Rick500

Were they actually selling for $350, or were they listed for $350?

Wow. I don't throw around sentences like this lightly, but: That is quite possibly the best looking guitar I have ever seen. I'm not joking. And +1 on Fraser Valley Fine Woods. I've bought several tops from him and have always been more than happy.

I've got the stainless steel 25/25.5 template. The whole system (other than the saw, as I said before) works very well.

LMI has a Japanese saw with a .023" kerf.

Gotta start somewhere. When an idea comes to me, I make a quick rough sketch first too. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so it's really completely up to you. Don't let someone else discourage you if you find a shape you really like. But you asked, so I'll chime in and say that I don't think the rounded-and-pointy-at-the-same-time look really works. Even so, I think the last one is the best of the bunch.

If that's still not enough, you might be able to rip it in half and individually plane the halves, then glue up the pieces.

I can't answer all your questions (I'm fairly new at this myself), but I can tell you that I'm building a solid mahogany guitar right now, and my mahogany slab looked just about identical to yours before I started working it. I don't think your mahogany is stained. Maybe it had some sort of sealer or wax or something applied to it. Does it feel waxy? I planed a bit off of each face of mine and the coloration is now the same on both faces. You shouldn't have a problem building a body out of that piece, regardless of how it was cut. Mahogany is relatively dimensionally stable, so you probably don't have too much to worry about. One word of caution: If you're routing the endgrain for any reason, be very, very careful and only take off tiny amounts of wood at a time. I had a huge tear-out problem on mine. I ended up having to cut a quarter inch off and reshape the bottom of the body. Next time I work with mahogany, I'll rough cut it on the band saw and then Robo-sand it.

If you do go after it with steel wool, tape up your pickups first, or the steel wool bits will be all over them.

Oops... don't click on that Taylor factory tour link from work. It goes to an adult site.

Anyone here have a Ryobi BT3100 table saw? I've had mine for about a year now, and I'm increasingly annoyed by the unusual "SMT" (sliding miter table) and lack of standard miter slots, and its habit of going out of adjustment every few cuts. Most of the reviews and opinions I've read about it are quite the opposite, so I'm just wondering if I have a dud, or maybe it's just my weird personal preferences. Along the same lines, does anyone have any budget-priced ($300 or less) table saw recommendations?

I have a 12" Jet bandsaw. I love it; it's a great tool for what it is. (And the $299 price was right.) However, I wish I'd bought the 14". The one I have can't be raised with riser blocks, and there's not enough room to resaw, say, a maple top. I have a $99 10" Ryobi benchtop drill press, and I've never been disappointed with it, and I haven't needed or wanted to do anything that would require anything bigger.

Mine fits very tightly. The saw, on the other hand, isn't nearly as good as I had hoped. (The teeth aren't very sharp.)

Yeah, I wear the amateur badge proudly. Body fixed, lesson learned. I ended up just taking off about a quarter inch and hand-sanding.

Sorry to thread hijack, by the way...wasn't my intention. I saw fookgub's tear-out and figured I could make him feel better by posting mine. I will use a Robo-sander next time. I used a relatively new Whiteside bit and was taking off maybe 1/16". Anyway, nice job, fookgub; that mahogany is really beautiful.

I had my own little lesson in tear-out last night: (Second pic is back view, before I attacked it with the router.) Eek... I'm thinking about cutting out the damaged area and inlaying a 2" wide flamed maple stripe parallel to the neck, and pretending like I designed it that way. And I'm buying a Robo-sander before I work with mahogany again. First post, btw... hi everyone!