ADFinlayson

Got some Bosnian quilted maple for carved tops, SCORE! One of them came with a big old crack but a replacement is getting sent. 2 of them are even long enough to make quilted fretboard binding This one came as a 2" billet and I'll have to bookmatch it myself but I care not because it was thrown in as a freebie

Have you got enough walnut left for a control cover? That would look badass

Unless you use it for a body, then it's f$%cking heavy

I like to think that my wood pile is planned and organised, but it's really just a pile of wood Also here is the inlay in context. I am super happy with it after all @Bizman62 my chiseling skills are not excellent, there is a lot of dust and glue around the edges. Just dive in, start with wood as it's a lot cheaper if you mess up, an offcut from your ovangkol into some ebony would look awesome

Why, is it that bad?

Smoke and mirrors

Thanks @Andyjr1515 my only gripe with it is that it looks slightly more cartoony than the original drawing, probably needs smaller eyes, but overall I'm happy with it. It's by far the most elaborate inlay I've attempted anyway. Cheers @Splintazert ha well I only did the odd hour here and there over a week or so, so it wasn't too bad on the eyes.

Another hour or so spent on it last night working on the details, I think I'm ready to call it done. It's not identical to my original drawing but I've surprised myself with how close I've managed to get it, not that it matters given that it was drawn by me, so you lot are the only ones that know what it was supposed to look like I know Ollie will love it anyway, Will get the dot inlays in tonight and hopefully frets in later in the week

My initial thought when I did that was that it's an awful lot of effort for a control cover. If you can keep it flat over time then you could use it as a drop top, but my 15mm slither of limber I cut free cupped significantly anyway (wasn't dry enough) so my choice was use it for a cover or bin it. But IMO having perfectly grain matched control covers looks that little bit more boutique. I guess you could make your wenge one first and decide if you like it or not.

Love it mate, it played it's first gig on Saturday. I took the ziricote as a spare in case it went on fire but it played well and stayed in tune for the whole set. I especially like the stainless steel frets, I hated doing the fretwork but it was well worth the effort - They just seem brighter than previous frets, but that could also be the semi-hollow affect. The volume pot is rubbish but I've been waiting on some more PRS pots in the post so I'm going to get it swapped out over the weekend. I haven't owned a single cut in a few years so really enjoying the toggle switch where it is. I think the next DC PRS style build I do will have to have the mcarty style toggle in the upper horn as well. Either that or I could install a piezo in the ziricote to fill the position of the switch and move it up to the horn. So many options!

Bandsawing the neck to thickness is actually what I do fairly early on, so the neck has been rough cut for a good few days before I get round to carving it. In fact the flying V has had about 3 months to "settle"

There is no reason not to carve the neck first - I've done that a few times. The only reason I like to carve the neck last is that I find it easier to hammer frets in when the underside of the neck is flat. I wouldn't worry too much about carving the neck, in my experience, the first couple of necks turn out to be a lot chunkier when strung up than they felt at the time of carving, in fact on my first few guitars, I came back and recarved the neck with strings on until I got the feel right. Well thanks, your Mrs clearly has good taste

Yep that looks good, essentially that is what I do only with a hand kerfing plane. If you make the side you're cutting the underside, you've got some real nice grain-matching control covers there

I'm not much good at demos I'm afraid, as I'm only going through a 20w roland combo and mac webcam, but I managed to record a bit of noodling at the weekend.

Thanks for the tip, the reason I thought a high fence would be important would be when cutting the ends of the board as it would be tall and narrow. Sawing the middle part out, I've found to be fairly easy to keep the saw true as long as all 4 edges have a kerf already cut into them. I guess I'm just going to have to get myself a table saw and have a go.

I've never even used a router for inlay cavities, the hardwork is getting the outline accurate and true which is a hand chisel job anyway, hogging out the material in the middle, yeah it takes a little bit longer with a chisel than with a router, but it doesn't take long. But you're right, I find lighting where the bit is is always an issue. Would be cool if they could design them with a bulb pointing at the work when active like most hand drills.

Table saw is a really good idea, I tend to bookmatch my timber with a kerfing plane then a hand saw but I'm seriously considering a table saw for this very reason, would take a lot of the hard work out if you can cut a few inches into each end first. I'm thinking that a good quality tall fence would be paramount though. What is that top piece, is that more claro? It's gorgeous

It looks stunning @ZekeB The difference between this and the previous finish are night and day

Life always has it's way of preventing fun from time to time, your builds are looking stunning though. Looking forward to seeing how they turn out.

You asked about preferred order of tasks in neck building. This is the way I've done things over the last couple of builds and currently my preferred order but it has changed almost every build to this point and will probably continue to change with future builds: - Square off neck black - Pencil mark everything from truss to headstock angle, where heel starts, etc - Route truss rod channel - Cut headstock angle (front) then plane it flat and square - I like 11º - Rough cut neck underside profile, headstock angle, volute, heel. I do all the above on the band saw then leave it for a day or two in case it wants to move - Glue on headstock veneer then plane it's top edge flat with the top of the neck (creates a flat for the nut to sit on) - Rough cut the neck taper and headstock shape then leave it a day or two before routing final taper - Thickness fretboard blank to 6mm and glue it on after installing truss rod (I use 6mm Graphtech nuts) - Trim fretboard edge then route it flush with the neck taper - Drill access through headstock - Radius the fretboard - Thickness the back of the headstock (spindle sander) - Mark fretslots with centre line and protractor - Cut fret slots - Put off inlay work for 2 months - Inlay fret board and do all the sanding - Hammer frets in - Carve the neck - Levelling, crowning etc. I always aim to build the neck first in it's entirety, but I nearly always get excited and start carving body half way through neck build. But If you're impatient like me, it's a good idea to be working on the body when giving the neck time move after rough cutting.

Thanks bud. I have to say I've found inlay work to be among the most intimidating of jobs in guitar building (once the basics of building have been mastered anyway). I've put this inlay off for so long that I've got 1.5 guitars built in the meantime. But as with anything, the best way to learn it is to get jet on and get it done. Worst case scenario if it all goes wrong, the inlays can be dug out and replaced with something else.

This is now my preferred way to do a headstock cap, now I start the headstock angle at the start of the nut, not the end. If you get the cap down to 2mm thick when you flatten the protruding end, the flat is just deep enough to fit a 6mm graphtech nut on it edit: It's just occurred to me that as a serial progress photographer (in fact some times I think I spend more time taking photos of the work than actually doing it) I have photos that explains this much better

Cheers bud Got the last bit glued in. The jaw line is slightly lower when compared to the sketch, but I think if it isn't the bottom teeth will be lost under the 13th fret so I'm calling it a happy accident. Next up I'll need to file the pieces as flush as I can then fill all of the gaps with ebony dust and CA before doing the eyes, shadowy outline on the left hand side and the bottom jaw (crushed mop). Then it should start looking a bit more skull-like. Then I'll have to scratch away to make the cracks and make the teeth look a bit more realistic. Getting there though! This project has got me thinking a little lazer cutting machine might be a worthwhile investment.

That's basically an armada of tones, really versatile axe