mistermikev

wow, really coming along nicely.  some lovely wood there and lots of solid woodworking going into it.  bravo.

On 5/23/2021 at 1:09 AM, curtisa said:

I wouldn't go quite that far. The difference in the low-Es is only half a second over 16. That's not a lot really. 0.6sec difference in the high-Es looks more significant, but it also may fall into the 'easily missed' category in a real life situation.

going to have to catch up on this thread but certainly taking it to some interesting heights. 

.6 sec isn't huge... but add a little amp drive/compression and that will expand exponentially.  reminded me of some testing I did a while back -I was interested in making a sampled instrument of guitar- was running through my tube setup and finding the low e would sustain for 30 seconds... reduced the gain to unity and was surprised that it brought it down to 16secs.  this was of course in a room being influenced by speakers but just pointing out the obvious i guess... that .6 seconds might be a bigger difference in the right context.

1 hour ago, Andyjr1515 said:

It's like climbing up a very steep hill.  Feels like such hard work and you don't feel like you are getting anywhere at all.  Then after 30 minutes, you turn round and realise just how much higher you are now.  

Trust me, you are positively jogging up that hill...

 

thank you, I really needed that!  I know I will turn a corner here and start to have something worth looking at... just has been such a long road compared to how I thought it would go.  With the cnc issues, the minutia of the revisiting the design work... and then everything seems to take longer in reality than in my head (duh, why didn't I see that coming!).

5 minutes ago, Andyjr1515 said:

There's some impressive stuff going on here @mistermikev.  I've been a bit distracted the past few months and in that time you seem to have advanced in leaps and bounds.

Love the machined ribbing on that top!

 

well thank you so much!!  feels like I'm running in slow motion but I'm getting there.  thanks again for the reply.

worked my arse off last weekend to re-design my design... and worked very hard this weekend to try to get a completed body.  cnc was running solid from 8:30am yesterday to 8pm, and 8am today till now (6pm). 

I wanted to do another test run b4 moving on to the wood kevin chose... and make any minor tweaks along the way... turning out pretty solid.

so here's my process... cut the f holes and shape of the top, flip, 

cut f hole/toggle/ctrl relief and some bending relief in the back.  modified my process to switch to a ball nose bit for the bending relief as this should make it less likely to crack... and since it will also make it less likely to bend... I put in more lines:

so then rough cutting my body - 4.5hrs!

another two and a half hours to finish cut the top side...

added a middle pickup here because I felt like I wanted more support in the middle there and... who knows - maybe I add a middle pickup somewhere down the line!  actually "my guy" - oat soda pickups... made some special pickups for me to put in my 'prototype run' ie 'one-for-me'... and in the process he wound an extra one because he's super cool.  these are split singles ie two coils each with 3 poles for each coil... I'll already have so many options so haven't decided if I'll use the extra one or save it for another build.

also... put some stickers on my cnc!!

here you can get a reference for the overall thickness of the build... 1 7/8" body blank + 1/4" top should put us at 2.125" overall thickness, while the average thickness will be in the 1.325" neighborhood.

another 3hrs to rough cut the back side...

and 1.5hrs for the finish pass...

then probably a couple hours additional between all the cavities and magnet holes and such...

if you don't look at the endgrain... pretty solid top match:

yes... beat that dead horse mike v... love the back side of that.  really is a nice job.  not to overshadow your top or anything... but the backside is a real standout.  

very nice.  very colorful.  

1 hour ago, Charlie H 72 said:

Ah interesting.. the more I put this together the more I am beginning to realize that this person miscalibrated the machine. Dims were correct before he did it, and he was calibrating to his piece, not to a ruler on the board. So there must have been something off in his file. I’ll have to talk to him. Good point about the bit too, though I was using the same one the whole time, I should triple check that it is 1/4”. I’ll get some shop time on Tuesday and I will report back. Thanks a bunch for the tips. 

idk if it's like mach3... but in mach3 you have an xml profile and If someone else was using the machine and potentially messing with the calib I would make a copy of the config file, name it something new... and load up with my that (own private config file) from there on out.  just a thought.

nat top looks great. def stay with that.  

4 minutes ago, Charlie H 72 said:

It’s still unclear if it was calibrated right across the board. The people that use the CNC at this shop run different programs. Could calibrating it correctly for one software throw off calibration on another?  And if so I will need to check calibration each time I run the machine because there is no way to know who has used it. I’ll check out the ball screws too. I’m wondering if it’s better to just go old school at this point though. I don’t imagine I will be using a CNC all that often in my near future, so this time may be better spent actually putting into this instrument. I’ll give it one more shot and see where it goes. 

i can't speak to how other programs work but I would guess they are similar.  in mach3 when you calibrate it saves that in an xml settings file and loads it as a profile every time you start... so for me... as long as I start the sm profile... it will load the settings I had last changed with it.  I would highly doubt this would have any impact on other systems.... that said - also... you have to remember to hit save after you've calibrated in mach3 or those changes are lost.

well if you have it calibrated right... could be backlash... (barely understand that concept myself because I haven't experienced it).  could be an issue with your machine losing steps - many causes but one I'm told is unshielded wire.  some say that putting ferrite beads on your cables can help.  another possible issue is your couplers (another thing mikro schooled me on).  I'm not sure if you have ball screws on all axis like i do... but if so then there is a coupler that connects the ball screws to the stepper motor... these can get damaged over time or loosened over time and there is a set screw to tighten them.  I've never actually had problems with mine afa I know but then who knows what awaits me down the road.  the mech side of cnc is not a strong point for me, so barring responses from the great @curtisa or great @mikro... you might try cnczone or perhaps some of the facebook cnc groups if none of the above pan out.

fantastic work.  this hat is delicious and yes, I will be building out of pine from here on out.

the flying v is a standout for me.  just so much natural beauty there.  you could add literally anything to that and it will look great.  the purple is just a fantastic color... lots of depth.  the explorer - goo goo ga ga.  setting the bar as usual.  nice work.

On 5/11/2021 at 6:39 PM, Charlie H 72 said:

Hm I am running into some CNC problems-and maybe some of you good people here could help.

I’m using an x-carve, with a Dremel router set to medium speed, .035” passes at 75”/min

Im cutting different parts on different days and getting different dimensions.. what’s that about? I think I ruined my body blank today but I may try to work with it. Neck pocket and bridge pocket are too small (even with a .01 offset) and the overall shape is about 1/4” narrower and 1/8” shorter than it should be. And halfway through the cut the x axis band snapped. It must have been at the end of its service life. It looked pretty worn out. I stopped the cut in time but the last few passes were drifting which made the wonky dimensions even worse.

Is the only way to work with this machine to cut a bunch of templates on the same day from the same material? At this point I want to get off this machine sooner rather than later. Any advice would be appreciated. 

no cnc expert... in fact I've only been doing it for a couple months so keep that in mind.   idk what software you use to run g-code... but if I was having this issue I'd first suspect that my steps weren't set correctly.  Mikro actually showed me that in mach3 there is a config that does all the work for you.  you need a very accurate dial guage.  you pick and axis... tell it to move say .85", then measure how far it moved with the dial indicator.  it will set proper steps based on your feeding it back the amount it moved.  I found that if I did this three times (since measuring over such a small length - my indicator only has about 1" of movement) I would repeatedly get the same measurement after... then I knew it was right.  hope that helps.

2 minutes ago, mattharris75 said:

If everything had been square it would have been a breeze. Unfortunately, post-carving, that was not the case...

router sled?

14 minutes ago, ScottR said:

In spite of all (or perhaps because of) this looks really nice.

That really is an aggressive arch--I like it! Mine are usually a little shy of an inch. It does pay to plan for a flat spot for the bridge. And the pickups have to be planned for as well. Recessed mounting rings work well on an arch.

SR

thank you for the reply. 

the severe arch - well with my prior teles... one of the things that bothered me is that in most pictures you can't even tell it is arched.  I guess I am sort of vein if that's the only reason I did it, but also I just wanted to challenge myself to see how far I could take it.  thanks for the vote of "it's good".  

the pickups... well... since the neck is body mount... and the bridge is bridge mount... wasn't planning on doing anything special there.  they do end up exposed a hair more at the edges... but the worst part of that is when adjusting them you keep thinking they are higher than they actually are!  

looks lovely.  really great.  i will 3rd the heel - looks comfy.  

afa bit... well if it was hitting your template... and you had the top cut... would seem like you should be able to put some tape on the guitar, remove your template and gain the width of your template in depth.  

lovely couple pieces of flame there.  bravo.

1 hour ago, curtisa said:

For exactly one note. And its octave if you really want to stretch the theory a bit more. As soon as you fret an F, F#, G etc, placing the pickup at the 24th fret location to specifically chase that one harmonic node ceases to have any relevance to the note you've just fretted.

@Bizman62s graphic simplifies the motion of a plucked string to make it easy to visualise how a sinusoidal waveform can be broken down into its harmonic components, but that's not how a plucked string moves in real life. It's true that moving the pickup closer to the 24th allows more of the lower-order harmonics to be captured which in turn translates to a warmer sound, but don't fall into the trap of assuming that the 24th position is the harmonically optimal spot to place it. It's physically and practically meaningless in a fretted instrument.

You put the pickup where you want it because you like the sound of the result, not because it is mathematically correct.

brought a lot of clarity to that argument.  thanks for that.  not to beat a dead horse... but the other thing I was thinking... is that we know that when volume is lowered the perception of bass freq drops off faster than others hence the treble bleed circuits and the common 'more bass' option for amps like my marshal.  so by chasing vol we are in turn chasing bass it would seem.  that said.... I wonder at what fret would be "too much bass".

3 hours ago, Bizman62 said:

Wouldn't that mean that the loudest location for a pickup would be at the 12th fret? As it shows in the image, there's a spot where half of the string length is at the largest while at the same time a quarter of the same string is standing still. Which one is node and which antinode, I can't remember. Anyhow, the point is that in such a place one harmonic is strong and another harmonic is muted which explains why the neck pickup on a 22 fret guitar sounds different to that pushed one inch towards the bridge on a 24 fret one.

yes,

"If a stretched wire fixed at both ends, or the string of a musical instrument, is plucked at the centre, it will vibrate in the mode shown in Fig. 90. This is the simplest form of vibration, and consists of a single loop" ... "The mid-point of the wire vibrates through the greatest distance; such a point is called an antinode"

now the if here says if it is plucked at center.  who knows how it is effected if we pluck somewhere else... but the one thing we do know is it is most pliable at center.  and this is why we put in relief. The harmonic 'cancelation' is likely also a factor... I'm not trying to argue which factor contributes more to the the 'tone' of the 24th fret... but if you look at bass guitars it complicates this further.  Bass players have long preferred the position of the 'p bass' ie "the sweet spot" which doesn't appear to match up to those harmonic hot spots.  further bass players tend to pluck in that spot.  So... perhaps it's a bit more complicated than just the harmonics... perhaps I've opened a can of worms... we can dig in.  on a les paul there is a humbucker in that position... while the dominent coil is approx at the 24 one could argue that the best placement would then be somewhere just beyond the 24th dependent on where the pickup is going to pickup the most amount of sound(one would think somewhere between the two coils but closer to the neck coil).  further, pickups were designed to 'amplify' the sound... it would make sense that they are after the most volume but perhaps not.  

this one was done b4 I got cnc and I did a less aggressive radius of 30" on it... I just sanded it flat in that area... and it just starts to break away from the tele plate at the edges...

7 minutes ago, Charlie H 72 said:

Just read about the bridge plate-I hadn’t even thought of that! Just mill a curved bridge hahaha. The flat spot sounds good actually. How will the front edge of the bridge meet the curve? Maybe a heftier bridge plate would allow it to be a simple drop-in thing? 

well... I planned to mill out a 1/16" area that is flat and fits the bridge exactly.  in my original design work it seemed like that would be just enough (I've actually tested in 3d software).  looking at it... I have my doubts.  If I glue a piece onto the body... 1/16+ thick... then mill out all around it to reveal the orig top, and mill out a flat spot... should def be enough to keep the bridge plate from 'floating' at the edges.  I guess I'll know once I mill out the flat spot if it will work with just 1/16.

thank you for the reply btw.

in retrospect... I think you are asking - yes, the wood radius will come up over the hight of the bridge in front just a hair.  I can always feather that out... but I don't even think it would be noticeable once the pickup is there and it won't interfere with the strings at all so... perhaps just break the edge a bit.

19 minutes ago, Charlie H 72 said:

Whew 35 steps but they are all worth it!! That curve looks absolutely awesome. What a great way to make a tele comfy and modern without the sort of afterthought look a forearm contour can bring. 

hehe - get out of my head!!  I never cared for the look of the forearm cut on strats or teles.  radius has a lot of cool benefits really... 1.125" carve which is more than you can even do on a les paul... controlls fall way from hands so you won't hit them.  but has been a difficult road.  

so this is the final stages of my practice run with a body and top that aren't the one's kev chose.  decided I needed practice so went ahead with this top despite making a small mistake (hole visable at bottom) thinking I'd probably put an inlay over it.  well a number of things i will change with what I learned here...

1) should not have cut off my bottom 'edges'.  on this one I didn't have enough material to get a mount on either side, but on my next two I will so... note to self: need to cut that area away so I can effectively sand the millmarks out of the radius... but leave enough material to maintain a mount on either bottom side.  

2) this curve is pretty aggressive!  need to do a flat spot for the bridge and am already having thoughts of gluing a 1/8" piece on that mirrors the bridge plate so that I won't have the edges of the bridge 'floating' once I cut the flat spot.  looks like I'll have to go deeper than I wanted.

3) I did a dry fit when gluing up the top... but then somehow managed to put a stress fracture in the top during glue up.  I think the problem is I was going straight across the body as opposed to tapering to center towards the neck (to follow the compound radius).

well mike v... you wanted to get experimental so... you should have known there was going to be some refining!  man this was a LOT of work.  "just follow my simple 35 step program and you too can have a tele"!  seriously... 35 literal steps in cutting this body.  could put it in one file and my machine would stop for tool changes but that would only bring me down to 24 steps by my calculations.  

anywho... feeling a little overwhelmed but I know I just need to chin up and charge.

Antiguq would look really great on that.  if not that... sunburst.  I love sparkle but on a semi hollow it just feels "out of place" to not have a finish that shows the grain (unless it's ANTIGUA!!!!!!)

have often thought about a pickup that would be part of the fretboard at the 22nd fret or perhaps a pickup that had frets built into it (obviously they'd have to be adjustable to work).  I love 24 fret guitars... but there is no question the sound difference from a guitar with the pickup positioned right where that would be.  guitars w 24 frets don't get that bass sweetness you hear in a les paul or strat on the neck pos.  Not a bad sound on a 24... just different and maybe "not as different" from the bridge when on a 24 fret.  that said, it's not a difference that would keep me from doing 24 frets if the guitar called for it.  

I think bizmans' pick above can be simplified even more: string rings the most at it's halfway point... the closer you are to that... the louder it's going to be.