Acousticraft

Thanks scott. It made sense that it should be flat but thought I would check. Have you got the 12" rad or the compound, as I feel tempted to go with the compound?

Im building some Strat type guitars with students and want to know if anyone has used some of their pickups. Im looking for a set for blues/rock and also no doubt some of these kids probably want extreme metal type sounds that will probably make me cringe. Any suggestions what people have used or can suggest? Are these pickups noisy as I am a humbucker fan and dont know much about them? Thanks in advance.

Does anyone know whether the 25.5" Fender radiused/slotted fingerboard has the 1/8th" nut slot cut with a flat bottom or a radius. I couldnt see this info on their web page. I need to know if I need a flat bottomed or radiused nut?

I am getting ready to build some solid body guitars with students. I have not built a strat myself, mine have all been Gibson inspired. I thought a strat style guitar would be good as the electrics are all mounted on the pick guard which to me would speed things up hopefully. My query is regarding the headstock. The strat headstock as it is shaped has very little string break over angle so you need to use string trees, and it would seem to me to be harder to sand and thickness. What if I just angled the headstock even to 10 degrees? I am thinking it would be easier to cut, face and thickness the headstock. what do you pilgrims out in guitar land think? I am not a stickler for authenticity. Being an engineer I like things to be practical and functional.

Yes it should be 1/4' deeper in the middle of the neck. When you tighten the nut and the rod is under tension it tries to pull itself straight and thus pushes up the middle of the neck. I seen some pretty wacko descriptions by supposed experts about how a single acting truss rod work. Its like a tow rope when the force comes on it pulls itself straight. I'm going to build guitars with some school students and decided to use hot rods. a lot easier and quicker hopefully. It may change my thinking about one way truss rods in the future.

I just repaired a broken headstock on an acoustic for a friend and glued it with epoxy for max strength. I touched up the crack line with tinted lacquer with a tooth pick. It did hide the crack line mostly, but as I told him if he wanted a perfect job then it would have to be sanded, filled and re- lacquered which would take off the logo and be quite a job. It wasn't a expensive acoustic after all, but he was very happy to have it back again. The same would apply with your headstock. Without sanding back, filling and refinishing it is hard to hide a crack line like that.

I put a 1/4" fairly even curve over where the truss rod will sit but make it flatten where it comes under the finger board at the nut. This is so it doesn't sit up too high and foul the truss rod cover. My latest technique is to bend the end of the rod sharply to 90 degrees and anchor it into a neat fitting hole in the heel area of the neck. I have always made my own truss rods using threaded rod or threading my own. I dont bother using stainless as it is an overkill IMHO. I use silicone grease to lube the threads at the nut when I set up the guitar.

Yes I have been looking at guitar fetish hardware and it looks enticing but I have no experience of their stuff. I know other members here buy gear from them.

Very retro looking. Cool

Excuse my ignorance. What is the purpose of those nicely dovetailed (Sappelle) cabinets? Bit to nice for nail boxes dont you think. LOL Get an answerphone then you want get interupted. Also congrats on winning the Cricket world Cup again.

Ive been to Denver the mile high city many years ago (1984) when my wife and I toured across the US and Canada for 4 months in a small Campervan (VW). We didnt get to Texas though. Great memories of a great trip. Actually Ive got a belt with all these pictures of semi trailer trucks engraved on it that I got in a town near Denver and I still use it.

Gee some of you guys must have understanding, or deaf neighbors if you are rocking at concert levels. I usually only crank the levels loud if the rest of my family are out and only for a short time so I don't get too off side with my neighbors.

When I first sit down by my amp to jam and pass the time, I like to start off with wicked distortion, compression, using the bridge pickup and after a bit of shredding, chugging, palm muting etc. I grow bored with that. I am playing thru my self built 335. I then switch to a clean channel and often without any effects use the neck pickup and just noodle around playing jazz or blues type stuff. I find this a lot more invigorating and satisfying than the dirty stuff to be quite honest. What are your preferences guys?

There is a 14 1/4" long one with an 1/8" allen nut that will do the job. http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Truss_rods/Hot...Truss_Rods.html

This was something i wanted to try for a while but never got round to it previously. I plugged one of my big Hi fi stereo speakers into my Vox AD50VT amp and tried it both with my own handbuilt acoustic guitar and 335. The acoustic sounded really good through the Boutique Clean(Dumble) setting once I dialed in the EQ settings. The 335 didn't sound as nice as the standard speaker did though. I'm thinking the acoustic was good due to the big frequency response of a Hi fi speaker with its compliment of woofers, mid range and tweeters etc. (6 speakers). I thought if you were going to gig with a guitar amp using an acoustic this may be the way to go. With a little volume and really plucking the bass strings I could get this cool sounding feedback going from about 8 feet away from the speaker.

There is no way I can build even a very basic electric guitar in NZ without it costing about 50% more than a brand new Squire Strat. I cant even buy the parts for what one of them cost here. I liken guitar building to boat building. The wood is the cheap part but the hardware cost is where the price soars. But then that basic guitar you build does not have a plywood body but probably has wood as good as a custom guitar.

The very first acoustic I made had a fat neck like hanging on to a 2x4. Idrilled a tiny hole 1/16" in the back of the neck to see what depth the truss rod was at by poking the drill bit in and measuring off it. I figured as long as it had about 3mm / 1/8" it would be fine. I released the truss rod tension and clamped the neck down to at the heel and headstock and had the rest of the guitar overhanging my work bench. I set up some thick rails so the router base could sit over the top of the neck and routed off about 6mm 1/4" from memory going as far each way before the router base hit the heel and headstock. Next I clamped the guitar so the neck was overhanging the bench and with my trusty spoke shave reshaped the neck. The finished neck felt great and not huge and chunky any more. The tiny hole was filled with filler a matching colour. I needed to refinsh it so I used paint stripper and scraped off the old finish and sanded it. Then I used my old electric kettle to steam out some dings in the soundboard and laquered it. Came out awesome but I dont really think it sounded any different with a thinner neck or finish but a lot nicer to play. I aim for a neck thickness overall of 21-22mm aprox 13/16-7/8" including fingerboard. As for electric necks there is a very low string tension in comparison to an acoustic so thickness for strength is not an issue.

If you dont have a ground from the bridge to a pot casing or whereever your ground is, you will have buzzes etc that will probably go away when you touch the strings because you become the ground. As far as being electrocuted you would need a major short circuit in an amplifier to get shocked so all the more reason for your strings to be well grounded.

I know the router bit is not spinning fast enough ideally in a drillpress but if you take light cuts it does the job ok. Lack of equipment makes you think outside the square and adapt something to do the job. I have done at least 4 headstocks this way with no problem but it is certainly quicker using a good router setup. As far as facing the headstock is concernened on a jointer, use a scrap piece and set it so it has a light cut. Feed it very slowly and use a block to push the headstock down flat on the table keeping fingers clear and cutting with the grain. You know after the first pass if your going with the grain or not.

Maybe try your local guitar store they may have leftover boxes that guitars were shipped in.

Hey Rhoads I bet you don't have any cobwebs in your workshop as that rig will truly blow them away. Am I the only one here who plays a humble Valvetronic. I do get tempted by other amps but for practicality, portability this fits the bill as well as lots of nice tonal palette's when cranking thru my 335.

Did you try the bypass of the master to see if it makes any difference?

You may need to unsolder the pickup wires and do some testing with an ohm meter to work out the ground, humbucker and coil cut circuit wires. I would imagine the red but I'm only guessing, is probably the humbucker circuit and the white/ green are coil cut options. The humbucker circuit will give the highest reading and the coil cut about half of that reading. Have you tried googling to see if you can find a wiring diagram. I just found something that may help. http://www.gibson.com/Gear_News.aspx?Alias...up%20the%20Pace

You need to face the top of the head stock accurately by using a jointer to skim it flat or a sanding machine. Once you have a true face then you can thickness the underside by method in have used several times before. Put a router bit in a drill press. Adjust the table height and without moving the feed handle, take light cuts by sliding the headstock flat across the table backwards and forwards under the router bit. Keep taking light cuts until you are about 1/2 mm thicker than desired. that will allow you to sand it smooth without going under size. A couple of things to bear in mind. Tighten the router bit really tight so it doesn't move in the chuck and have the drill on the highest speed it will go. Using a router on rails does the same except the bulk of the base doesn't allow you to get right in near the neck. I have a router that is removable from the base and I can use it like a die grinder to carve and shape the last bit by hand. I also use this for the truss nut adjustment slot so I have room to just get a socket on the nut.

Why the need for the master volume? If it is wired the exactly as per the diagram I would try bypassing the master volume by putting a jumper wire across the lugs to see if that makes any difference. You want one with an alligator clip either end. Happy hunting.