mattharris75

First carving session on the neck this evening. It's looking somewhat neck-like now, but it's got a long way to go, I'm just too worn out to keep going tonight. A bit of an odd-one for me, as with the single cut design it's highly asymmetrical, which requires me not to fall asleep at the wheel and take a bite where I shouldn't...

Thanks guys. Here's a bit more progress on the carve. I think I'm about to 90% done, just little tweaking of angles and curves and cleaning things up at this point.

It's very rough, but it's a start. Going to have to put in some hours to get this refined, but I think it's headed in a good direction.

Pickups routed. Started working on the top carve on the bass side. You can see the knot on the upper bout, which I think is a pretty nice little beauty mark.

I had them cut by a service called Send Cut Send. I think highly reflective metals require more power, but they do cut a variety of metals. I've also had them cut titanium before.

Thanks guys. @ScottR the logo is laser cut out of brass. Neck pocket is routed. I'll get the pickups and control cavity done, then the part I'm looking forward to: carving the body!

Thanks guys. @Bizman62, the overall simplicity of my templates and jigs is in large part born out of experience. My first couple of builds I did the opposite, and made templates and jigs for everything. After a while you learn what your critical dimensions are, what you are capable of doing by hand, and where you really shouldn't wing it. If I was interested in making a run of the same instruments and needed a repeatable and simple process I wouldn't work this way. But doing one-off builds, and being more worried with expressing creativity and letting yourself adjust and tweak as you see things come to life, there's really just no reason for it.

@ScottR it's not quite finished yet, but this should give you an idea of how the headstock carve is going to look:

Alright, headstock time! First thing to do, drill the tuner holes: Then use some .625" pieces of MDF, with a little binding tape to keep the rails tight to each other and double sided tape to hold it on, for my routing template: Fresh off the router. Needs a little sanding where that router burn is, but it's looking good:

I think Birchwood Casey's Tru Oil would be a good option for you. It's easy to apply. Plus it's safe enough to wipe it on by hand, and inside, without a bunch of noxious fumes. And there are a lot of tutorials out there on how to achieve the finish you want with it.

Only in the area behind the nut where the strings break down toward the tuners, Scott. It should look quite nice, nothing too radical here. It'll make more sense when I get the headstock finished. I finished the binding on the neck. The fretboard is all shined up, but there are still some scratches in the first 4 frets, so that will require a bit more work. Here's a quick mockup. The positioning of everything is roughly (very roughly) correct. You can barely see the pencil line where the last few inches of the neck will get cut off.

More work done on the neck. I tapered the neck and glued and trimmed the fretboard, and glued the headplate and backstrap laminates. Then it was time to use my jiggiest of jigs. The binding jig: I hot glued the neck and the MDF together to have a nice solid platform and ran it through. I got one side of the binding glued on tonight and will get the rest finished up and sanded flush to the fretboard this weekend. I also cut the outside profile of the headstock. Here's a quick preview of how the laminates look together: Should look cool once the interior is cut out and the ramp down to the tuners is carved.

Absolutely! It was also a great opportunity, as my 8 year old daughter (who is absolutely a 'maker' type and in spite of her ADHD can really focus and absorb this sort of information) was helping me, and was able to see me work through a problem. Hopefully a little learning experience for her as well.

Thanks Ash. Neck update. When gluing the neck blank I didn't manage to get my alignment pins all the way through, which made things a bit sloppy. Between that and cleaning the blank up I managed to introduce a bit of twist, about 5 mm corner to corner. So I made an MDF sled, shimmed the blank level, secured it with some hot glue, and ran it through the thickness sander until it was flat. I then cut/sanded the blank down to 22 mm thickness and laid out the headstock/taper/fretboard position/ truss rod/etc on the blank. I then proceeded to make another mistake. When routing for the truss rod the edge guide managed to slip a bit on the second pass, which I didn't notice on the third pass, because I was apparently on autopilot. So, I fixed the edge guide 2 mm the other direction, tightening it down better this time, and routed in the correct spot. Then I cut a 2mm walnut shim, glued it in, and scraped it flush. No harm no foul. So the neck (well, my own carelessness really) is fighting me a bit so far, but progress is being made. Next up, route the neck taper and get the fretboard glued on and cut flush to the neck.

Thanks, Andy. Neck blank glued up, out of the clamps, and cleaned up. I need to run it through the jointer to get it squared up and then get it sanded down to final thickness. Then I can really get started on making a neck out of it...

Yes, I think this is going to do the trick nicely...

Low blow, Scott! Although true... I do feel like I've sped things up a little recently! @Bizman62 , when he said he 'pulled it out of a barn' I take that to mean that it was stored in a barn. Just looking at the wood when I got it, while rough, it didn't look as if it had spent years facing the elements. I think barns here are typically cheap and local timbers as well, but I'm no barn expert! It would certainly be a waste to use this wood as barn siding, but then if that's what was on the property at the time, who knows?

Hah! If you say so, Scott. Went by my buddy's shop today and got a few nice pieces of cherry that he'd pulled out of a barn in Murfreesboro Tennessee. Six feet long, nearly an inch and a half thick, one of them 7" wide and the other 10". Plenty for this bass and some leftovers for a few necks and maybe an electric mandolin in the future. Got the body and neck stringers cut, planed, and sanded. It cleaned up really nice. I think it's going to do the trick! I'll get the neck and body blank glued up over the next few days and start making some sawdust this weekend.

That's how I do it too. Puts the joint in the middle of the headstock. The wings go on the headstock, the headplate and backstrap go on, it's an invisible and strong joint.

I actually did it the newfangled way and imported the pictures into my Adobe Illustrator design file, which has not only hardware but my carve lines. The fact that some of the lower bout will be carved away for the arm rest influenced the positioning as well.

I think depending on the shape of the instrument it could move an inch or two either way, but there's definitely a sweet spot in there! I went ahead and cut down the top and made the veneers for the head plate and backstrap. It's 1.5mm thick walnut with 1.5mm thick maple underneath it. I decided to go with some pretty simple non-figured walnut, as I don't think it needs it be a feature, since you won't see much of it with the open headstock. Figure might, in fact, be distracting in such a small area. I'll be heading to my buddy's shop on Wednesday to pick out the cherry for the body and remainder of the neck. I should make some good progress this coming weekend!

Yeah, as a builder if you're not giving the wood proper consideration then what are you even doing?!?! After fretting over it for a bit this is the position I'm leaning toward:

Thanks Andy. I wasn't able to pick up the cherry this week, but I did get some work done on the wood that I do have. Maple and walnut neck stringers are cut and sanded. The outside pieces of the neck laminate will be cherry. And the maple veneer/stripe that will go between the walnut top and cherry back has been joined and sanded down to 5mm thickness. The top has been joined and thicknessed down to 14mm. There is currently a lot of extra wood on each end of the blank. I'm going to print out a paper template and get the placement where I want it to show off the grain to the best effect, then I'll cut off the excess before gluing up the body blank. I need to hurry up and get my truss rod and fretboard and whatnot ordered, because I'll be needing them fairly soon...

As I finish up the details on my Zenith guitar build planning for my next project has ramped up. Many years ago I built a bass for a buddy of mine. I was simultaneously building a 'cousin' for myself. My friend's bass turned out great, but there were some things about the one I was building for myself that I just wasn't satisfied with. So off to the closet it went, unfinished. So now it's time to begin a new bass. Why Zenith bass? Well, it's got a 'hook' on the horn like my Zenith guitar ( and like the mandola that preceded it). So let's keep the theme going! I built my wife a keepsake box for Christmas, and I loved the color combination of black walnut and makore: So walnut and cherry with a maple accent layer it is! I have a pretty large stash of walnut that has some interesting grain to it. But most of it is oddly sized and in very rough shape, twisted, cupped, etc, etc. It was all stuff that was cut down locally by a family friend and stored in his attic for years, perhaps decades. Digging through the pile I found some interesting pieces: So I spent some time cleaning it up, squaring it up on the table saw, planing it, thickness sanding, etc: I think we have something here! As for the cherry, a cabinet maker friend of mine has some old, old boards that he pulled out of a barn up in Tennessee. I'll be heading by his shop to pick out some of this within the next week or so: Hardware on this will be gold or brass. The neck will be laminated from cherry/maple/walnut, and it will have an open style headstock like my previous bass, patterned after Dave Higham's open headstock design. Fretboard will likely be ebony, but that's subject to change. The body will have a fairly deep and organic carve to it. Should be a fun little project, I can't wait to see what this top looks like when it's all said and done!

Not longwinded or boring at all! Personally I've wanted to see a step by step of this technique for years, so thank you!