Bjorn.LaSanche

Polymaker, have you tried contacting Ibanez to get a tech drawing, or at least proper measurements?  If they wont help try a local Ibanez service tech to see if he can acquire one for you with the promise of lunch or a six pack if he can help you out.

I really wish I could find a good deal on Z-Poxy locally instead of paying the Wood Crafter cork sniffing prices. They only carry locally quart amounts and are asking close to $50 per can.

Have any of you worked with this wood before?  I have enough to build two instruments with and was wondering on its viability on use as neck wood?  Originally was planning on using it laminated with either maple or another common neck wood that would augment its color like wenge or similar.

As far as air darkening, It was fairly coca cola red when I bought the lumber and hasnt darkened too far off from that, maybe a little deeper, but nothing like how purpleheart changes

Just about had this project done and pulled an ultimate impatient bonehead maneuver. 

Let us reinstall the tremolo post studs with forgetting to remember yyour dumbass removed material from the top route at 2am and while tapping the stud in you blow through the backside of the guitar.  Luckily all damage is within the confines of the spring cavity and is essentially in one piece.  Just need to glue the splitting and clamp it up.  Put the project aside a few days as i have too many things on my plate to be dealing with this type of stuff right now.  The refin looks nice, but the color did an odd one during the process.  Have pictures of about 90% of it.  Will start a new thread for it to document after Christmas.  If i dont post til then, everyone have a God Jul, Christmas, hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Festivus, or hwatevah youz celebrates.  Please be safe so youre around next year. Already seen too many drunks on the road this week driving lime idiots for my liking.

Before you invest in EMGs, look into some quality passives and a preamp.  Lots more tonal possibilities going that route. Keep the layout simple by using cermet pots mounted to the preamp pcb so they wont be seen.  Granted you wont be able to adjust on the fly, but most rock/metal bassists are the set and forget types in regards to their tonal settings and access to a working volume pot is usually more than enough adjustable control for them.  Not to be read as a dig to anyone, just an honest observation.  

You may also give Neal Moser a shout for any non original hardware you may be needing.

MrMuckle, any follow up on this? Was a fairly interesting topic.

True, but we've all seen the videos explaining where once pickups and amps come in, the actual construction material of an electric guitar is really reduced.  Acrylic guitars sound good, metal guitars sound good (my only experience playing/hearing was test driving a Jackson Roswell once), high end wooden guitars sound good, low end wood guitars sound good, MDF (Mosrite) guitars sound good.  the only common factor they all need regardless of materials used is quality construction and a good setup.  I thnk the only real mitigating factor in the end would be which guitar sounded fuller and which sounded thinner.  That to me would be only different between the instruments materials mass and density.  Before anyone says anything, all instruments would be played through the same exact rig, and all tuned to standard tuning.  All instruments would have to have same body shape and scale.  All hardware, electronics, strings, and frets would be the same (components from the same manufacture lot if possible).This way we are comparing different apples of the same sub species but from different orchards instead of apples to oranges.

Oh, thems peoples...I will just plug in my concrete Tele into my amp and shoo them away.

I guess I never hit "Post" as I could have sworn I replied to this. 

I repaired the neck problem by routing away wood on the bottom of the neck pocket.  The neck now sits almost 1/4" deeper into the body.  This resulting in exposing a separate but related problem.  The tremolo top route was not deep enough to accommodate the lowering of the tremolo into the body to correctly create the proper tremolo angle as shown in the Edge installation manual.  I did not trust using my router to correct this due to not having a bit where I could it with a template.  The only place in town which carries a bit selection with top bearings in the diameter bit I wanted to use wanted $65 for a mid grade bit.  They also do not sell individual bearings so I could adapt the tools I already own.  As a work around I picked up a straight cut bit made for a Dremel tool.  I created a set of acrylic templates using the pre cut top route dimensions and using the top rout depth measurement from my RG, I fixed the top route depth.

This then led me to correcting the old original spring route cavity to modern dimensions, creating a behind the spring slope the installation manual calls for as well as lengthening the same cavity to accommodate the use of common size tremolo springs. Ibanez size springs are only sold via Ibanezrules.com unless you want to pay premium from Ibanez, or the stealership. I also like the feel of regular generic "Fender" sized springs anyways.

During a break on this project, I watched a video on Youtube on tinting oil for oil finished via two different methods.  The first is by using a linseed based oil paint(oil paint as in Bob Ross and Happy Trees and Clouds) diluted by linseed, the second by using the same type of dye I used in my other thread when I refinished this guitar two years ago.  This calls for adding the dye to the oil based and then adding in acetone to the mix which breaks up the solids in the dye allowing it to mix with the oil.  I really want to try the oil paint method seeing how I can mix the color I want so I sanded the finish off the guitar.  Dont worry I compensated for any wood removed off the top of the guitar when routing the tremolo/neck issues by removing a little more then the exact amount needed to correct the problems.

Once the body is sanded down to 600 grit, I will make a photo log of the refinish process and post in a new thread in the refinishing forum.

Where they are still held off from total global domination by their Nemesis Divina who goes by Aliphatic Resin.

Has anyone checked out using hydrographics for adding graphics to their finishes on any of their guitars?  I ran across this method of finishes when I was looking at finishing some motorcycle parts I have.  Once I saw what could be done, I had to rethink my previous plan I was going to do for my Triumph, then when watching more of these videos I saw that they were using the same method on guitars.  The only draw back I see are that most shops that do this finish tend to use stock images and custom images aren't too available. 

The materials to create the graphics ( printable film and chemicals) are not too expensive.  The expensive part is a large scale printer.

Either way I think this type of finish is beyond neat.

This was the video I first saw the technique done on motorcycle parts.  The flames on that first tank are wild.

Well I finally tackled this job tonight.  No pictures as I went about it too fast as well as my confidence wasn't that good and was winging it.  The template I made was slightly smaller than the pocket which I cleaned up with a chisel.  Will sand it flat tomorrow as the router bit left trail marks in the wood.  The pocket was lowered 2/10". The neck sits proud of the face of the body similar distance to my RG's now.

While messing with this I went and took some measurements of all the routs dealing with the tremolo.  The top rout is a mess and do not think it is possible to fix unless I use a dremel router bit.  It needs to be lowered into the guitar body some. I can't believe I paid $300 to have this tremolo installed back in 1989.  The only measurement the guy got right was the mounting posts distance from the nut as well as the distance from each other(At least that was corrrect, the rest of the routing was just ugly).

The spring cavity was 4.5mm too short, as was the depth of the spring cavity.  As per Ibanez Edge manual the depth should be 18mm at claw end and 25mm at through hole.  I had 14mm and 16.7mm respectively.  This was I suppose one of the reasons the block kept bottoming out when I would pull up on the bar.  I fixed that with a chisel as this was easier than trying to figure out the proper angle to make a template for a router.

On 8/20/2016 at 1:20 AM, Prostheta said:

People think that the half inch of wood removed from behind the pickup is where all the sustains live...

Well I can say for a fact that Sustain doesn't live behind any of my pickups.  That is where Dust and Pickdust live in their hovel. Across the street from them lives Sweat Gunk and Blood Drops.  All  of whom are getting evicted rather soon.  Sustain lives between the neck plate and the neck.  He says those other folks are just too trashy for his taste.

Can images for this thread be updated by those who originally posted them if possible please?

I sometimes wish that mounting system Dimarzio had back in the early 1980's to advertise/test drive their pickups would have caught on. The pickup would be attached to a removable block that snapped into the back of the guitar.  The pickup holes were routed clean through.  This way you could test out pickups directly in the store instead of having to buy one, take it home and install it, then reverse the process again and again until you find something you like.

True, unless you have a mug like mine.  Almost every time I fly with a pedal board, I happen to get the mouth breather that doesnt understand that the little boxes with wires connected to them that say terroristic things on them like Boss, Crybaby, ISP, and have titles like, Super Overdrive, Compressor/Sustainer, Chromatic tuner, etc.. aren't items of mass destruction.  Luckily I insist on making the suggested 2 hour before departure, this way I can deal with this nonsense.  Luckily I have not had to have the one on one search as of yet.  That would be depressing.

You guys know what TSA stands for right?

TOTAL SEXUAL ASSAULT

No there isn't an angle to the pocket.  I've decided that I am going to tackle this once I get back from Baltimore next month.  Until then I have too many other things going on.  I have to rebuild my pedal board so that I can fly with it and hopefully not have TSA wig out about what all those things are wired together, I also have two guitars in primer that I would like to shoot at least the color on before I leave.  We have also decided to rerecord the album, so that pre-production starts next weekend.  Not to mention my day job and I have to fit family in somwhere.

Thanks, I was actually going for stagnant pond overgrown with algae green as that is the color swatch on the dye.  It was actually more like fresh cut golf course fairway green once it was done.  This was the decision to hit it with the torch to darken it some.  I did learn one thing from doing this type of finish.  They belong only on instruments made with wood of rock maple hardness or greater.  This guitar is basswood and my fingernails have gouged a trench around the volume knob and where I anchor my hand to pick.

I don't think one should use a powered sander for any step of the refinish job except stripping of an old finish.  It is too easy to sand through any work you have done and destroy an otherwise good job.  I make my own sanding blocks about half the size of ones you can get in the store, and glue a piece of leather smooth side out to it.  I spray glue my sand paper to that, and peel it off to change grits.  It works a lot better than a store bought sanding block. 

The amount of pressure needed to sand the finish coats is so light that a powered sander would eat through them in short order.

Here is my 1984 Ibanez DT-250 I purchased in 1987 and have had since.  Due to extensive use/abuse and moves over the years, the finish on various areas of the guitar popped off.  I got tired of it looking like a beater and decided to refinish it using an oil finish.  I tinted the oil using a Mixol #14 Oxide Green.  The oil finish I used was Formby's satin Tung oil.  The procedure I used to apply the oil was cribbed off Warwick's forum.  I melted raw beeswax which I applied liberally over the body, allowed to dry, sanded back down to the wood, applied tinted oil finish in small areas which I used steel wool (0000) to rub in utilizing the wood/oil emulsion to act as a grain filler.  I applied two maybe three coats of the oil, allowing to dry for minimum 24 hours between coats, light steel wool sanding between each coat.  One done, I applied a mixture of beeswax/turpentine as the polish. Mixture of the wax/turp is 3:1 respectively which was picked up off the Warwick DIY forum as the mixture the factory uses.  I did not take a complete set of pictures as I went through the process.  Apologies about that.

Body prior to disassembly and stripping. The BK in the neck pocket was original as I was first owner of this guitar.  Shoddy installation of real Ibanez Edge done in 1989 by local "luthier"  Routing is ugly and there was no wood  removed as per Ibanez instructions from the front shelf of the tremolo cavity resulting in almost no ability to pull up with the tremolo

Using a heat gun to remove finish due to Ibanez' formula of Great Wall of China thickness poly, As I went through the black layers I came across the transparent red base coat.  These guitars came in Trans red, Black, and White.  I suspect all got the red undercoat with black and white opaque finishes as per other orders.  Fairly interesting though.  If stripping a poly finish use a heat gun its really fast compared to using Jasco aircraft stripper(also fast but also very messy).

Picture of a piece of the poly clear finish after 30 years.  I didn't bother to measure it, but the thickness was about the same as the cover of a standard genreic brand spiral notebook you used for school. 

Body post stripping and sanding.  I left the pickup cavities alone, as well as the tremolo cutout(it was colored with black marker from when I had it installed, really pro job considering what I paid to have it installed ).

After first coat of oil.  Fairly light at this point and bright as well.  It came out very very grassy green and this was the most muted green Mixol has.

I had to scumbag it up some to fit my personality.  I used a torch to "toast"  some areas, mainly around the tremolo cavity, pickup rings, and knob/switch areas.

Reassembled and ready to play.   I modified the original circuit of the electronics by adding a second tone pot, moving the cable plug to the lower side of the body using a Fender Strat type cup, Knobs are metal with one rough side for volume and two smooth sides for the tones.

I did eventually discover a problem with the refinish job (aside from softness and my fingernails digging grooves into the wood around the pots, and my playing anchor point) which I will add to this thread as I tackle them.  Right now I am in the planning stages of that repair.

Have you thought about other spalted lumbers?  Spalted maple just is a tad ordinary these days.  Spalted camphor is pretty intense looking.  There is a tree here in Texas called mesquite that will usually have some really beautiful spalted section and it is far less expensive than spalted maple.  IT has a greater variation of colors appearing in the spalted mesquite.  It is your guitar though  use what you like.

16 hours ago, Tim37 said:

In the first pic it appears that the action is OK,  and that your only complaint is that the strings sit too high off the body.  If that is the case you will want to drop the term also,  that or add neck angle but that won't get the strings much closer to the body where it counts.  

The action on the guitar is good.  Matter of fact, This guitar, as well as my other Ibanez, I mainly play are the two most stable guitars I own.  Both are set up with neck relief of .028mm at the 9th fret, and the action is low enough just to remove any damping buzzing while playing(on my RG 1.75mm at 24th fret for E, 1.0mm on e, the DT is maybe a tad lower, only due to it having 21 frets).  My goal is to be able to lower the tremolo closer to the body on this guitar, as the tremolo sits high enough off the body to put my picking arm into an uncomfortable postion due to that I am used to lower action guitas, the string distance away from the body at times will have my picking hand travel a normal pickng arc, which results in the pick being slipped between the strings too deep.  If that makes any sense.  If I can lower the neck into the body some, say for argument 1/4", I can lower the tremolo 1/4" resulting in the strings being closer to the body resulting in a distance where I will not have to make too drastic change to muscle memory paths of picking mechanics as I have to now.

Here are the pictures.. 

My camera did not want to utilize it's flash, so this is dark and I had to edt it in Paint.  Area of concern is in yellow rectangle.  The arrow pointing to the right is the forward edge of the knife point pivot.  The arrow pointing left is the face of the body where the tremolo route begins.  The knife edge should be able to sit into the tremolo route so that the bottom edge of the knife edge (in the pic it is the rectangle just above the arrow pointing left)is flush with the top edge of the body when looking at the guitar from the same direction as this picture is taken.  From the previous pic the neck is sitting too far from the body face

Rear of neck where it meets the body.  The neck pocket has always been slightly loose, even when it had the Ibanez Death Coat Poly on it, That is the reason you see the indentation of the lock washer.  I use that to keep the neck from shifting.  The horizontal line is wax build up from maintenance.

Top down neck pocket.  Top left corner of it as well as the lower right are factory slop jobs. 

Trying to show that the pocket is the same thickness from front to rear from the side.

I think it is safe to remove some wood from the pocket. The heel is 1-1/8" thick off a standard metal ruler.

I guess I will create a jig to compensate for the lack of wood on the lower edge of the pocket.  I am not sure how far out a fret board should be from the face of the guitar body.  I will just take a few measurements off my other guitars, and get an average between the two or three I tend to play most.  I am not trying to create a zero need for shims and they will be used if needed to create a proper angle, but this guitar always makes me feel like I am fighting the guitar by having to lift my picking hand away from the body to play..

FWIW the final picture was taken when finished with applying oil finish prior to waxing. I used Mixol tint Oxide Green to tint the linseed oil I used on the body.  This picture makes the body look too pretty it actually looks like I picked it up out of a stagnant pond which was the effect I was going for.

I'm late to the game on this thread, but I oil finished all of my bolt on necks this year, as well as two guitars my bass player owns.  Totaling 7 guitars. The first three each used a different technique that I found online.  I am by no means an expert, but I do play a lot both at home and live, so I can give my experience from that angle.

Guitar 1: Used 80 grit to get to the wood fast.  100 grit next, then proceeded to walk up the grits to 220.  Each grit was sanded until all scratches from previous grit were gone, cleaned neck off with tack cloth then acetone.  I then applied water to the neck with a damp rag ( idea here is to only use enough water to darken the wood as compared to dry to raise the grain). Sand again with same grit as first pass until it felt smooth.

The oil I used was boiled linseed oil.  Used rag to  hand apply until coat was even.  Allowed to dry 24 hours, Sand with 220,  Repeat the process twice more.

After the final  coat of oil, I allowed the neck to air out for two days then applied a 4:1 mix of raw  beeswax and turpentine. allow to dry (5 minutes or so), then buffed off. 

Final result - Neck is really fast and comfortable.  Feels like the finish of one of the old San Dimas custom Charvels from the mid 80's.  FWIW, The body was done using same technique, but I dyed the linseed oil as I was told the oil will make a stain blotchy.  Also have to wax the neck after every 2-3 weeks of hard usage. Wood darkens a bit from hand oils.

Guitar 2: I used the Tru-Oil method a lot of people use, use the instructions on the bottle .  Application is the same as above, but the finish, ends up like a production "oiled neck".  In other words, it doesn't feel like wood under your hands.  This will get redone after November to same technique I used for the next guitar.

Guitar 3: I experimented here. This time I melted straight beeswax to liquid and applied that to the neck after initial sandings, and before oil application.  After I got the neck covered, I used a heat gun to warm the wax allowing it to penetrate into the wood.  I repeated this application twice which left wax proud of the wood when dry.  I then sanded the neck back down to the wood, then applied matte finish tung oil as above and finalized again with beeswax/turpentine mixture.  This technique is similar to Warwick's method of oil finishing.

Final result.  I have a hard time putting this guitar down.  The feel is similar to guitar 1, but somehow feels slightly refined.  Also the first application of the wax I believe creates an additional barrier to ward against oxidation and sweat discoloration.

The 4 others I refinished, I used the last method, and am happy with the results enough to keep using this method. 

I do not sand further than 220 grit as I like a little tool handle feel to my guitar necks.  The second guitar i  took to 320, but it feels too plasticky with the Tru Oil.

To the OP:  To answer your questions. 

No the oil wont come off on your hands if you wax it afterward.  Even if it did, the amount is very small you wont feel it.

I used two coats of oil on each neck.  I don't like slick painted neck feel on an unfinished neck, but I want to feel the grain a bit.

Dye the oil with an alcohol based dye designed for woodworking.  Apparently stain underneath gets blotchy after applying the oil. I don't know how true this is, but I am not made of money and wanted to not have to redo anything from blotchy stain

Yes.

Keep in mind Im not an expert and only have done 5 of my own guitars and two of a friends.  He always comments on how he digs the oiled necks I put on his guitars (Or just stroking my ego while secretly hates them, but he plays the hell out of them).  You sounded like where I was last year, so I just wanted to pass along my experiences.

Thank you guys.  I have been away from the forum so long, I forgot I asked this already and just asked Prostheta in PM again.  Sorry about that.   Here is a photo of said guitar. No clue why it shows upside down.