IWishICouldShred

You need a metal surface for powder coating, so a guitar body won't work. Also, the heat needed to cure it would probably cause the wood to crack, if not when it gets hot, then when it cools down and the powder coat would flake if you could even get it to stick at all. What if you had sheet metal cut out and conformed to the body by a really strong adhesive of some sort? The metal would get really hot though and still crack the wood I would imagine. This is sort of what I was thinking. If you had a guitar body with no bevels or curves, you could cut sheet metal parts for the front and back, and even bend pieces for the sides if you really wanted to. Then just get 'em chromed, rivet them into the body, and you're all set.

Bump. Negative feedback encouraged too.

I picked up a neck yesterday from a friend of mine for like 15 bucks and decided to use it for practice defretting, considering that my next project will probably be a fretless. Anyway, I brought it over to my friend's house so we could start working on it, cause it goes much quicker with 2 people. I'll post pics of the de-fret later if you want... I'm going to epoxy it today. It looks sweet. But I digress. Each guitar I have worked on thusfar, I've approached from a carpenter's point of view. I know nothing of carpentry (except now, how guitars work...). After we finished with this neck, I realized that maybe I was taking the wrong approach. My friend is a toolmaker by trade and we do auto body work in our spare time (Currently doing a resto-mod of a '54 GMC pickup)-- with all this experience working with metal between us, why not try and do something a little different? So we started tossing ideas around and came up with this idea to make a tube-frame guitar. It will have the basic outline of a Stratocater or Les Paul, made of metal tubing. We'll add cross-braces to support the control cavity, which will be made of sheet metal (pre-shielded!) and essentially just sit in the middle of the guitar. From there we can either add more interesting electronics (on-board Big Muff?) or add more metal bracing to weigh the guitar down more evenly. If my description isn't clear, picture it this way. Start with an image of a neck-thru-body guitar, but only the neck piece. Now replace the wood with metal, from the end of the fretboard down. Now, instead of the traditional carved wood sides, just think of a steel frame that outlines the edges of the shape of the guitar, connected at the neck and also via a few cross-braces to the control cavity. There are only 2 issues I feel like we'll run into trouble with. 1.) I'm not sure how to do the neck pocket so that it will support the whole deal and 2.) Between being fretless and not having a body, this guitar may run into issues with sustain. On the other hand, we could add chambers or the resonations throughout the tubes might give it a really interesting sound. Another solution to the last problem would be replacing the middle section with a block of some sort of heavy hardwood, and then covering it with sheetmetal panels. Has anyone seen or heard of anything like this before? Successes? Failures? Please let me know what you think!!! This is my first build since I finished "The Green Monster" last summer. I'm not sure if I ever posted pictures of that or not. I left the CD that they were on at the house of the girl I was dating back then, and we don't talk any more... but I have a few hard copies I could scan. It was a neon green/black crackle finish superstrat with a plexiglass pickguard and EMG's with an afterburner. Wow. I talk too much.

Thanks for the help, everyone! I didn't realize I could get a flamed piece! Also, pardon my ignorance about the spalt, but thanks for setting me straight.

there's a HUGE silver maple tree being cut down in my back yard- should I get my hands on a chunk of it? i dunno if silver maple is any good for building guitars. if its not good for a neck, is there a way i could get a piece and spalt it myself?

I like 3 personally. 2 seems kinda off to me for some reason.

It's still going to be very neck heavy. Go with the smallest headstock you can!

Personally, I'd say to beef up the bottom right horn a little to balance with the neck and top left horn, both of which will be pretty heavy.

Will there be enough clearance for the left hand between the top horn and neck? Just a thought. Other than that, it looks quite grim and necro Edit: frostbitten, too!

For those of you with long hair... While doing electrical work and bending over to see into cavities, either tie your hair back or make sure you know exactly where the soldering iron is! Otherwise you might just lose a chunk of hair and possibly your lunch from the smell in the workshop! (This one is not something you think about until it happens! )

*Bump* I just heard that spraying an enamel over a lacquer will also produce a crackle effect- is this true?

That's beautiful. Maybe more of a fish than a snake though

Ok, I'm going to do a crackle finish on a guitar that we just finished routing. I want to do bright green as the bottom coat and black as the crackled part, but, I don't know if the black will come out opaque enough to cover because it needs to be sprayed. Any tips on this before I start? I looked at the old crackle tut. but I'm not sure how opaque the black top-coat will come out. Has anyone had that problem in the past? Also, any suggestions for what brand of glue I should get, and how much it will cost me? thanks!

go long scale and play a baritone tele. that would be positively hideous

I'm doing one on my current project that never seems to go anywhere. Its been a 'current project' since this spring... seriously though I'm doing black over bright green, and I can't wait! go for it, it will look amazing.

I've used those for a long time and they've been great. The nylon is pretty much that of a seat belt. The strap and clips would likely hold me hanging from them. However the little screws commonly used for strap buttons won't take much stress before being yanked out of the guitar. Re-enforcing those screws can be very important. Otherwise, when you jump, hold the body would ya? ← I had to hit a note when i hit the ground... I sorta jumped off of a bass cab which wasnt too bright... Anyway, it isn't the material of the strap that i'm worried about, its the seatbelt mechanism itself. Thanks for the input though, everyone!

A while back, I had an on-stage incident where I jumped off of something with my Explorer, and my strap snapped when I landed. What a pain!!! My straplocks worked fine, but the plastic adjustor on the strap gave out. Yeah, I know I'm going to get replies that say "don't jump, let the music do the talking". Stage presence is important too, and being able to swing my guitar/jump with it and not worry about it smashing on the floor is important. I was thinking about how to prevent it from happening again with the new guitar I am working on now, an I came up with the idea of a strap made out of seatbelts. The seat belt lock mechanism is designed to stop a moving person from exiting a vehicle at 65+ mph, so it should probably hold up. I hope Anyway, I'm wondering if this sort of thing exists, and if not, how do people think it'd work? The basic idea would include one of those belts that they make out of seatbelts, and then corresponding male and female seat belt ends mounted to the guitar with heavy screws. It would clasp on and could be removed, and would probably look sweet too! Anyway if this is in the wrong forum, just tell me and I'll delete it. I don't post on this board very often and didn't know where it should go.

does anyone know the measurements for a Gotoh liscenced floyd rose trem?

I've got an 81/85 set in my current live/recording guitar, and I love it. A lot of the time I use them backwards though- it's suggested that the 81 is for leads, but I think it gives a crunchier rhythm sound and the 85 is smoother for leads. I'm in a metal band but I also use it with my school's jazz band and it sounds great there too. I've heard a lot of people say they don't sound good clean, but they have a really nice response, and through my wireless they sound exactly like an acoustic, which is kind of scary

How thick are you expecting your finish to be, if you think you need to route your trem cavity larger to still fit the trem? And why cannot you spray clear inside the cavity? ← isnt clearcoat fairly thick? i've never done this before are you saying it wouldn't cause a problem at all?

Hey everyone, I'm back on the forum again after being away for a long time, and I'm almost ready to start my first full project! It's starting with an alder Strat body. I've called a local luthier (because I know very little on the subject) and he said he would help me draw up a template to rout it for a Floyd Rose. Then I have to go about routing it on my own, and I might do the monkey handle too, 'cause it looks cool. Anyway, my friend's dad paints cars, and he just painted my friend's bass body, which looks really cool. The problem is that the bass had a flat-mount bridge and cavities that were already too large, so it wasn't really masked at all. How/where would I go about masking my tremolo cavity? Should I just rout it slightly large? The problem with not spraying clear inside the cavity is that the crackled finish will just flake off. Actually! That brings me to another question about the crackled finish. Where can I get a water-based but still very opaque black paint that I can use for the top coat? Thanks if you can help out! I'll post pics as I get stuff done, cause this is going to look amazing if it goes as i planned it- black gotoh Floyd Rose bridge, black paint crackled over green on the bottom, EMG 81 in the bridge position and no other pickups, scalloped maple fretboard, and a headstock painted to match the finish. itll be like a shred machine Peace! and thanks in advance if anyone can help out!

My explorer is made of it and it has a pretty warm tone but not as good as mahogony. But yeah it is a type of wood.

I love it!!! Awesome flame! Whered the idea of the shape come from? Also great job with the routing it looks really clean.

I shred on .11-.49's. Great for building up technique and stuff. I use D'Addario, and for 3 bucks a set, I get a pretty long life out of em!

My Live Rig Samick Explorer with EMG 81/85 set Dunlop Crybaby Dano Surf&Turf compressor (used for boost) Crate MX65R Amp Crate PA with Yamaha Speakers Ideal Rig Samick Explorer with EMG 81/85 set and boost Dunlop Crybaby Crate Blue Voodoo full stack Boss Chromatic Tuner almost done... when i get a job i'll be able to finish it off.