Bizman62

Drilling allows for using softer pin material like plastic or tooth picks. Plus if the fingerboard wood is very hard you may end up hammering the poking part deeper into the neck wood.

4 minutes ago, Asdrael said:

I had the pins at a tad over 1mm at first and then redid them thinking "I don't need much that it'll just make it hard to press".

You don't have to press them much, only enough for a mark so you can drill the marking hole deeper. If you're using very hard woods you can first drill holes into the neck, then put the pins in and finally put a piece of masking tape to the approximate locations of the pins. Don't burnish the tape so it remains somewhat foamy to get a mark for drilling to the fingerboard.

5 hours ago, Asdrael said:

While the locating pin close to the nut was fine, ensuring the "vertical" alignement or the board, I couldn't for the life of me put the fretboard in the heel pin. I do not know why.

I do. Tried it and faced the same. The glue layer is thick enough to cover most of the heigth of the pin and the glue is also thick enough to cover the very tip so the fretboard slides over it. Think about a snail that can glide over a razor blade without cutting its foot. The muckus is that thick. Same thing with glue. Next time I'll leave it at least 1 mm tall.

Oh, and I used side dot pins instead of nails just in case.

59 minutes ago, RedHeadedStranger said:

my muscles go carried away.

I know that feeling. I've snapped some 8 - 12 mm bolts just with an adjustable wrench. Not to mention smaller screws. Regular steel isn't that strong.

Good luck with making the rod! It's not rocket science, just make sure that the rod can't rotate inside the anchor!

Here's a tutorial including several anchors. Just follow the instructions for the flat bar one.:

You can take a longer one and cut the rectangular washer end to desired length. Then put the washer back in a way it can't rotate. A square nut tightened and peened works.  Or you can take a length of welding rod of the right diameter and cut threads for the nut and the square anchor.

Out of curiosity, in what way is the truss rod broken?

Hi and welcome!

What type is the original truss rod? If it's a single rod in a curved or slanted slot it's single action. If it has a flat rod welded both ends to a round one or two round rods connected at both ends it's a two way rod.

You "can" replace a single action rod with a dual but that would require filling the original slot and routing a new one.

After finding out which version it is, simply measure the length and search for a suitable one. The FarEast online shops may have inexpensive two-way rods, a single action rod is relatively easy to make by yourself.

No, not how I figured in the previous post!

You were chopping firewood when you suddenly realized the gorgeousness of a couple of pieces but some damage had already been done which you cleverly fixed by putting the cracks on opposite bouts.

1 hour ago, ScottR said:

your images are from opposite edges of the body

Haha, didn't notice that! Now it's time to change the explanation: You must have noticed the cracks (caused by an axe) and stabilized them by putting a solid piece on the opposide face.

58 minutes ago, ScottR said:

What you are seeing is the reflection of one of the ribs of the umbrella.

Ahh... I was wondering how a crack like that would be possible in a dual layer body.

The huge crack in the upper lower bout looks frightening but apparently you've stabilized it with epoxy or CA.

This one:

That man knows what he's talking about.

11 hours ago, henrim said:

caused permanent damage to my eyes

For the last 20+ years I've been a member of another, most American forum. Our Finnish community has been holding (semi-)annual meetings and of course it involves posting pictures of the event or it doesn't happen. Sauna... Need I say more?

Photoshopping is a good way to test destructive ideas without actually destroying anything. I asked about the jack since it was in the cut area in a previous mockup.

1 hour ago, sadclevelandsports said:

Is there no risk of pulling off the paint by masking the black portion?

There's always that risk. There's several sorts and qualities of tapes, though. A low tack tape might be safer for the fresh paint. Then again, using a brush to apply clearcoat on the rim of the top is fool proof.

Hi and welcome!

I'm by no means an electrician but as I did a search for both systems it appears that they both use up to five conductors including the shield. Thus "all" you need to do is to match the conductors...

An adapter would be the easiest way but there don't seem to be ready made ones although the parts look very standard. Maybe if you ask GFS for one? Another option is to get a replacement cable with the plug and right amount of conductors installed. The 4 conductor version seems to be in stock: https://www.guitarfetish.com/Kwikplug-Replacement-4-Conductor-Cable-145-_p_21890.html . Getting a ready soldered harness would be the easiest way but they seem to be out of stock. But maybe available somewhere else?

And as said the connectors are standard so if you're good at soldering tiny things making a pair of adapters wouldn't require any rocket scientist skills.

Interesting indeed, but where's the jack?

2 hours ago, sadclevelandsports said:

I was actually just going to go in and clear coat the whole thing with a few coats of 2k. Is that wrong?

Nothing wrong with that. The main idea in my previous post was just that. The masking and coating the top only was to try to smoothen the ridge of the black and deal with a potential step. But there's easier ways, you can simply brush some clear on the rim of the top and then level the entire side. Let me draw it:

Nuff said.

11 hours ago, sadclevelandsports said:

One other area I'd like to ask about is the border of the spray paint, can I sand it to be slightly more flush with the body wood, or is it better to just leave it alone?

If it's a rough edged ridge left from masking tape I'd tame it down a bit. Very lightly just on the edge. And with very fine papers as you don't want any scratches on the paint.

Will your next steps be masking the paint and apply some clearcoat on the top? And then sand the ridge off again and apply clear over the entire body, both sides?

34 minutes ago, sadclevelandsports said:

I'm not sure if I can sand after paint is applied? I have a couple very minor areas that aren't perfectly flat...

If the areas are under the paint I wouldn't touch them. If you sand humps away and do a patch repaint you may well end up getting contours as the patch won't blend into the existing paint. Another potential issue with partial repainting is that you may not follow the exactly same painting direction and angle which causes the light shift differently on the surface. Then again you can sand it all matte after having fixed the problem spots and repaint the whole thing. But that will increase the overall thickness of the paint layer and as all coatings are basically liquid plastic you may end up having a nice wooden instrument inside a wrap that absorbs all vibrations. 

Sanding the entire bottom down to the primer would keep the coating thin but think twice if it's worth the effort.

The Scrap'O'caster

This is my build #6½. It's a little rustic and has quite some history behind.

The body is pine and started its life as a beam in a cottage at my inlaws' and was reused as a doorstep at our front door. And then it supported stacks of firewood in our yard.

Similarly the neck is of recycled materials, maple, cherry and nogal. The main part is a leftower but it was a bit too thin so I stack leftovers from another to the headstock and heel. Plus the headstock back plate is constructed from offcuts from a third neck. The front plate of figured birch was found in the trash bin of the workshop, We could resaw four such plates of the block, the other three had much more worm holes than this one. The fretboard is of merbau which I once bought from a parquet factory, the dots are cut of offcuts. The scale appears to be 25", I let our tutor cut a dozen boards at various scale lengths and this one was left. And the floating bridge is simply a piece of pine from my firewood storage equipped with a length of fretwire.

The pickups are donationware, I got a broken Tokai Strat scratchplate with the mid and bridge pickups from a guitarist after he learned about my hobby. For the wiring I used salvaged computer power supply cables. The trapeze was given me by a fellow builder, salvaged from Chinese guitars when he replaced them with hard tails.

The pots and tuners are new, original Chinese cheapos. And the pot knobs were turned a decade ago of a branch of our plum tree, same batch as I used for my first build.

For finishing I used steelwool diluted in vinegar which I mostly sanded off. It highligths the growth rings nicely, though. And on top of that I applied several coats of a mix of BLO, lacquer and turpentine. Finally I applied a layer of a mix of beeswax and carnauba, also home cooked.

The original Neverending Story can be read here: https://www.projectguitar.com/forums/topic/54656-what-next/?do=findComment&comment=616388

There was a knot at the end of the bridge but it fell off despite having been secured with a drop of CA glue.

Inlaying the jack plate has become somewhat of a trade mark. Logically I had to inlay the trapeze bracket as well. All cracks were filled with CA glue and some dust.

On the volute you can see a bit of the offcut from another neck used for steepening the headstock angle. Most of it is hidden under the back plate.

For the control cavity cover there's both sides of the headstock veneers used. There's a cross laminated veneer for added strength underneath.

As the shape of the sketch was based on LesPaul templates I studied the main differences between a Jet and an LP a bit more to find out that the Jet should be a bit bigger and that the lower bout isn't as round at the waist. It's more like a drop hanging from the neck with shoulders added. So some redrawing was required. The size is what it is since the top veneers don't allow bigger but as this is not going to be an exact replica by any means I'm happy. After having decided the shape I then fumbled through the scrap bins and found a slightly twisted piece of 3 mm plywood, most likely abandoned by some furniture repairer. It's too thin for a routing template but plenty good for drawing outlines. At least it doesn't crumple or tear!

Double checked the narrower piece to see if it would be wide enough and it was obvious that it wasn't. There was a live edge on the bottom side. Routing a roundover might have been enough but I wanted a bit more wiggle room. So I took another piece cut from the same trunk and also found a couple of slats donated by a fellow builder. Don't know what the wood is, birch, maple or even aspen. Doesn't matter, the colour is close to that of the decayed figures. Dry fitted and glued.

While waiting for the glue to dry I attacked my notched "straight" edge. Slammed a length of glue backed 60 grit paper on the dead straight table of the planer and started making some steel dust. Can't tell if it's perfect now, it seemed to warp while sanding the other edge. But it's better than it was.

Unclamped the block and to my pleasure the bottom side was relatively flat. It had taken several untightenings until all of the pieces seemed to be tight against the clamps on both sides so I was very happy to find out that all the fiddling had paid. Cut the excess of the slats off (and saved the strips for future use!) and planed the center piece level with the surrounding pieces. Very happy with the subtleness of the center extension!

As there was not much time left I then played with the template and drew the outlines into both directions to see where the knot would sit. Having it on the lower bout might be safer than at the tip of the cutaway. In any case we're talking about the back side of the guitar so it doesn't matter. The knot only shows on this side but flipping the piece is not an option since this side just looks so much nicer!

There'll be a two week hiatus before the last workshop Saturday for this semester. My stock of neck woods seems to have disappeared but there's always options!

That might work to some extent, shrinking and checking are the results I'm tempted to suppose as well. Interesting...

There's a technical issue, though: If you just lay a freshly lacquered guitar into a vacuum bag the nitro will most likely stick to the plastic. A basket of sorts would solve that problem but the guitar will still lay on a couple of slats. A vacuum chamber where the guitar could hang freely would be the optimal solution.

Thinking further about a vacuum chamber or cabinet... The size doesn't have to be huge so one could easily build one into the workshop - something like 1200H x 500W x 300D in millimetres would suffice with the door being in front on the largest panel. 12 mm thick coated plywood should be sturdy enough to prevent collapsing and the automatic electric pump of a vacuum bag system should be plenty strong. If you already have the vacuum bag building such a cabinet wouldn't cost too much.

3 hours ago, sadclevelandsports said:

I'm sure these mistakes seem completely inane all of you experienced builders.

Bwaaahahahahaha! How do you think we've learned what we've transferred to you? Those who have a dedicated workshop can spread notes all over the place but we who have to pack our bags after every session to free the space for other users - be it a communal workshop or a basement room shared with all household chores - easily forget what would be the next step, not to mention the scratches caused by constant wrapping and unwrapping! Also, since building a guitar on a weekly basis usually takes at least one winter it's way too easy to forget the golden ideas you get/discover right after having finished the very step where that idea would have been utterly useful.

One more thing: Most hobby builders are like boutique luthiers, they don't repeat their builds. Instead we tend to try all sorts of ideas, be they about materials, finishes, shapes, structures... Your turquoise epoxy is a perfect example of that.

The greatest luthiers are not the ones who don't make mistakes, they're the ones who can turn their mistakes to unique features without sacrificing structural integrity.

7 hours ago, eb0248 said:

was hoping someone would call me out for the novice I am and say it was fine

As I'm no expert either I was hoping the same but since none of the more savvy active ones has chimed in and corrected my answer I guess the advice of using nitro on nitro has silently been accepted.