Prostheta

None of it is glued yet. Since it's a good ol' classic 2x4 neck, you can do EVERYTHING as far as the routing goes on the tenon without gluing the wings on! The neck is a lot easier to handle without the extra bulk of the wings, so whilst i'm still doing "coarse" work (routing, bandsawing, etc.) i'm leaving the wings off. As you can see, I have yet to complete the headstock (got a bit distracted yesterday as my wife and I went to a GWAR gig). Anyway. More about the build. The neck tenon is five laminations of wenge and mahogany, the central mahogany core being some OLD OLD growth quarterwawn mahogany which, with the wenge, should add a good deal of stability and stiffness to the neck: CLICK FOR LARGER IMAGE The wings are plain mahogany. After about three months of research, I couldn't figure out an easy or economical way of doing the Gibson-style V-jointing between the wings and the body so I sacked it off in favour of a straight planed edge join. The finish is going to be a solid one, most probably in black with green accenting same as my mainstay gigging bass. In that respect, I better do some hunting for black-green-black pickguard material or plastics which I can laminate to achieve the same effect....once the pickguard and truss rod covers are made, i'm hoping to have them engraved with the band logo or something along those lines.... The nut is currently going to be a Warwick Just-A-Nut 2 which is a height adjustable plastic nut which is simple to install and will get the bass up and running in the shortest time possible. I'll most probably replace this with a black Corian nut - ring your local outlet for samples which are ideal for several nuts! :-D Oh man, I never mentioned how proud I was of my first well planned and executed scarf joint. The other two scarf joints were done in a bit of a hit and miss manner, but using Setch's great tutorial and a couple of similar tutorials on here, the laminations line up perfectly. Once i've shaped the volute i'll post pics and beam with self-satisfied pride of course! Overall, a very simple and quick build also. No more than six hours work has been spent so far (lots more in terms of thinking and planning time however) excepting the gluing time of course. I'm tempted to rattle off a few more Thunderbirds now!

another pic yet another pic Just awaiting the cocobolo board with inlays....

You need what's called in the trade as a "wood stretcher". Sorry to hear about your sandthrough!

If a luthierie is releasing a video giving insight into their "tools of the trade", i'm sure that showing somebody hammering in frets looks a lot more old-school and "desirable" than a chimp whanging frets in using an arbor. Maybe i'm biased against marketing, knowing how it works to manipulate your perceptions. Anyway. I think that on the face of things, hammering in frets makes luthiers look experienced and confident which leaves an impression on your mind of attention to detail, care and consideration. Personally, I love the Taylor factory tour where they make no bones about CNC machines, automated spray booths and all the advanced manufacture procedures which improve potential error margins hugely, and make what used to be boutique craftsmanship down to earth. Of course, boutique craftsman make one-off creations, whereas manufacture is geared to quantity.... I digress. I believe that pressing is as good as hammering, but this is dependant on who bears the hammer or the press. A badly slotted and prepped board will suck no matter how good the fretting. Whatever works for the luthier to achieve the same end result shouldn't matter unless you're severely suffering from obsessive-compulsive guitar manufacture disorder.

Arg, somebody kill the thread and post a link to the previous one on this topic!!!

I agree with the press side of this as there's no real learning curve. If you want the visceral feedback of hammering then put up a fence, or go kill a neighbourhood chav.

Use the search function as this has been done to death a million times before. The difference is in apparent volume, but the size and dynamic response of speakers comes into play a lot also. Your mileage - as always - will vary whatever you choose.

Here are some more pics so you've got an idea of how the edge varies.... top edge inside the cutaways bottom edge strap button Ugh. Looks like I need to do a full teardown and cleanup on my Iby. Funny how flash photography makes everything look 10x worse!

Definitely - I would probably approach it with my head before putting hell to wood :-D My Ibanez S1640FM is just over 1/2" thick at the rear button and horns, and widens in the recesses.... I realise the shape is computer carved, but as a CAD technician I kind of wonder what the basis behind the radii are around the body....it could be as simple as a flattened football (rugby ball to us English!) or a number of radii....I'd love to know the answer to that one....and then to be able to build a non-duplicarver jig for it :-D

Excellent! The constant radius carve reminds me a lot of my Ibanez S1640FM which is quite lightweight, plus quite thin looking/feeling. Kind of like comparing RG thickness to Blackmachine thickness...!!

Great work man. Isn't the body hellaciously thick? I presume some heavy body contouring is in order there!

I could do it in a couple of hours. Wouldn't be a top class job though. Depends who you take it to, how busy they are and how much care they take.

Thanks man. I've put it onto a back burner for a bit until I refit the workshop. I usually step back from projects to make sure my progress is solid and correct. That and my spindle sander went back to the retailer for a warranty repair :-D

That's exactly how i'm making my BIG router jig! I'm using the rectangular cold extruded iron bars for the horizontal and round tubes for the vertical instead of the U sections (they had a bit too much play). Isn't B&Q novel to improvise from? The electrical dept. had round black ABS conduit which i'm sure would work nicely as an insert for top mount jacks a la the Ibanez' S I have.... Was the maple ready cut or did you have to do that yourself?

It's similar to Westone....even though it isn't, it might be the one you're thinking it is.... :-D

Hmmm. I think as good a Taylor acoustic as you can afford would be fitting :-D

I think there has to be a lot of sarcasm in there man. I haven't really gone out of my way to see proof of sarcastic concept however! An acoustic V must be the most pointless thing ever unless you want to play in the classical stance all of the time of course :-D

An acoustic V? hahaha

Posh git :-D I use Painshop Pro, when it works...hahaha...

"Should"? It's a subjective matter! I would go small, say 1/4"?

I use a chamfer bit on a router to rough in the angle, then use a spokeshave and surform to shape, then a spindle sander to round and finally a long strip of 80 grit using a pull-pull method with both hands and the neck's back facing upwards. Rounds it off a treat!

Oh yeah - last piece of important information: Ed Roman talks out of his filthy ass. Other than that, you're on life's right road man!

I think that you need to consider playability over tone. For example - I have two ESP Explorers, one of which is set up for standard tuning and the other set up for heavy top/light bottom in open C - the lower strings require higher gauges to compensate for lower tuning whereas the top three strings are in standard tuning, except B (2nd) is tuned up a semitone to C.

Looks like a lassoed area, a bit of gamma to increase contrast and colorising.

...l.ike Tru-oil, which was designed for gunstock finishing....there are plenty of threads on here referring to Tru-oil finishing. I believe the consensus is to whang on as much as the wood will take (LOTS!) for the first coat and after that, thin coats. Usual tack rag prep applies etc.... Sorry to paraphrase your post Stiggz man!