Rizh

Wow it's been a while! This has been a busy month but I finally can update the thread.

I glued the new layer and got it to shape. Sadly... it kind of moved when using the clamps so the shape end up wrong on the top layer. Rookie mistake.

After I finished that I just put the body away (I was tired of working on that new top layer!) and kind of wanted to try out the paint, so I used it on the headstock.

I liked that reflective effect

The next day I thought about painting the guitar body, which was scary because I didn't know how would plywood react. In my country, when you ask hardware store workers for wood primer they look at you like if you had asked them if you can lick their ears. They literally don't know what that is.

I looked up something like homemade primer and saw something about using a mixture of wood glue and water. Tried it out but it didn't work, which I assume is because I used a lot more water than glue. Something else to have in mind for next time, would love to try it out.

So, started painting the body even with that questionable layer of homemade primer

And meanwhile, working on the neck, just as Dan from Guns And Guitars taught me

A total 8 layers of paint with no intention of covering it with lacquer, I dig the exposed paint look. It was kind of dissappointing the look it got without primer, but it wasn't like I'd ruined a great guitar body anyways

Besides, I also think that looks is part of its charm haha.

I took no photos of the wiring process as I kind of rushed it at 3am so I could finally use my guitar hahaha. But it was very rustic, and also the first wiring I've done that fully worked (thank god). A thing to mention is that I didnt know how to ground the bridge. I've seen it done with standard tremolo bridges but never on a top loading one like mine. So I just cut through the pickup's ring and pulled the cable out of there to make it get stuck between some saddles. Rustic but works. (It wouldn't solder directly to the bridge so I just put it in there)

When I put the strings on I noticed a huge fret buzz and the 9th fret wouldn't let any other fret before it make sound. I rushed to make it work without taking into account that It would be 'fixed' by the effect the strings would have on the neck. That is a thing right? I think that's what happened, because after a while I could lower the action/saddles and got no buzz.

A bad thing with this cheap bridge is that the high E saddle got stuck and it's at a ridiculously high action. I have no idea how to make that work out. I'll find a way.

The final step was installing the chinese strap locks with a little bit of glue. I'd never had a guitar with strap locks before and I really like the feeling of having them on this guitar

So, I reach the end of the road.

There you can see some cheap covers I improvised with plywood scraps.

Welcome to the family

(I wouldnt use the bridge position for playing clean haha)

Thanks a lot everyone, for helping out with my first build. I feel like I'm more proud than I should be But yes, this feels like a huge accomplishment. Can't wait to get to a new project

Thanks for your answers!

On 19/10/2017 at 3:04 AM, gpcustomguitars said:

Hi again!

Don't worry about the slight curvature of the plywood, it's OK. When cut closer to size it will hold less weight and bend less. I would try to get the same screws, shouldn't be hard or expensive, although it is sometimes hard to find that exact head shape.

Could you post a picture from the back?

Drilling holes trough the new layer shouldn't be a problem, glue first and then drill. You could/should start with a well aligned pilot hole from inside, and drill with the actual drill bit from outside, so that any potential tear out is inside. Use an awl, or make a small plug with a hole for the pilot drill bit in the center (a piece of dowel or something) but it probably is not needed.

When starting drilling on a crackable surface, ie lacquered or in your case, plywood layers, you could start drilling with the first few turns counter-clockwise, slower but scoring the rim of the hole to be drilled.

If you decide to add one of the 3mm layers from the back, you could use it to form a recess for the electronics cover?

For drilling perpendicular holes, you can make a small angle out of wood, a square with one quarter accurately cut out. That corner is your 90 degree guide for hand drilling. I can post a drawing if needed.

Good luck!

 

Actually, the new layers are going on top, the drilling is to be done on the body I already have. I'll make covers for the cavities from the rest of the plywood.

I'll glue the new layers on top so I can repair that broken thing on the top. You can see I haven't drilled the holes for the neck screws.

On 19/10/2017 at 3:14 AM, gpcustomguitars said:

On 19/10/2017 at 7:55 AM, Prostheta said:

I demonstrated more or less the same thing in a pickup rout tutorial....mine was more about dialling in a tighter radius for corners than a router bit might allow (think, EMGs) however the idea stands. Just use a taller template. The masking tape was there to protect the template.

 

 

This is a magnificent idea! I'll look forward to get the thing done.

For now, I'll glue the plywood blanks together, then drill the holes for pickups, switches, knobs, etc. and then I'll cut out the body shape. Then I'll glue them onto the body and finally do the holes for the bridge (which scares me the most since I already did it and it was okay)

It's been some days since sunday haha, but I've finally gotten everything I need to finish this up (maybe)

two 3mm plywood... blanks? and the neckplate arrived yesterday

I traced the back of the body, some cavities included, on the new top (lower layer)

The plans are to glue them together, then drilling the cavities, cut the body shape with the jigsaw and then glue them on to the body.

But the layers are... bent, like warped.

Do you guys think I could glue them like that? Also I dont have anything to make the clamps' pressure even, so I thought I could use construction blocks weight for that. Or I could find something to use the clamps?

Another thing... the neckplate's screws are different. Two are smaller and I am not sure if they are supposed to be like that. I suppose I could get two that are as large as the bigger ones.

Do you guys have any advise on drilling the neckplate holes on the body? I guess a drill press would be ideal but that's some technology I dont have!

Thanks for reading, I'll be reading your answers

So, I've tried to cut a 3mm shim to add a neck angle (which I was scared of because the neck would be angled forwards, and not behind the body as it's usually done) but I can't seem to find a reliable way to test it without drilling the neck to test it with a neckplate. (Which I still don't have).

The 3mm shim only works if I keep the bridge higher with the coins beneath it haha. I think this method might have some bad consequences, like maybe the whole thing would be fragile for some reason, or that I could have intonation and tuning problems, specially when applying a little force to the neck.

I tested it with the high E and B strings and it seemed okay.

Left: 3mm wood shim Right: WIP of a 5mm plywood shim so I can use it without adding coins beneath the bridge

On 9/10/2017 at 8:14 AM, gpcustomguitars said:

one way of uniformly deepening it without router would be to score the inside outline of the pocket with scalpel, exacto knife or a chisel, and to use the plywood to your advantage once again Use the chisel to peel off a layer of plywood or two, that gets you reasonably close to desired depth.

I found out how hard it is (to me) to peel off the layers with an exacto knife, maybe I dont have the right method haha. Also I only have a huge chisel, which i dont think would be useful for a precise work.

On 10/10/2017 at 2:57 AM, gpcustomguitars said:

Well, I understood that you layered 3 x 12mm, so you could add another layer of 4mm or even 6mm and it should be in the standard range. It would help to know some of the measurements, ie neck thickness without the fretboard. You could shorten the screws or get shorter ones, stainless ones are nice and you can get them in non-guitar related places, but you would need to have enough body thickness left int the neck pocket.

I'll assume that the neck without the fretboard is around 20mm, so you should have around 36-20=16mm. That should be enough, but additional 4mm on the back wouldn't hurt. You could lighten the body with some contouring if that's an issue.

The neck w/o fretboard is 21mm, so 6mm plywood on top would be ideal. I'm waiting till sunday so I get the money to buy it.

So I've been avoiding this method but ultimately seems like the perfect one. The thing that worries me the most is making the holes in the right place in the new top. I'm trying to think a good method to do it but we'll see in the future! See you guys on sunday!

19 hours ago, curtisa said:

It can still be done with a drill and chisels if you take care as you go. You already have the neck pocket and pickup cavities cut out, so all you have to do is match what is already there.

@Andyjr1515 doesn't use a router much when creating cavities - have a look at his thread to see how he routes without a router

 

Hondo has more street cred than the "Torch" I had. I remember getting the shock of my life when I chipped the corner off it one day and found plywood poking out underneath the paint. I dunno what I as expecting to find underneath the surface of a sub-$200 guitar??

Thanks for the post! Andy is a total artist with his guitar builds. I think that's the way I made the pickup cavities at first. 

4 hours ago, gpcustomguitars said:

Hi!

First of all, great first project! I especially like that you have worked around the tools you don't have by using alternative material that works well with the tools that you do.

Regarding your problem with the depth of the neck pocket, one way of uniformly deepening it without router would be to score the inside outline of the pocket with scalpel, exacto knife or a chisel, and to use the plywood to your advantage once again Use the chisel to peel off a layer of plywood or two, that gets you reasonably close to desired depth. Some riflers and a good flat double cut file should make the surface nice and flat, and/or get you to the exact depth.

Hope this helps!

Hey thanks! Your idea is pretty good and I think prefer that option. Only thing that worries me is that the neck screws (which I don't have yet) could go past the fretboard.  Maybe I could add the extra layer of plywood on the back? 

I thought 1/4" would be too much, but considering the neck's heel is about 21 milimeters high (not including the fretboard) i think it will suffice.

And I dont have a router or anyone who can lend me one, so I think that would be maybe too much of a trouble to get.

So new plans; I'll wait till I have money to get that plywood. Do you guys have any ideas for getting the holes from the top of the body to the new plywood? I'm afraid I'll get them wrong. 

Lets keep going!

After 2 days, I released the wood from the pressure. Put some hardware on just to see it

After some time I got a jigsaw so I decided to try and cut the body shape.

It then took some days for the neck to arrive, and when I got it I tried to fit it inside the neck pocket, it is such a tight fit!

I then installed the bridge, by making holes for the screws with a screwdriver and a hammer

And here we are! This is the point I'm at currently. I have two issues:

1) Neck pocket is too high. I'm considering adding some height to the bridge by any means I can... I did a thing that might not be the best choice. I put some coins beneath the bridge so it stays higher. How much of a bad idea could this be?

2) I tried to make a hole for a 3 way swtich, but it accidentally broke. I'm considering following my girlfriend's advise of repairing it with epoxy clay. What do you guys think?

That's it till now! Thank you.

2 hours ago, Prostheta said:

Let's see!

Lets hope it turns out good!

2 hours ago, curtisa said:

It looks a bit unusual, but yes, it will work. You'll get sound when the three-way switch is all the way over in position 1 and no sound for positions 2 and 3.

I thought it that way because i didnt understand that part of 

5 hours ago, curtisa said:

use the two leads on your kill switch to connect across the two lugs on the output jack instead.

If i can figure it out I'll try it, because I'd rather have two positions with sound

13 hours ago, Prostheta said:

I doubt it'll cause noise.

That's weird, I thought I saw something about a relation of the control cavity size and undesired humming or such. Thanks! 

Hey @curtisa, thanks a lot! I really know nothing about wiring even though I've managed to figure things out in the past like when I built a fuzz pedal that didn't work (certainly a story for a different day)

So, that wiring diagram is a bit confusing to me, I've made it different for me to understand haha

Do you guys think it would work? It seems to me right now that it would... but what do I know haha

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So; I then proceeded to route the rest of the middle layer. The reason I cut it that way between where the killswitch would be and the pickups is because I thought It would be hard to get a cable to that place when everything was glued, but I think the final weight may not be worth it haha.

The lines around the body are how I planned to cut it with the hacksaw, crazy, but I didn't have the jigsaw at that moment so ...

Top and middle layers 'routed'

That pickup there made me feel like I was getting something done; so encouraging!

Dremel tool used to get some space for the knobs:

It looked beautiful. 

Then I was so eager to get it all glued so I did it without considering that it still needs the output cavity and without  caring that the neck pocket would be only 12 mm deep, whilst I planned it to be at least 15mm; never rush your work, my friends.                                   

Yes, only two clamps, but what could possibly go wrong?

It's a chinese fixed hardtail bridge from ebay. Yes the saddles are all the way up. The option of reducing the heel of the neck scares me because of what could go wrong haha. I think I'll try to go with the shim on the bridge, thanks a lot for your help!

Oh dear, those paw print inlays look adorable hahaha I love them

So what is exactly offset in your design? I'm really liking it

Specs for the guitar:

- 2 Mystery Chinese Humbuckers: I got 2 humbuckers on eBay, and they have two wires each, which confused me at first but then I saw that I could wire them the way single coils are wired (Right? Correct me if I'm wrong haha) $8.50

-Two 3-way switches; one for tone and one to use as a killswitch. $2.90

-Two A250k switches for Volume and Tone 99 cents

-22 fret Strat Maple neck with rosewood fretboard from eBay: Because I dont feel ready to try to build a guitar neck, and I don't have the necessary tools $25.37

-6 Tuning Machine Heads from ebay: I bought 6 inline right machine heads but received 5 right ones and a left one, so it will look different. $5.14

-Home Depot 12mm Plywood (0.61meters by 1.22meters) $8.80

-Hardtail Fixed Bridge $13.80

Total cost: $65.50

Tools that I had available: Power Drill, HackSaw, Metal File, Dremel Tool and I borrowed a Jigsaw at the very end only to cut the body.

I started by scaling a front image of the guitar to a kind of real size. I dont quite remember how i did that. After that I started drawing the outline and marking the places where screws would be. Then I cut the three layers apart with the hacksaw, which took 3 days haha

Then I started "routing" the cavities on each layer, I did it by drilling holes into them and then cutting them with the blade (just the blade) of the hacksaw and finally I tried to file the edges.

After reading a lot about this, I realised that the control cavity is way too big. I think it may cause some noise but I'm not too sure.

I've done more than this, I'll post more tomorrow, but I'll take this chance to show you my wiring diagram.

I'm not entirely sure how the diagram of the switches work, but to synthetize; before wiring the volume to the output, I would solder it to one position of the second switch, so the other two positions would act like a kill switch. Am i right?

Cheers x

1 hour ago, Prostheta said:

Hi Rizh! I love working with plywood....maybe not for a guitar body (super heavy!) but it's a great engineered wood product. Making jigs from plywood is just as enjoyable as making instruments, sometimes....

Yeah haha I wasnt aware of the weight of plywood, the body is as heavy as a les paul's

25 minutes ago, charisjapan said:

Hey @Rizh, 

Looks like a great project.  I also got into building so as not to pay 💰 for the guitar I could not afford ... but soon ended up with my own design instead. But you seem to know what you want, and that's great.

One suggestion ... since your guitar is a three-piece "sandwich," consider chambering the center piece.  As has been mentioned, plywood is heavy, so cutting out some of the unnecessary areas of the middle piece will lighten the body, and might even add a bit more musical quality ... plywood can be a bit "dead" with the added glue.

Just a thought! 

Cheers

Yeah I've always found manson guitar's bodies attractive, even though they are similar to a Telecaster, which I dont like that much. I didnt take the weight into account and I "routed" it (with a drill) that way so it would be easy to slip a cable to and from the killswitch. The layers are already glued so yeah haha but I'd have definitely taken your advice.

Later Ill post more pictures and specs

I mean if you could add a shim to the neck screws that are closer to the nut. It seems to me that then the neck would be angled to the front, which I don't know if would be an issue

Thanks! Yes they are pricey and I have the feel that the Cort model doesn't do justice to mansons.

Here I'll leave photos of the process

Hey everybody, I'd like to share my first build with you guys before I finish it (and maybe get some advice on the way)

So I've been meaning to build my own guitar or bass since I was 17 years old, but it's a bit scary at first. I then decided I wanted to try it, 4 years later, but got disappointed when I failed at finding wood. Then I saw a video of a guy building a guitar out of plywood -neck included- and I thought it was a good way to start (also considering I don't have the tools to work with other kinds of wood). As a fan of the band Muse, I decided I wanted a replica of a Manson guitar.

I got the plywood from Home Depot, 12 mm thickness, and I planned to build it on 3 layers so it would get a total depth of 36mm for the guitars body.

I printed a full size image of the guitar 

I'll post more to this after school.

Thanks for the answer! I didnt know you could shim a bridge but now it seems logical.

Do you think it's advisable to add a shim on the top screws? I don't know if there are consequences to having the neck on a forward angle, I've only seen them angled as they are on TOM bridges

Hi everyone. I've just registered and this is the first forum of this kind I'm a part of, nice to have a place to get started on guitar building.

I have a question. I've been building a telecaster kind of guitar, but with standard hardware (not telecaster-y) including two humbuckers and a hardtail fixed bridge.

When I made the neck pocket I realised it's not deep enough (should be 15 or so millimeters, and it's about 12), so the strings sit on all the frets and make no sound. Do you think it would be wise to add a neck angle by, say, gluing wood into the neck pocket? Or should I try something else?

I didn't made the neck pocket per se, my guitar is made from three layers of wood, so I just cut the neck space on the top layer.

Thanks in advance, hope to get into this kind of stuff.