Hotrock

Definaely Setch's method would work fine (and better than the method I'm about to suggest). I have 2 straight edges, one of which was a big straight bit of meta I swiped from a building site and the other is a metal rule that I bought from a shop for about £5. It's 1 meter long and proding that you don't jump up and down on it will be perfectly straight $60 for a straight edge seems a little excessive considering how many long straight bits metal you can easily get hold of. Kaj

easier said than done. Our IT department is actually a company that comes in to sort it all out. I was supposed to be getting 512MB Ram but they ordered the wrong one and didn't realise until hey took the back off. Since then everything has been a bit funky Wouldn't bother me too much but the bloody thing keeps loosing drawings. The absolute worse thing though is the guy has to come back on Monday. He's like the carisma police, he's so boring that you can feel it when he walks in the room. Still, it's the weekend (Boing Boing Boing) so I'm not going to worry about it, the girlfriend has gone away to see her little sister and I'm left at home with some freshly sharpened chisils hopefully have my inlay done by Monday. Either way, everyone have a good weekend...... ......And Phil, I still want a card

Nice one JFC because my POS laptop just dropped the file while it was saving. Sorry Phil (but JFC's is probably better anyway )

I'll have a belt at it this afternoon (once my boss has buggered off). I will need the maximum external dimensions. BTW has the typeface changes for everyone on this board or did the IT department just balls up my computer. Kaj

Cheers mate. Unfortunately the router that I borrowed has gone back to it's rightful home I'd better order myself a new one then Nice one Setch, yet another beer I think I owe you

I was thinking of doing something similar, too. Maybe epoxy would do the trick? Silicone would probably hold, but the softness of it might dampen any resonance. TIG weld? We're looking at brazing (silver solder) to join up the front, back and sides of the resonators we have on the cards. Can't remember if it's an option on Aluminium though

Nah, fret board isn't attched yet. I'm too busy ballsing it up trying to put an inlay in it Setch, if you could give me a bit of a better description/pics that would be great. I think I get what you're saying but pics would be very helpful. Cheers dude, have you done this before then?

Oops, yeah I think a bit more info would have helped. Sorry dude. OK then, the neck is very nearly the right shape, theres a bit of shaping left to do at the body end but only a bit. I'm leaving the final shaping for as long as possible just incase the neck pics up a few knocks here and there. Truss rod is installed etc. The headstock has already been cut at 13 degrees (scarf joint) and the headstock shaped. It's kind of like a PRS style headstock. On one of the tips of the headstock (in the maple laminate) I came across a streak of really dark wood about 4mm wide and 2mm deep. It looked horrible and easily broke off when I was prodding it with a small screwdriver. I decided that there was no point having a fault running through the headstock and I also didn't know how far into the neck it went so I broke out the jigsaw and chased the streak bit by bit down the headstock hoping that it was only small and praying that I wouldn't have to throw the neck out. The streak didn't look like a mineral streak, it looked decidely rotten. Bleaching it wouldn't work either as you could tell the difference in the grain of the wood. The streak only went through the wood for about 3/4 inch but this means that my headstock is now too small and doesn't look very nice. What I'm thinking of doing is chopping it accross the part where it's widest (just above the nut) and sticking on a solid piece of maple. then for aesthetics veneering both sides. To be honest, providing I do a good joint I can't really see a problem, but just because I can't see it doesn't mean it won't be a nightmare. I'll try to swipe a digital camera from work tonight but I'm not promising. Cheers dudes Kaj

I use my old mans £30 pillar drill and this happens from time to time (but what do you expect for £30). What I do is put a bit of wood on the platform and use the drill press to press it back on. Make sure that you are pushing down directly over the centre of the platform though as otherwise you'll push it down to an angle. I keep thinking about using the stuff (the name escapes me at the minute) that you put on bolts to lock them into place. It's called Nut lock, thread lock or something like that. I did find that the pressing method was better than hitting it with the hammer (although less satisfying )

Alright guys, I thought that I had posted this on Friday but it doesn’t seem to have worked so here we go again…. …. A while back when I was shaping my headstock I came across a dodgy bit of wood. This bit would have ruined the finish, so I decided that the best bet was to cut it off. My original plan was to make a feature out of it by cutting off the end of the headstock and replacing it with a bit of contrasting wood (African Walnut in this case as this is what I am using for my inlays). However, the more I look at my headstock, the more I wished that I had made a standard Gibson style one. What I want to do now is just chop the rest of the headstock off and replace it with a Gibson one. Obviously to hide the join lines I was going to veneer the front and back of the headstock. Is it possible to chop off the headstock and replace it with another one and can someone please explain the best way of doing this? I realise that there probably isn’t many people (if any) have done this, but any advise would be appreciated before I break out the power tools and just cut it off. Cheers dudes.

If it's a nech through that you're buildiing then you can put a slot in the side of the neck that goes through the body and glue a McDonalds straw into it. Once the pups are routed, you will go through the straw and have a little cable duct going through the wood between pups.

Congratulations Eddie (on both the wedding and also for having such a stunning wife ). I'm going to be getting married in Buxton (Derbyshire, England) where it's pretty much always cold and raining (that is of course unless that girl in the bikini 2 people to your left will take me ). I think I might have to show my girlfriend the photos to try and change her mind. We're hoping to go to South America for our honeymoon for 6 months and stopping in the caribbean on the way so a beach wedding there would be much better Anyway, Congrats again dude Kaj

If it's not magnetic it isn't steel. If I remember rightly, not all steel is magnetic. I'm going back quite a few years since I learnt this, so it might not be 100% (I'm sure someone will jump in if I'm wrong). There are two types of steel (well actually there are loads but I'm just talking about bog standard mild steel here). The difference is not in the composition of the steel, it's in the molecular structure. Austenitic steel has a face centred cubic structure and is not magnetic (I think ) and Martensitic steel has a body centred cubic structure and is magnetic. Martensitic steel can be made for austenitic by heating and the quenching. This is why fast quenched welds can be brittle. You can also use this to tell the quality of such things as knives. I think that if it's non magnetic steel (austenite) then the blade is of good quality, if on the other hand it's magnetic martensite, it's cheap steel. As I said before, don't take this as being right (in the details or in the whole for that matter), as it's been a few years since I had to think about something like this. Hopefully someone jump in and correct/confirm. Kaj

Good point I've always routed using the same side of the bit and always push away from me. The only time I pull the router is when you need to around things like horns and there isn't enough surface to have the router sitting flat. I tend to move around my workpiece alot though as I use a workmate and have good access all the way around my workpiece. Either way Breakem, I value Dugz opinion, he obviously knows what he's on about (he's even got pictures ) so I'd go with him, as I understand it he's waaaay more experienced with wood than I am. JUST BE CAREFUL OF THE PLUMS Kaj

I was always under the impression that you NEVER, NEVER EVER pulled the router towards you. As far as I'm aware, the router bit will always be in the correct orientation so that when you put your thumb on the operating button of the router and push it away from you, the cutting bit is turning in the correct direction. Could be wrong though. I do know that if you pull a router towards you, you are serious danger off cutting of your danglies.

Do I detect a hint of sarcasm?

I'd quite like to see an amp one day that has seperate bass and treble signals. Might mean making special split pups though. Then bi-amp each of the drives (using bi-wirable speakers) But as for the surround sound amp. I'd like to see a sort of joystick like footswitch so you could swirl the effects around the surround speakers. For example, you could be playing the same tune through all the speakers, stamp on your delay (for example) and then use the joystick so that you can bias where the majority of the sound goes to. Spinning the joystick around with you foot would cause the sound to spin around the room. I don't know if this is possible, but you're the electronic geezer so you tell me

Cover Barry Maguires cover of PF Slones “Eve of Destruction” The songs probably more relevant today than it was when it was written. Also the first time I heard it was when John Peel played it years ago (and John sadly passed on last month, so I’d be a good little tribute). It doesn’t sound that hard to play, but I could be wrong because I’ve never tried it. Either way, it’s got to be better than yet another smegin Metallica cover

It’s the shop where my mate sells his resonators. I put them in a thread in case anyone wanted to have a look in the players section but anyway…. www.deltaresonatorguitars.co.uk I had the bloke round my house the other night, asking me to do some CAD work and to rack my brains about a new line that he intends to be doing. I also asked him about a resonator I’ve been planning, hopefully to sell a couple so that I can afford to keep one myself. Obviously he would be doing all the woodwork but I have special plans for the resonator in order to make it very special indeed. If we ever get round to doing it (obviously it depends on money, especially as my girlfriend has just blown up her car – but it’s stopped her taking the proverbial for blowing up my bike ) then it’ll more than likely be sold through there. I was wondering if you were ever passing the place, if you fancied taking one of the resonators for a quick thrash and give me an independent decision.

You might want to check out: Jaros Guitars McNaught guitars And PG's very own: Ormsby Guitars These guys all use the deep set tennon, which extends right under the bridge. Nothin' new under the sun ARSE Nah only joshin' my tennon is visable from the front and back of the body though. Looks a bit like that McNaught without the cap on Furry muff, not that original then..... .....But the first time I've done it. BTW Setch, being a cockney, ever get chance to visit the resonator centre?

I thought that the SG neck (a set one as it is) is very unstable due to the closeness of the neck pup to the neck, cutting into the tennon? So the SG set neck is not as stable as a bolt on? True or talking out my arse? Either way I've gone with a super long neck tennon (half way between set neck and neck through, just because I haven't seen anyone do it yet ) Kaj

I stand corrected.... ....And I'm happy that I'm wrong. Now where can I get some from

I'm currently getting ready to knock 1.5mm from my quiled maple cap as there are some chips taken out. Not a problem unles you've got to do it with sandpaper Anyway, as far as this chopping the back off the guitar, I'm very glad that you're now going down the route that you are. I honestly think that if you were to chop a slice down the back, you're asking for trouble. What I did to hollow out my old strat copy was to draw round it on a piece of mdf, then draw a line about 10mm inside of this one, all the way round. Then inside this line, draw another about 4mm away (I doubt if these are the best dimensions but you get what you pay for ) You will also need some wood to use for a cap (lets say a 5mm sheet of mahogany) Now then, cut out the wood to the inside line and now you have a template to hollow out the body, remember you have to leave solid bits (like a core) though. Once this is done then you can cut the template out to the oher line (10mm from the edge) and you have a template to do a lip to mount your cap to. You will need to raise the template though so that the shank of the flush cutting bit sits against the template. You can now route to the 5mm depth of your cap (which in this case would be on the back of the guitar to save the need for recarving on the top). You can now take of your template and put it on the bit of wood you intend to use for the cap, draw round the inside of your template and cut out the shape. This should now fit very nicely on top of the lip that you've routed. And now for the final step: glue it in and filler and paint makes things what they ain’t . And now an admission, I hollowed out my guitar when I was drunk (which I certainly wouldn’t recommend to anyone, it’s a very stupid idea) and I didn’t use this method as such, I did most of it free hand which I wouldn’t recommend either. I would have used this method if I was sober though. Kaj And remember to keep the walls of the electrics box and bits like that (not that I forgot and had to knock up a box or anything <----- Insert little whistling “would I do that” avatar here

You could possibly make a plug and mold using an existing guitar and then try to lay carbon fibre over this. I'm not too sure if it’s possible to do carbon fibre at home though. I’m pretty sure that you need to inject the resin into the fibre by pressure and heat, pressure being the problem for doing it at home. As for using solid graphite, I would be a bit dubious, I’m certainly not saying that it can’t be done (I mean how the hell should I know never having tried it) but my alarm bells are ringing. I think that graphite is very brittle, well looking at the structure of it, it damn well should be and this would probably make it a bugger to work with. My advise would be to buy a small amount of graphite and try to do all the processes of making a guitar on this scrap piece. That way you know what you’re getting into and also….. ….. you can tell me the results

Bringing in some resorces learnt in a previous job, there is a chance that if you have a fan and force the air over some corona tubes you can create an ionised blanket of air the neutralises a lot of nasties. Anyway, it might work, might not, but t's always an option to explore. BTW, I would use this in conjunction with the spray booth and not instead of.