Desopolis

there are a few different ways of doing a neck through, but mainly, the neck goes THROUGH the guitar..

as long as that rule is followed, I think you'll have it made.

you can cut the body and attach the two sides as wings, or you can route a channel into the body for the neck to go through, you can top it, or leave the wood exposed..

other then that its straight forward...

as far as the ring goes, I dont have dimensions on me, but im sure the places that sell it will have it listed.

look at a telecaster, all the pickups are under the pickguard, and the control plate covers the cavity there. All you have to do, is route the holes for the pickups, connect them, route the cavity, then connect them with a channel.

The cavity and pickguard cover it all.

it doesn't have to be exactly, or even similar to someone else's, as long as those properties are met.

no its my fault, I didn't see the replies in front of mine(rather I had the thread open, so they weren't there yet on my screen)

wow! looks killer..

are you talking about the headstock itself or the scarf joint?

most necks are usually at 1" thick(back of neck to top of fretboard), with a much thinner headstock.

a picture speaks a thousand words..

whatever link you posted is bad...

personally, I would try and check out your local hardwood dealer before buying online.

chances are you can find a better deal there.

I tend to look online for the high figured woods, witch seam harder to find locally.

If you add luthier to wood, it seams to magically go up in value. mainly because they machine it to standard sizes and plane it. But that took me no time at all..

I have no Idea what your building, be it a Bass, a guitar, or what your plans are.

Im guessing your fairly new to woodworking, so Id start with somthing cheaper so if/when you cut something wrong, its not very expensive.

Alder, Poplar, and Basswood are commonly recommended.

With that said, my first guitar used swamp ash with quilted maple, then the neck was made of Padauk, maple, and mahogany. I learned alot, and although I used nice, expensive wood, Its pretty much worthless to me now as far as the quality I require for myself, and I wish I built one super simple first.

I wont even get into Tonewood yet until I know your plans.

+1 on not stripping it..

for one, the wood may not be standard cuts, and have weird division lines in the middle of it.

two, swamp ash is a cool figure, but may not be what your used to seeing...

Id either buy another body, or another guitar to try it on, because just like wes said, if you like it as is, it probably wont live up to what you expect.

I have a KKV that was stripped to have a natural look, but once the guy saw it was 3 pieces he wanted to get rid of it.. $50 later and I have a flying V that would look good with a normal finish, but TERRIBLE natural..

haha

I didnt see where you said what the neck would be. My bad.

Also, there wernt any shots of the neck itself so I assumed you had it in there to not look like a floating body...

I did that with some of mine to line up the routes before I had finished the neck for it.

I say you teach the boy something to keep him interested and encourage him to get a teacher..... Smoke on the Water, Iron Man, Born to be Wild Something that will keep the drive to get better going.

+1 to that, the first few songs I learnt were Black Sabbath songs, Black Sabbath Iron Man then The Wizzard as I remember. Teach him something he wants to learn though, its the best way to keep him interested

Once you've taught him some scales you might want to do some jam sessions with him (get him to play a simple rythm and solo over it to show him some new techniques then swap and get him to do some improvisation) my guitar teacher did that with me and it really does help you get the hang of the scales and techniques quickly.

yeah thats how I learned improvisation as well.

I had him playing some chord changes to a basic harmony, something super simple, basic switching, and he kinda felt like is was a waste of time to keep repeating when he already learned it, So I picked up my guitar, told him to keep going, copied him and then did some lead stuff off of it..

was a good model to master the basics...

still freaky to see kids absorb so much so fast.

is that the neck going with it or is that just a sample one?

that strats pretty cool!

one thing im curious about, what if you had a figured top that would cover the neck lams?

should you just carve the angle out of the blank, or do something like what you did?

where are you located, mainly what country...

im also using the newest version of FF and not having the issues..

occasionally I will, but im on here 3 times a day and its ok.. I also have a hot link right on top so I dont have to type it.. maybe your security is set different..

Im going to try and help you the best I can, being a lefty strat player, and a hobbyist, I'm going to do my best.

First off, your tremolo is a standard left handed one. I think your talking about the wammy bar itself.

whats the double sided tape or whatever on the headstock?

and when you say you cut a hole in the bridge do you mean the pickguard?

as far as comfort goes, you wont have the usual arm rest on the side, it will be more like a Telecaster. But with the bridge a bit further away. a Similar feel to the LP you have(Nice BTW lets see more pics)

why HSH? ever look into the compact stuff by SD? My strat uses the duckbucker humbucker and a set of high gain hotrails.. Killer..

anyway

Q.1

Your Tremolo can use the same 6 mounting points as the vintage trem you have, but the offset for the bar will have to be widened( notice the trem pocket is slightly wider to accompany the bar, but the sadles are still centered with the mounting screws.) a simple router will do this, but you will see the gap on the other side. Personally, the reason SRV did the same swap was because he and Jimi wanted the bar to fall over the bridge(well, Jimi HAD to have it like that). So id just leave it.. It looks more Jimi anyway.

Q.2

Understandable, whenever I play upside down strats I notice the cord rubbing my arm and annoying me.

to do what your saying you'll need a long drill bit to get to one of the cavitys(the existing jack cavity being the closest) and it would be a impressive mod to say the least.

Q.3 Volume and tone controls:

I dont see why the bar would get in the way, unless you mean simpy using a lefty bar on the right handed trem, it would be in the way as much as it is on yours.. but thats only if you tighten it and not let it sit flat.

when you said tremolo earlyer, did you just mean the bar?

as far as a kill switch, a simple push pull pot can be wired for that.

Q.4

asuming your repainting the body(witch with routing for the trem pocket, if thats indead what you ment, would almost be required) otherwise, I think Id just leave it.. nothing else would look right..

Q.5

a hammer.. seriously..

its possible its glued on and there are a few things, like heat or whatever, but im not versed enough in that, mine came off with a good wack to a flat head.

Q.6

a router, obviously

witch way is the bow? for mine I turned it clockwise when the action was to high..

why do you need new knobs?

and dont forget your going to need to drill a new spot for the strap button.. otherwise it will flip over on you while playing(at least that what they do for me!)

when I built a few sub boxes I cut right through it without whitening.

I dont know how you would do the sides though..

I think there more art pieces for the regular world, not so much for the players world.

that said, and with someone in a Art background, there composition is pretty decent, and the use of color and design is intriguing..

and if they were simply paintings on a wall Id think they were pretty cool.

as a luthier the first thing I noticed is that they wouldnt be that playable, and that the necks are boring.

thats based on the few I saw, that websites mixed up, I cant tell if theres one company or like 4 different ones.

The totem stuff in the gallery's is mixed, some is terrible, some are awesome.

the custom basses of the main page dont look bad IMO..

but whatevea.

Im wondering, because it was brought up for a maple top thread I was reading before, but if your going to glue the top to the body, wont that hold it in place?

I know when I glued my maple insert, I used 2 25lb weights and once the glue dried it was perfect.

how bad is the cupping?

Just saying, so you dont have to wait a year for a nice top, that would work out fine simply glued.. especially if its going to get carved.

whats the other pickup they use besides the dimebucker?

and I like the guitars, but the weird dean headstock always bothers me..

http://www.warmoth.com/guitar/necks/necks....uitar_neckwoods

for the direct link...

If you've got two pickups you could give them each their own output, both going to a box on the floor where you can put all your switching and volume and tone needs. It would be hard to control volume and tone on the floor though, and you'd look silly with two cables coming out.

Love From Samuel.

P.S.

I think controlling each pickup I have with a separate volume control is aaaaaawesome.

the first part impressed me as thinking like a GuitarNut! ............................. but then you lost me.

think separate outputs, with the neck and middle being controlled by the 5-way, having their own volume and tone control.

the bridge HB has it's own volume control on the guitar, but the output is send through the extra connection on a STEREO shielded cable.

both signals travel separately down the same cable to a box where they are split.

from there to separate effects chains, the 2 chains joined by a A/B box, then to the amp.

one stomp on the A/B switch and you switch from normal to lead.

+1 on something I wasn't thinking of..

I kept seeing a standard switch on the ground..

I wonder also, with a stereo cable/jack is it possible to use the guitar with a normal cable? Assuming that the bridge pickup wouldn't work..

yeah, I googled it and got this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_walnut

why dont you just scrap that neck for a new one? or at least attach it for the grade then make another one.

The body is pretty decent but you will never be happy with that neck.

if youve concluded this already please ignore this..

I used padauk for my Tele style neck(was part of a lam)

its a nice wood, a bit waxy sometimes and the pores are a decent size(about the same as mahogany)

only issue with it is that its UV sensitive, so if you dont keep it in a case during downtime(or at least out of direct light) the Vibrant red will fade to a more brown color.

I read that bloodwood doesnt fade, but I cant confirm that.

the dust wasnt worse then any other wood ive worked with, just much more visible, and can stain clothes a nice pink color..

That's about all the info you'll get on Padauk besides tone and the fact that it smells nice. I have yet to fully finish a guitar with Padauk, but the stuff I have is quite resonant. Slightly less bright than Hard Maple.

yep, its part of a multi piece laminate with mahogany strip slightly larger then a half inch that runs through it as well as two 1/16 strips of maple:

so I cant really pick apart the tonality of it.

it WAS rougher to shape by hand, but the machine tooling felt normal.

as far as finishing it goes.

I've read that Marine lacquer can, but the threads here on PG are a bit spotty on first hand experience with it.

for the feel, I recommend a oil finish.

surprised drak hasnt replied yet..