.

Sigh ...

Half millimeter shallow.  That's it for today.

Here's a few pics of my parts choices (again).

Seymour Duncan Pro Shop Vintage Stack for Tele STKT-1N ... noiseless vintage output.  I have used this in a Tele, and like it!

Allparts USA PC 5763-003 Pickup ring for Tele, black powdercoat over solid brass.

HipShot 6 String Fixed Guitar Bridge (aka Hardtail), chromed brass

Solid brass string retainer block from @Juliusjahnmaker on FB

HipShot Chrome O-Ring Knobs

Montreux Electrosocket, chromed brass

Checked neck alignment and treble "e" saddle location, and it's looking good. Used the bevel template to mark the top and also neck pocket and pickup location.

Popped the clamps this morning, and threw the body back into the router box.  As expected the top had uneven thickness ... I only flattened the glue side.  Took it down to the desired 5mm top thickness, and had minor tearout on only one side of the Kaede maple.  That disappeared with a bit of sanding, now quite flat and smooth.  Glue joint seems (pun!) seems tight, but the real test is after beveling.  Weight down a bit more.  Taps nice!! 

Question: When I test sprayed the urethane over unsealed Kaede, it really soaked up the paint, but unevenly, which probably helped with the warping I witnessed. Do you think a natural shellac might help?  I really want to keep as much of the natural maple character as possible ... any suggestions?  Thanks!

Dug out all the clamps I own, got them all lined up, pencil-marked their locations, then used Titebond Original to glue up.  Template is taped to the back, and the top will be thicknessed in the router box.  Also, two screws are for location purposes and to clamp the bridge block and neck pocket. 

Found a pair of "Y" clamps, but just could not find a place for the last one ... poor guy .

Sure hope I haven't forgotten anything. 

This is what you see peeking through the soundhole. Part of me thinks I wasted time, but another part says it felt good, even if it's hidden. 

And if by some miracle this guitar sounds beyond fantastic (in the hands of an accomplished player, not me!), I can claim that the sound waves travel between the chambers smoothly in precise waves of tonal reverberation ... exactly as I calculated beforehand.

1 hour ago, curtisa said:

Seems a shame to hide all that work with a timber top. You sure you don't want to slap a perspex cover on instead?

is tempting! 

Will clean up a little under the soundhole. but this should be smooth enough for the tone to flow and resonate between chambers ... if that means anything at all!? 

Next on the agenda is to connect the chambers.  Don't ask me why, but I thought it would be more "acoustically alive" ... maybe. I could have just routed the whole thing and added braces for a bit of longitudinal strength (and support under the top glue line), but somehow just like the elegance of doing it this way.  It is, however, an exercise in patience and bruised knuckles!  I'll eventually be ready to glue the top on and carve the bevels ... Yay!

At some point I'll have to decide what the fretboard will be.  The neck itself is Padauk, with my Mt. Fji headstock.  Originally I thought to use this pre-slotted Ebony board from LMI, and maybe bind it with black.  It's an evenly dark board, and should polish up nicely.  But I also have a few Wenge blanks that looked great on the Limba, and recently picked up an African Blackwood board.

Decisions, decisions! 

The patient is immobilized, ready for a serious shave! 

(Btw, all this happened over the past 2 weeks, in 30 minute "free time" increments)

Router box raised 5.5mm for a 0.525-degree angle, then shaved from zero at the tail to about 5mm at the end of the upper arm.  I admit that this is pure whimsy, but thought it might be an interesting thing to do!  I will leave the box set like this, and will use again after gluing the Kaede maple top to flatten that also down to 5mm thickness.  

Into the router box again, after inlaying a Padauk "neck plate" to give a little more sturdy place for the bolts to pinch.  Now down to a perfectly smooth 5mm.  (as expected, the body moved a bit after routing the cavity)  The body now weighs a bit less than half before the routing.

Life intervenes again ... last week Mrs. Charisjapan had an accident that scared me witless, tumbling down 17 hardwood steps.  Fortunately, a week later, she is on the mend.  However, a broken dominant left arm at the wrist and broken toe leaves me little shop time. The scary part was hitting a table at the bottom of the stairs that required 5 stitches just at the eyebrow, but those came out yesterday promising minimal scarring, and zero concussion.

Sitting in front of the PC using my favorite digital editor, MSPaint (the only one I know how to use  ), I finally came up with something that shows the bevels.  Here's a modern-ish slash soundhole and a more traditional f-hole.  So far, pretty unanimous nixing of the f-hole. 

At the slowest speed of the variable router, this bit was wonderful!!  Smooth, no smoke or drama. got it down to 38mm, leaving 7mm on the back.  After letting the body settle a few days, will put the thing back on the router box and shave a half millimeter off the back for the desired 6.5mm.  Then will flip and flatten the top again before gluing the top on. 

I cannot believe how lively the body taps! Very perky, more so than I thought Chinaberry would be ... a lot like I would imagine from a nice piece of mahogany.  Who knows, maybe this will actually turn out to behave something like a semi-acoustic?!  It would be very cool to have a guitar that could be played unplugged in a quiet room. 

Whole hog Hole hogging.

Finally got around to some severe weight relief.  Actually, the purpose is not lose weight, but make a "sorta" semi-acoustic guitar.  Less weight is collateral. The body is 45mm thick, so took out 32mm ... remembering the 3mm point on the bit.  When I rout it, I will leave only 6mm or so ... if there is any acoustic resonance to be had, thin is good, right? (fingers crossed)

That was a LOT of work!  Started out with 2,324g, 1524g at this point.

Thanks @Andyjr1515, I think it should be ok.  The top will be appreciably thinner (about 5~5.5mm) than that piece, and the stress is spread over a large half-oval-ish area. That test piece was pretty radically "soaked" with several coats one after another, but I will give a shellac coat, then make sure the first coat of urethane dries well before following coats. 

I found a nice color of this same rattle can that is called "mahogany," and tried a gradation with it that looks pretty nice.  Since I'm doing the bevels again, maybe a natural edging would look good? 

Also entertaining a few soundhole ideas ... I know this isn't a true semi-acoustic, but it might look better than just a "lonely" single neck pickup.

If you've been following, you know that the plan is to hollow the Chinaberry out pretty thoroughly and add a thin (5mm) maple cap.  Well, I sprayed a couple coats of my favorite (i.e. available) rattle can urethane, and while the color and chatoyance is nice, the 8mm cutoff warped something fierce!  After drying completely, it settled down a bit, maybe half of what's in this picture.  What will happen when I pain the glued top?!?!  Should I first apply shellac or something to seal the wood before the urethane?  Any advice would be welcome.

When cutting the body blanks out from the Chinaberry Chunk, someone said, "Beware the Pith!" Well, when faced with the decision of two blanks or three, I took the Pith ... and decided to make it a Feature.  Made a 4mm dowel of Padauk and epoxied it in ... right about the top between the forearm bevel and the tummy cut.  The neck is Padauk, and probably a Neck Bolt Plate of sorts, so why not? 

Here's the template for weight relief routing ... as promised, pretty aggressive. 

Finally cut the Japanese Kaede Maple top out using my little bandsaw ... where has this been all my life?!?! Was a breeze compared to my two-decade-old jigsaw.  So this piece was my first resaw and cutout on a bandsaw, and while this will never be a "resaw king," it's better than any alternative I have.  Happy Puppy! 

This particular version of this body style is going to be pretty radically weight-relieved, acoustically enhanced, and tonally transmogrified.  Will rout 39mm from this 45mm blank after I make a template like the below pic. Then will use my box to angle the entire top about 0.7 degrees to take about 6mm off the top horn to zero at the rear strap pin.  Next, add a 6mm Japanese Kaede Maple cap, and finally bevel it much like the Limba 6. 

This guitar will have the other Padauk Mt. Fuji neck with a dark Ebony 24.75" fretboard and a Hipshot hardtail bridge.  Pickup will be a single Seymour Duncan Vintage Stack mounted in an Allparts metal pickup mount.

In other words, another prototype. 

The Chinaberry has been on the back burner too long!

Tendinitis and Bursitis seem to be under control, as I've been in the shop for short times almost every day and not had the Popeye knobs on my elbow and a lot less pain in the thumb and forearm.  Yay!

Finally got the router out of the table and tried to put it in the fancy jig and ... the base was too big by 4mm! Gaaaah! I measured the bottom plate, but the actual base overhangs the front cut area.  No idea why, but in retrospect, I guess it would have been a good idea to check that before building the jig. (duh!)  Anyway, after a bit of work (while very tempted to chuck the whole thing in the bin!) got the rails the correct width. It was probably a good thing, as my wheels were a bit off, so fixed that, too.  After waxing rails and router base with some Briwax, the router slides side-to-side nicely, and the wheels roll on the rails very smoothly.  Put the Chinaberry body in the box and used adjustable blocks to snugly chuck it in place.  After taking down top and bottom a bit more than 1mm, then a few minutes with a Bosch sander, the body was within 0,1mm all around, and perfectly flat to a straight edge.  Since my shop won't support a planer or sanding  thicknesser, this is perfect! 

Heady Company!

Not one bit ashamed to put this on my wall alongside my favs ... and happy to say that through my 5C1 amp and using my homebrew fuzz+dirt pedal, it Rocks AND Blues (new verb) nicely.  Plays nicely with my new toy, a Morley Bad Horsie .

And the backside ...

It Lives! 

As expected (er, hoped), minimal setup needed. Intonation was spot-on, pickup height to TV Jones spec was perfect.  In fact, since I had not looked at their spec before and set height like a S-D, the bridge now sounds better than before.  Controls work nicely, but I may want to use push-pulls to give me and off option for the treble-bleed.  It rocks maybe too much, and needs a bit of taming for blues.  "Course, I haven't even fiddled with the amp yet, so maybe no need.

Tale of the Scale: it weighs 13 grams more at 3,738 grams or 8 pounds 3-1/2 ounces.  I'm not disappointed, as it feels nice, and is certainly not heavyweight for what it is. The balance is nice, the ergonomics great, and tucks under arm just right.  Calling it a WIN!

9 minutes ago, Prostheta said:

Lovely! You've had a really consistent aesthetic running through this from the outside to the details such as the shaped recesses for the pots. The jack might not be the most practical in terms of repair going forward (don't set it down with a cable in!) but everything is internally consistent. Fantastic.

Thank you, kind sir!

After playing an active circuit MusicMan bass for years, I always pull the plug to keep from draining battery ... good habit to have with this guitar. 

The paint seems to be quite dry, no evidence of out-gassing by smell. But as a 1K, it will surely continue to sink.  I don't mind, and as Limba is so incredibly soft, I imagine it will get dented pretty easily.  I love the look and feel, so a "slow-relic" will just make it better!