Ben

I think its looks fantastic, but those huge pics will get you into trouble!

I think the rule is 1 pic per post, 640x480 max. Link the rest.

Do you hate the pickups because of how they look or what they are, Matt?

If its the look of them you dislike, then that isn't going to change (except maybe the colour, I'll test and see if white or black looks best), but if its the sound of jazzmaster pickups you dont like then dont be decieved by the covers. I'm making my own pickup's to go under the covers. They'll have a variable 'heat' , with resistances up to about 16K each, so they should be able to cope with high gain metal stuff too Plus the switching means I could have them in series, = 32K, but that's maybe slighty OTT

How heavy was your 1st guitar, rsguitar? I was expecting this one to be pretty heavy, even with all the chambering, but its strangely turned out to be very light so far.

More surprisingly, its not even neck heavy. I was worried that it may be, since although the body may be chambered, the neck is still a solid piece of oak. Plus it has 24 frets proud of the body.

Thanks for the comments!

Logarithmic are better suited to volume, because they give a smoother volume change and linear ones are best suited for tone, but either type will work for either function.

If theres an A on the botom its logarithmic (volume) if there's a B its linear (tone)

As I said though the difference isn't crucially important

At last!

Heres the link to my yahoo account with a few more photos:

http://uk.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/mrbutteri...album?.dir=814e

Thanks Jon and Robert,

Heres a few more photos. They're a bit dull [thanks to the weather] and crappy [thanks to my camera/ photography skills], but they show some stuff like the neck/ body joint etc.

***I'll edit in the other photos as thumbnails in a sec. Posting this for now so I dont lose what I've written while I try to figure out what the hell is going wrong with my computer***

EDIT: My computer and imageshack don't seem to be getting on so well, so I'm uploading them to my yahoo account. The time remaining bar says 24 mins, so in 24 mins I will post a link

I've been spending ages sanding this afternoon and its getting pretty smooth. Plus the sanding seems to make all the grain patterns stand out more, as some of the photos show. I also drilled the cavities in the back for the rotary switches on the 2 horns. This was a real pain, as my handheld drill had trouble with such a large drill bit and kept getting hot and stuggling. It was also difficult to keep it straight and get the correct depth. Turned out ok though. The routing on the back is a little scruffy, but will be covered up, so I'm not too bothered.

Thanks to exams, progress will grind pretty much to a halt soon for quite a while. My first exam is next week (22nd May) and they finish on the 29th of June.

Looking great!

They don't sell Tightbond round here anywhere I've looked, but the PVA I used should be pretty much the same thing.

I thought I did the scarf joint well, the surfaces were both planed flat, I spent a long time on it because I was aware of how critical it is to get a strong joint.

I was pretty sure I clamped it well too, I drilled holes and used tooth picks (in places that would be removed when I carved the neck) to make sure it wouldnt slip, then I used some of the scrap wood to make what I think is called a 'caul' [?] to match the angle of the headstock when clamping.

Because I wouldnt understand what I just wrote if I were reading it, heres a diagram:

If the worst does happen and it breaks in future I'll worry about it then. I may as well try the easier repair first.

If it fails later it wont be much [if any] harder to fix then than it is now. Its not like I'm selling the guitar, (its not like anyone would buy it either ), its just for myself.

Well I'll be using an oil finish on it, so if the crack re-opens any time in the future, its not like it will be hard to touch up the finish over the repair, as it would be with laquer.

If the crack ever does reopen maybe I'll try CA, but I'll cross that bridge when/if I come to it. Hopefully I never will.

Heres a photo:

As you can see its a lot paler without the dye, and also the glue lines from the original table are a lot more evident, whereas when dyed they were nearly invisible. The pickup routes arent finished, and neither is the trem route. I just roughly removed a lot of the material before I glued the wings on to save me some time later.

Lots of sanding ahead.

But looks like I got the headstock fixed thanks to peoples help on this forum

Told you my camera was crap

What you are seeing is beads of glue aroung the edge of the crack.

I clamped the guitar body upside down to my bench, then used another clamp on the back of the headstock to carefully apply constant, controlable pressure to it and prise the gap open [no friend handy ]. Then I applied the glue and used the feeler gauge/ blew hard on it to force it in, flexed it etc. I then wiped all the excess glue off, and the pic above is the squeezed out glue from when I removed the clamp [so I'd guess there was more than enough in there].

When sticking the feeler gauge in I could feel the depth of crack, and it wasnt really that deep.

Because I couldnt clamp it easily due to the difficult shapes/ angles, it's now drying in a spare room upstairs with some carefully positioned books applying pressure to the joint.

I'll leave it there undisturbed until monday evening at least.

Seems to have worked well!

Thanks!

OK, im going to use the PVA. I'll get to it once I've finished this post.

Ben, did you feather the joint out so that the end was paper thin, or did the joint end at a 'hard' corner? This makes a big difference to the stregnth of a scarf joint. The feathered end will 'spring' with impact, allowing it to flex with the glued on headstock. A hard corner will not be able to bend, and so will want to crack open. I supect this happened with your joint - the corner allowed a crack to start, which then ran out into the grain because the rest of your glue joint was still solid.

Its sort of a cross between the two if that makes any sense. It does go paper thin at the end of the transition, but there is a definite corner, which may have acted as the point of weakness for the crack to start at.

Thanks

Thanks everyone,

I tried to measure the crack size when I flex it open [as much as I dare to], and the 0.002"/0.05mm feeler gauge just fits in it. I doubt that PVA would penetrate into it much without thinning, and the epoxy I have is quite thick (can you get thinner epoxy?), so thats what led me to think CA may work. The CA I have has a needle on the end too that with a bit of force may fit into the crack.

The scarf joint is still quite rigid, it takes a fair amount of force to flex the crack open. I would guess that it would hold up to string tension as it is (I have an acoustic with much thinner wood at the headstock, which [with no strings on] flexes more than this one does)

I tried taking a photo, but the size of the crack is too small, and my camera is poor at taking close ups. The photos show nothing at all.

Once dry I would put reinforcement strips. That might be a problem if it will be a clear finish and you have fancy wood for the neck stock.

Not a problem, I'm pretty new to building and it has plenty of visual imperfections already, however considering the size of the crack, the reiforcement may be more trouble than its worth. My wood is from an old table, so its definitely not fancy.

Would that extra info change anybody's advice? do you still think I could get the PVA / epoxy to penetrate into such a narrow space?

Thanks again

This is going to look great!

I look forward to seeing it finished!

They have the chair doctor glue in the UK on the internet. I'll check locally first though to see if I can save on postage.

I used PVA, and I did leave it clamped overnight (and then some). It's hard to describe, (and impossible to photograph) but when I look inside the crack it seems to start at the glue joint, but its not a clean break along the glue joint. Its not a huge crack either, but its significant

The fretboard is glued to the neck with epoxy, which may mean that I'd need to use heat if I were to remove it.

Here's a better diagram:

the lump is a veloute thingy.

I'll see if I can get that glue in the UK because I dont think they can send glue from the US by air.

I am tempted to try easier methods before I remove the headstock. With the oil finish I am planning it wont really be any more of an issue to remove and repair the headstock once the guitar is finished if the easier repairs fail.

Thanks!

EDIT: Added glue labels to respective parts on the diagram to make it clearer. Red line is break

Update:

Progression:

• Cleaned up inlay on 12th fret and done 5th fret inlay (look good from afar, less so up close, but I'm satisfied)
  
• Glued neck to body wings
  
• routed for tremolo
  
• Begun routing freehand for pickups, then stopped before I screwed up. I'm going to make templates soon
  
• Carved neck/body transition. Pleased with how this looks and feels.
  
• Improved body carving.
  
• Sanded body. The dye has been sanded off so its all quite pale for now.
  
  
  • Broke headstock http://www.projectguitar.com/uploads/emoticons/default_biggrin.png' alt=':D'> Should hopefully be able to fix this soon. Started a thread if anyone can help.
    

  Annoyances:

  [*]The previously mentioned headstock break

  [*]EXAMS

  I'll try to get pics later today

Thanks Robert,

I have epoxy too, but the CA is a lot runnier and I thought it may penetrate further into the crack

A more extreme method might be to take the whole headstock back off then stick it back on properly rather than trying to drop glue into the joint.

I cant really see how I could do that without removing the fretboard, which would be a major PITA.

Everything was going very nicely with my project (a neck through), with no issues what so ever so far. I'd just got everything glued together nicely and was onto sanding when I went and knocked the guitar of my workmate and broke the [insert expletive here] ing headstock.

It's not broken off completely, its just cracked along the scarf joing glue line, as in this diagram:

Just the red bit is cracked, and from what I can see when I carefully prise it open, its not cracked directly along the glue joint, which I was pretty sure was a good joint.

What shall I do?

My best idea was to prise it open and pour some thin CA glue into the crack... could that work?

Thanks

http://www.stevesmusiccenter.com/JayTurserShark.html

http://www.fishguitar.com/octo.html

http://www.fishguitar.com/deco.html

http://images.google.co.uk/images?hs=vHt&h...F-8&sa=N&tab=wi

Here's some inspiration!

What Robert, Wez and Mattia said; that looks great!

Stiking, yet subtle and not too 'in your face'.

+1 on the knife edge thing. I got fed up with mine and blocked it off so now it's dive only. Keeps perfect tune now!

Shame about the old finish, but such is life

I'm sure the blue will look equally great.

I like the LPJR too. You said you were aiming for "somewhere between a TV yellow and a blonde/butterscotch" and thats exactly how it looks to me.

Looks great so far!

Nice!

I like the colour scheme.

Balsa IIRC is actually classed as a hardwood and yet Pine is a softwood.

The names hardwood and softwood dont relate directy to them being soft or hard. IIRC the difference is deciduous/ evergreen (?)

Balsa is softer than pine. I'm certain of that.