al heeley

My take on all of this is that it's missing the point: part of what a guitar is has to do with the compromise between the instrument and 'perfect' tuning. Which is probably true for all instruments.

It seems to me by eliminating the discrepancies in tuning, you eliminate a lot of what makes a guitar interesting to hear and play.

I have a DPDT 6 pole on/on/on type switch - the sort I've used before for wiring series/parallel/coil tap options, but I want to use it for switching between bypass (no cap), cap1 (0.0022uF) and cap2 (0.0047uF) in series before the tone pot, to give a gretsch-style tone option (nice, muddy and muddier...)

Can I do it with this type of switch?

I would have thought it took care of itself during the fret-levelling operation.

+1: Clasic, classy and quite sexy

Gorgeous, great work but then you already knew that

Here the thru-neck block has been planed and sanded level, fretboard position and nut marked on, and truss rod channel routed. (Yes I know, rod is wrong way up here but the blue colour makes for a better pic ). On either side of the truss rod channel I've routed a 6mm channel to take the carbon fibre reinforcing rods. Hopefully this will mean I can carve the neck down nice and thin and still retain good stability.

Thx guys - good advice on the binding routing at the neck join - makes good sense that.

On the pickup front, I am in search of proper ricky pups and it's been a steep task. My search continues.

If there's anyone out there that come across any in their travels pleasse let me know!

Hard enough to get hold of in the US but in the UK it's nearly impossible.

Maple cap on the mahogany wings has been planed to thickness and edges sanded smooth.

The maple will be routed for the binding later once the wings and neck-thru have been joined.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v609/al_heeley/mcap.jpg

Here's a quick mock-up to show the body and neck together.

Next it's time to start carving and shaping the neck.

I've never really understood what is meant or what is actually happening when a pickup is said to have gone 'microphonic'.

Can anyone clarify?

Can I just add to the PVA bit - (a company I used to work for was a huge producer of emulsion polymers like PVA) - there's 4 different performance grades from craft or school glue up to structural. You can include cross-linking additives or cook them into the polymer chain - cross linking of the polymer chains as it dries/cures stops any creep tendancies and also adds a lot of heat resistance where most of these families of polymers would start to get a bit softer with heat. Cross-linked types are very water-resistant.

Sadly the companies formulating PVA glues from the polymer rarely clarify on the tubs/bottles/cans which grade or the filler + water content they add to cheapen the product. Steer away from cheap products, they have little polymer in them and will usually not be the cross-linking type. You get what you pay for but also have to pay a little premium for the big brands.

More work on the body. Mahogany base and maple cap cut to size, being glued together. the pencil line marks the final thickness of the cap - a lot to plane off over the weekend. This brings the body depth to the regulation ric 1 1/4 inches and also the maple cap thickness will then match the depth of my white binding.

Useful table for future ref:

http://www.guitar-repairs.co.uk/guitar_pic...olour_codes.htm

Don't they coat the wound coils with a little varnish or something (or wax-pot them) to prevent unravelling?

Why not move the last few winds back down to the bottom againso it can exit along the bobbin base to the other eyelet?

Do you know about scatter-winding?

Birth of the neck. Here she is, all clamped up and oozing PVA. Luverly.

How do you cut your pickguard? Nice clean work there. And how did you apply the lable to the TRC?

Heh, thats how I got hold of the rest of my duaghters stock

Scored some wood today. A small departure from authent-rickity - just cut the rough body wing shape out of mahogany; this will get a maple cap (well it works for Gibson and PRS)

The neck is 2 pieces of maple with a central cherry strip to add a little flavour.

scoobies are those hollow pvc tubes that all the kids round here had a few months ago creating various plaited things of different colours - zip pulls, key fobs, etc. The lettering is just deskjet printed onto acetate sheet, then cut out carefully and a few coats of clear acrylic sprayed on the top to seal it in.

Jeez, I'm giving away all my home secrets..

Not normal is it to varnish anRosewood fretboard? Guess it woks fine for Rickenbacker on Bubinga and Fender on Maple. I've heard of 2-pack epoxies being used to coat ivory too. The rosewood is not meant to need coating as it has natural oils. This could give a problem with a varnish penetrating, sticking and curing.

Quite pleased with how the side dots came out - I was too lazy to order some black dot rod so I used up a little left-over white rod and pushed it inside small sections of a black scoobie I stole from my daughter. The result - tiny little liquorice allsorts that glue into the holes and make a cute little circle marker. Just needs a final sand down to make them sit flush.

Not much building progress this weekend, due to plenty of playing progress.

Got the pickguard and TRC made from the white blank.

Yep, lovely spalted top too. Look forward to seeing this one come together.

After a LOT of searching I saw Allparts UK had one of the old hipshot bridges come in, the ones they have discontinued/upgraded now, presumably due to IP infringement, but its more or less a direct replica of the authentic Ric bridge. The knobs I finally found at are 65pence each from maplin and are the closest looking to authentic ric style I can find without having to remortgage the house.

Tuners are 2-a-side open cog p-bass type.

Scratchplate will be cut from a white plastic blank piece (WD Music, where I got the truss rod as well)

It's been really hard getting the parts for this but then that's all part of the game.

Why is it oak is so rarely used in guitar building? Is it the high density or just so damn hard to cut, or maybe consistency with flaws, knot-holes, etc.?

I would have thought it would be pretty good from a tone-wood point of view.

Fingerboard finished today: bound and fretted.