ihocky2

You can always use staples the same way that you would when gluing down a fretboard. Use a staple gun and fire a few staples in to the body wood in areas that will not have a router near them. Make sure the staples stick a little prone and cut off the piece that connects the 2 legs. This will give the top wood something to grab onto and keep it from slipping when you start clamping.

I like the look and the idea. My first suggestion though would be to get a pencil and paper or try and get some kind of affordable CAD software. The reason I say that, is the pickups are really far apart for a 3 HB setup and they are pretty far from the bridge and neck. Once you get the critical dimensions you'll find that most of you body angles will change and you may not have the same disired look. But I think that will actually help the look, since I think it looks too thin because of it being elongated so much. Once you get actual dimensions and a closer idea of the shape I think it will turn out nicely.

If you are going for translucent and don't have your heart set on Metalcast, check out the House of Color Shimmerins line sold through Plastikote. You could skip the silve or pearl base and just use the tranlucent candy coat. I have found this sold at some Walmarts, but not all. It seems anywhere that sells Plastikote instead of Duplicolor will carry it.

I have been working several design out in CAD and keep coming up with only 1.5 or 1.75 degree neck angles when using TOM bridges. It doesn't seem to matter wether it is 24.75 or 25.5 inch scales. I just keep getting low neck angles. I know that some people get up to 4 degrees so I was wondering if I am doing something wrong or if it mainly where I have the neck and body meeting up. On the LP style I have designed the top of the body is meeting around 8 or 9 frets in, and the bottom is about 5 or 6 frets in. I think this may be why my numbers are so different than Gibsons normal numbers. I have the TOM drawn to complete scale and the heigth is within +- .002 so I know that is not the problem. I was kind of wondering what most other people find to be their normal neck angles and if there are any ideas why mine are so shallow.

Are there any opinions on the Mighty Mite floyds? I know there prices are lower, but I am guessing their quality is as well.

Keep us posted on how this works. My wifes family has several large apple trees that I expect will be coming down in the next few years and thought about using some of the wood for a guitar body and neck, and depending how it worked out, possibly a bass as well. And I can't stop drooling at the thought of all of the chicken and ribs and fish I'll get to smoke and bbq with it.

Well it certainly helps knowing that a lot of the better builders on this site have had their fare share of big screw ups. I find it fun to share wars stories sometimes. Since this is my first build I don't have too many or a favorite yet. But so far I think the biggest was butchering the pocket for my recessed TOM. A little epoxy and a block of wood shaped to fit and I was back in business with a much better template and once it's painted you'll never know it happened.

I am pretty far into the work on my first build and have made several minor mistake that a little sanding takes care of and have had a few larger ones that I need to make design changes to remove. I know everyone makes mistakes on their first builds and was wondering what some of you most memorable mistakes were and how you corrected them. I see all of the nice work guys do now and keep thinking that I am making major screw ups that none of these other guys would make. But then I remind myself that everyone else has made mistakes and had to work around them. I was just curious if I am making common mistakes and am on par with everyone else or if I am having problems that just reveal a lack of skill. So far I had a large tear out of the neck pocket due to using a poorly designed jig that forced me to enlarge and deepen the pocket and glue a block in and start it over. I marked the location of my bridge post and some how found a different mark in the same area and drill my post holes their. Luckily I caught it early enough the I only had used a 1/8" bit so far and just filled it with some epoxy and drilled in the final location. Once painted you'll never see a mark and even if there is, it will be under the bridge and I can live with that. I was also rounding over the the edges and had the router tip on me while working the horns and take a little extra out, to fix that I am just going to step up the radius to blend everything in.

Mik has good advice. I also wouldn't be trying to level sand with 200o grit unless your enjoy pain. Once you get above 600 grit you are not cutting material as much as your a polishing. 2000 grit is one of the final grits people will use before switching to micro-mesh or polishing. You may be sanding through by building up too much heat by trying to sand with such a fine grit. 2000 is also going to load up real fast if your not wetsanding and those build ups will make the 2000 work like a much coarser grit. If you want to light scuff sand I would stay around 400 to 600 grit and apply almost no pressure. Once you have 8-9 coats on then carefully level sand.

Did you use the laquer from reranch or did you buy it somewhere else. All the different companies have differing amounts of thinner and solids. If reranch says that two cans is enough when using their product, then that should be fine. But if you are using someone elses you may need a little more or a lot more depending on the brand. It also depends how heavy you lay your coats. Like previously said, 9 coats from 1-1/2 cans is laying it on pretty thin. How many passes are you making per coat? What grit are you sanding with and how often are you sanding? How hard are you sanding? Is it a level sanding or just a very light scuff sanding?

If your using laquer you don't need to be sanding that much. Laquer melts into the previous coats and there is no need to sand until you are pretty close to done unless you have runs or high spots. Rattle cans apply a lot thinner than a spray gun and 9 coats from 1-1/2 cans means your spraying them really lightly. You should go through at least 3 cans until you have enough build.

+1 for the PodXT Live. Unless you are planning on playing in your bedroom or studio only I can't see buying the standard XT or the Rackmount. You still need to buy a footboard if you gig which will only cost more money. It's better to get the Live so you have the footboard there already and you can still use it in your house or studio.

Another very simple option is to just remove to locking pieces and use it as a regular nut. Not the best looking, but it will work just fine. This is actually exactly what I am doing on my first build. I bought the neck I wanted originally planning on using a FR bridge and later decided that I wanted to use a TOM just to keep the cost down and to make it a little simpler. But the neck came routed and drilled for a locking nut. So I am just using the locking nut without the locks. I may play around trying to use the locks and tune it still.

Yeah, their both addicting and both seem to give the wife a headache.

I haven't done it myself, but just read about it in Dan Erlwines book on finishing. There is a product called binding melt that you can rub on and melts the seems together. The other way he said was to dissolve a piece of binding in laquer thinner. My guess would be to make it just viscuss enough to be able to spread it.

Just curious, but why the king V instead of he Randy Rhodes. The Laiho signature has the longer top fin similar to a RR, but the shape towards the neck is different and I think the angles are different. As well as the curve of the inside of the V. But the Laiho is closer to the RR. Or do you just like the KV better? Or get a few drawings or tracings of all of them and combine your favorite features. Since your building this, there is no reason to sacrifice anything, it's your guitar so why not make it exactly what you want and not what someone else likes.

The Stewmac template is a little too big because it is a template for cutting pickgurads, not the cavity. Therefore it is going to be closer to the dimensions of a pickup ring.

The most important things I have found so far are great planning , patience, good references (which you have plenty of here), and a full scale drawing. The drawing will let you figure out exact neck angles, hardware placement, and every other minor detail. If this intimidates you, there are plenty here with CAD experience that can help you. The Hiscock book tends to be the bible of guitar building around, and for a extremely good reason. It helps you a ton and leaves with with very few questions. I'm not sure you still want to make the body larger or not, but also take into account that extra size also means extra weight. So think about how you'll be playing, sitting the extra weight is barely noticeable, but standing for a gig, and your shoulder will feel it. If you want wood to just practice on and not make a working body, pine is great. It is cheap, easy to find in many sizes, works very nicely, and when your done with it and are ready to discard it , it burns nice and hot in the campfire.

Not a lot of pics yet. I have to get more progress ones taken. If you look under the In Progress section it is the It Has Begun thread. Thanks for the help. I figure a little recessed was better, but I was also trying to get the best results I can. But then again I am hoping for professional results on my first build, so I am probably being a bit an** on things that I really shouldn't worry about just yet. I need to learn to crawl before I can walk. I am hoping to have more pics up later tonight.

I will be routing the control cavity tonight on my project and was wondering how deep to make the recess for the cover to sit into. I am going to use a piece of acrylic I have as the cover, so I know the thickness, and know to go that deep to get it flush with the body. But I still have to do all of my finish sanding and don't know how much material that will remove. So my question really is, how much extra do I remove to ensure that the cover stays flush and how do I adjust in case the cover sits recessed after everthing is done?

First, here is a good website that makes it easy to compare different woods and they give pretty nice notes on each type of wood. Plus they run some nice sales occasionally. http://www.woodworkerssoursce.net I am not an expert on woods, so you are probably better off getting that advice from someone else. As for flatsawn for a neck you are fine. Cut severla pieces and glue them together to make a laminate neck. Then just turn it on it's side and it will be close to flatsawn and have plenty of strength.

I think another problem that may arise with ferrous paints, is that if they get wet they may rust and stain the finish. Now most people aren't playing in the rain, but even a few tiem building up condensation would be enough to get steel to rust, so the paint may very well do the same thing.

If you use a TOM bridge, you can use a stop tail piece to create a piece to bring the strings in to the right spacing for the bridge. I have been toying around with something of this type of design and using a stop tail piece was the easiest way I found to bring the strings together again.

Another option if you want to go headless is to get a Floyd Rose Speedloader and the ball end locking nut. You have to use strings made specifically for this set up since you need a ball end on both ends of the strings and the strings are cut to a high tolerances length, but it elminates the need for tuners.

As for the fretboard, you can have it sticking out as much or as little as you want. It's your design and you just have to adjust for neck angle and bridge height to accomodate for it. How many strings do you on and what gauge? How many springs do you have on the back and how deep do you have the claw screwed in?