mistermikev

had set the claw straight before... had floated with 3 and 2 strings, had it decked with two and 3 strings low tension and high tension... nothing I did would allow the low e string to return perfect except setting the claw at an angle. "1:53 that, 'string tension on the top needs to equal spring tension on the back" what I thought he meant was top (high e) vs bottom (low e) tension needs to be equal in the sense that there should be less tension on spring behind high e vs more tension on spring corresponding to low e. seems to have worked for me. have old strings on right now... but still it is a noticeable improvement over having it decked and high string tension. It is returning to a point where an e chord is not noticeably out of tune wherease before... it was pretty bad. I'm now divebombing it and returning 97% in tune. I suspect with some nut sauce and new strings it'd be perfect.

sounds like a great plan. as curtisa mentioned... you'll get better hum cancellation if you match the output on the single coil fairly close to the p90s. also won't have issues with vol drop in various positions.

so this will be a mando-strat? love this idea. afa winding... no, you need the middle pickup to be both rev winding and rev polarity to the other two. so you wouldn't want to buy the typical p90 pickup set as this will be 1 fwd and 1 rev. you COULD use a strong magnet to rev polarity on one and then rev the wires... but if you haven't bought them you just need two w the sm winding. then you get a rwrp middle pickup for the strat. again... dif mfg use dif polarity/winding as stock so you might have to rev the polarity and wire on the middle if you don't get a match... not hard at all. get a c clamp... and two n50 magnets. put the magnets so they are attracting and attach them to either side of the c clamp. screw the c clamp closed until you have just enough room to slip the single in. pass it through.

there are certainly similarities there... but not really. the key point was the offset of the claw.

Thank you scott. you da man.

ok, just tried this on a 2 pt trem... there is def something to it. A) guitar stays in tune perfect hi e strings bends less than low e: I have no idea why but I suspect the difference in tension. only change I made was floating my bridge and angle of the trem claw - as much angle as possible. tuned low e to bend up whole step and now high e bends half step. bends are not pitch accurate as you approach the middle. If this was myth busters I would throw a big metal VERIFIED on here.

first off... I see a lot of credibility here based on the fact that he's not selling me anything. I found this video by watching another pro's video on youtube. he casually mentioned it in passing. Had to rewind to even hear what he said... and then go hunting for info. I think you are saying - it seems unlikely that you'd get more than one interval regardless... and that stuck out to me too. I immediately wondered if there was an offset of the screws on top. Was thinking - I'll have to check that out because it just doesn't seem possible - but then who knows. He does seem to make it work in the video. afa tension - I had no idea that it wouldn't be the low e with most and high e with least. esp since it always seem like those are the strings that go out first. also, I'm guessing at a minimum... he must use nut sauce and I'm guessing brand new strings. I've notice with one of my guitars that stays perfect - it only does so for about a week or two... once the strings become old - no worky. Obviously it doesn't work until the new strings are thoroughly stretched too. I would bet one also has to ensure there is no binding at the saddle. long story short - I'm glad I shared it and even more glad for your feedback. I've been playing and setting up guitars for 35yrs and never even considered this. Thought I knew everything... but admittedly can't get a damn 6 screw to stay in tune even when it's decked let alone floating! def gonna have to try it. thank you again for the detailed response!

ok, mind blown. I've got guitars that don't have this and stay in tune, but have never been able to get a six screw guitar to stay in tune for squat... carl just blew my mind. he is wanking on a stock mexi strat here... and it goes back perfect. thought y'all might appreciate. also, he is just an amazing guitar player. I've known about him for a while but yeah... just a monster.

some good tips there - thank you for that. specifically, sounds like you put tape/paper on the fretboard, and glued your inlay to it? good trick. I've got an upcoming inlay that will put me to the test and I've picked up a number of dif sized bits from harbor freight. Plan on building an led base for my tile base/dremel. hoping that will help (can't see squat as it is!).

on that note... my recent experience with it... it is scary how easy it is to use heat to loosen glue. I was doing wood binding, and just a little heat and voilla! that said... and as @Prostheta has learned me... you really might want to focus on not getting to that point in the first place - unless you absolutely have to!

first off... I am an SG fanboy too! my first good guitar was an SG90 and man... my whole life has been trying to get back to that one guitar. I'm certain nothing I build will ever measure up to what that guitar was in my mind... even that guitar itself probably wouldn't, and the chase is on. there are pros and cons galore but it'd help to narrow it down to what specifically you are interested in comparing pros and cons of. set vs bolt? two way truss vs one way? order of operations? there are as many dif answers as there are questions so I'll limit my info to one specific thing I've pondered on a lot lately... There is a very well known builder named 'terry' over at 'another forum' who says that the neck should be shaped to within a few thousands of final shape prior to applying fretboard. He says this is the only way to guarantee a stable neck. He also says that double action truss rods are for the birds. I would guestimate that 95% of guitar builders don't do it this way. I certainly don't. Given his reputation and experience I have to assume he knows a lot more than me and perhaps we should all heed his warnings... but I also know that there have been more mfg not doing it that way for more time than I or he has been alive. My point being that all guitar building advice is a paradox. I think most importantly you have to find the way that works best for you... as such you probably have to TRY building one every way possible!

well the job was so good I can't even tell. that must have been a TON of work. this is something I need to improve on so tell me how you did it?

probably an unpopular opinion (I have a lot of those) but I like it most flat. also... if you are a true perfectionist... after you get it to the point where it looks good... the next step is to loath it and see flaws that are invisible to almost everyone else!

i literally can't tell if that's just sitting on top, or is actually inlaid. if inlaid - you did a great job! if not: get to work! really looks great.

good to know. that would be huge for me. no more dangerous chems and tedious drilling of holes!

ahhh, I could see how that could work. very cool. will have to go read through those threads. I could see a lot of things that could be done there, control cavity covers/templates, smaller pickguards... also I do a lot of prototype pcbs and would love to automate the drilling of holes. I imagine you could even forgo etching and route the pcb traces... but that actually might be too much precision/work. thank you so much for the wealth of info. you are a real resource here. thank s for the info. your workshop is impressive clean/organized!

thank you Norris!

I agree... lets here it for @ADFinlayson 's build. Some strong competition there. I couldn't agree more. We were both talking behind the scenes while we watched the lead being passed back and forth. Had I lost I would have been honored to have lost to such a fantastic build.

no idea... but I'm hear for support! my experience with wood is there can only be a ltd win in terms of fighting it. you could try to plane off some wood on the wet side to hopefully get it to release some moisture. adding water to wood seems dangerous as you don't know what way it's going to go and it could get worse. Ultimately, I think with something like this you just have to give it time, see where it ends up, and then shape it. I'm sure there are folks with more experience on this topic as my approach has always been to not fight it... so I'll let the fighters advise.

the closer one looks a bit more 'standard'. also the far one seems to be the non locking, no? have never used one but apparently they work for guthrie govan.

some great info there - thanks for that. how did you do fretslots on something that is that small? I guess if you lied diagonal it was just enough space? either way, that'd be beyond my expectations... looks like a good option for getting in the door. $500 and I could build a linux box to control it. would have to dust off my linux shoes but that'd probably be good for me. man pages don't scare me. I see the machines you mention on evilbay. something to dig into there. A wealth of info here and a lot to digest, will have to go do some research on a few of these techs. Thank you for the responses!

Thank you very much for your input. I def appreciate it. ok, so xcarve is no good. is it better to buy a kit an assemble yourself, otherwise can you do a light recommendation afa "just something to not expect much from but a good introduction tool"?

well altho discouraging... I appreciate the advice. If I may ask a few follow up q's? so... I understand one can get a larger x carve that is big enough to do a body in the $1500 range... so these are no good? afa learning curve... I'm sure it would a challenge, and take exactly the time you mentioned... but if I could do it a little at a time I think it would be fun and worth it. It has taken me years to learn photoshop/gimp, even longer to learn SQL... but with both I was able to do some basic handy things pretty quick... I expect fusion might be similar? also, are any of the 'hobbyist' licenses worth looking into?

kind of hoping for disaster as opposed to that! ;)

Thank you Stu.! Means a lot to me atho I'd like to formally acknowledge that I'm very lucky to have scraped thru against the formidable @ADFinlayson!