metalwarrior

This guy seemed to have no problems cutting through aluminium to make his jig to cut multi-scale fingerboards:

http://www.doolinguitars.com/articles/novax/

I didn't win anything. After reading the other thread I'm not surprised.

When I shielded my guitar I managed to kill the sound completely.

I had an EMG 85, 1 volume, battery and a stereo output jack all wired up and working correctly, but when I touched the pickup with my finger there would be a buzz so I decided to shield the pickup cavity as well as the control cavity in the back. When I did there was no sound at all, unless I unplugged the cable most of the way, then there would be sound, but the volume control seemed to be bypassed as the volume didn't change no matter where on the dial I turned it to.

When I pulled it apart I tried it again with the volume control hanging out the back, but with everything still wired up exactly the same, and to my surprise it worked again, the only difference being the volume pot was no longer in contact with the shileding paint.

After searching here on pg for similar threads I see that it might be caused by a ground loop or wiring things to the wrong place - and that's what it turned out to be. I am using a flush mount output jack that came with no instructions so I had to guess which lug was which. When I switched two of the wires around it worked in reverse to how it had been before ie, when touching the shielding paint it would now work when the cable was plugged all the way in.

The only thing that still confuses me is the ground wire between the volume pot and the out put jack - it makes no difference if it is even connected or not. I tested the guitar before connecting it (so only two of the three output jack lugs were connected) and it worked perfectly with no buzzing or cutting out. I connected it any way and it still works with no problems.

I have both of the stewmac ones too. For most of the neck shaping task I use a much coarser rasp though (I think it's Nicholson brand from the local hardware store). Then I do the final bit of shaping with the coarser of the two stewmac ones before sanding. The finer of the two never gets used.

I'm half way through building a guitar that needs some pick ups. Maybe if no one else enters I can win by default.

I used shellac primer / sealer, followed by PPG Dulon white acrylic lacquer, and finished with a top coat of Rustin's Plastic Coating. It seemed to work quite well together. I think I read somewhere that it is meant to be compatible with just about everything.

Your pics aren't loading. It is putting the "..." in the address rather than the full address.

I originally decided to go with the ferrule option to save me $5 on a neck plate, and have come to love the look of them. You can carve away more wood to give better access to the upper frets. They are no harder to install than a neck plate as long as you have the right sized drill bit.

As for sustain... this particular guitar doesn't have the best sustain, but I'm not sure it's the neck pocket that's responsible.

Here's a pic:

The Kahler has a string lock which goes right behind the nut so the strings are still locked. It stays in tune pretty well so far. The only problem I have had with the Kahler is the screws that come with it are so soft they get shredded very easily, and replacement screws are a dolloar each! One of the ones to screw it into the body is beyond repair, and I haven't replaced it yet, but it isn't a major concern.

The body might end up an 80s style fluoro yellow or green, so I'm not too worried about it looking a bit flashy

I'm hoping by having the letters there I will finally learn where all the notes are, and what notes are in which scales / chords etc. I could go with plain dots but I would prefer the letters as well so I will email Doug when I figure out the measurements.

It sounds pretty good, the Earvana does make a difference at the first few positions.

The reason for the input jack so high up is so when I'm sitting on the bed the cord can still fit without getting jammed into the mattress.

I'm not sure I have it wired up correctly though. The first time I wired it up the volume control did nothing, the volume was high whether I turned it up or down. After rewiring it, it now goes from 0 to 10, but stays really low and then turns up quickly all at once. I think I have read this can be caused by using the wrong type of pot (log / linear) but I am using the one supplied by EMG so I assume it's the right one.

Although this was not the first guitar I started building it is the first I have completed. I'm pretty pleased with it.

The body is based on the Ibanez 540p, aka 540 Power. I always loved the look of this guitar since Joe Satriani was pictured with one on some of his earlier albums. The headstock is a reverse ESP style.

Hardware:

Kahler Hybrid Tremolo / Behind the nut stringlock

Earvana Nut

Fender Tuners

EMG 85 - 1 Volume

Flush Mount Input Jack

Dunlop Straplocks

I have an inlay idea, but I am not sure if it is doable, even with CNC.

I want to inlay the names of the notes in their respective positions all the way up the neck, using a different colour for each letter:

Here is a totally out of proportion mock up:

Is anyone able to do this? Or should I just forget the lettering and find some coloured circles and inlay it myself?

I bought the Z-vise from one of those shows, and although it is the best vise I own, it isn't as good as the guy at the show makes it look.

One thing you need to consider is he doesn't actually clamp anything down tight and put any pressure on it. When you use that vise in the rotating / swivelling mode, you can't actually clamp a guitar neck tight enough to stop it from moving when you go to work on it.

Other than that, if you just want a vise that adjusts easily and can be removed from the bench in seconds it's not too bad. As for holding guitar necks in a vise with non adjustable jaws, I just wrap it in a sock.

I was looking for the same thing a few months back. You can get ones that aren't behind the nut, but I think they are new old stock or something. I saw them on ebay, and they were going for about US$70 each, which is why I still don't have one.

When taking some wood off the top of the board you may have accidently taken a bit extra off the edges. I did this to one of my necks. To fix the problem I left the frets about 10mm past the edge of the board and after pressing them in with a fret press I hit the ends with a hammer to over bend them and it did the trick.

ABS plastics are also used in the kitchen industry as edge binding. They come in rolls 25 or even 50 metres long (75 to 150 feet).

It will definately be too tall and you will have far less options in thickness, but you will have unlimited options in colours.

You could also do a regular bookmatch, then take the off cuts add stick them on the widest parts of the wings and do a black burst of some kind to hide it if it doesn't look as good as you want in those areas.

Just a thought (I have never scalloped a neck or really looked into it) using the pvc idea you could find a way to attach it to your drill/drill press and have and electric cylindrical-contour sander.

That's the way I do it - put a dowel with sand paper in a drill. Doing it this way allows you to sand with the grain and is much quicker than doing it by hand.

while it's running, squirt some oil into the intake and watch your pressure guage. If the pressure begins to rise and then fall again, it may mean that the piston rings are stuck, dirty, or toast. The oil artificially serves to seal the blowby. Let me know what comes up.

I tried squirting some oil into the intake when it was running and most of it got blown back out the intake and also some smoke was created.

I tried turning it off and then squirting some more oil in there before turning it back on and once again it got blown back out the intake, this time all over the shed. There was smoke too. The pressure change was minimal if any - less than 5 psi.

There was also some oil sprayed out on the other side of the compressor, where the little copper tube connects to the pressure gauges. I didn't get a chance to look into it though because the whole thing was pretty hot by that stage.

The hole is there as a breather. As the piston goes up and down, a certain pressure/vacuum cycle is created in the crankcase. If the breather hole wasn't there the oil in the crankcase would foam up and not provide efficient lubrication and would also end up blowing the oil into your air system. When you say air "leaks" from the hole, a small amount of air coming from the hole is quite possibly normal. Excessive air would probably blow some oil out of the crank as well. If this is the case, then I would be tempted to say that your piston ring(s) are at fault. Refer to my oil in the intake test in my previous reply to determine if it really is the rings that are at fault. Just out of curiousity, how old is this compressor, and how much action has it seen. Also, do you live in a humid climate? Albeit long-distance, I'm brainstorming your problem. It's getting personal now .

Cheers

The compressor is about 3 or 4 years old I think. It has not seen much use at all, mostly just used to blow dust off stuff. Sometimes it would go for months without being used. In the beginning I used to drain it every time I would use it, but lately when I use it more often I haven't bothered.

The climate here in Adelaide, Australia is fairly dry most of the time.

I will try the oil test next time I am in the shed.

I had a look at some new air compressors today and it looks like I will be limited by my power supply which is 240v / 10amps.

The biggest one I can get is 250 litres per minute, 174 litres free air. I think that's 8.8cfm / 6.1cfm.

It has a 58L (15 gallon) tank.

The gun I just bought off ebay consumes 130lpm (4.6cfm), so that compressor should get the job done, but it's gonna cost me $600

I just had another thought.

Can you hear air leaking into the crankcase by removing the oil filler cap. This would indicate air is leaking past the outlet valve and escaping past the piston rings down the bore.

Im sure it is a moisture related problem and there is corrosion that causing vital parts not to seal.

There is a little hole in the oil cap, and there is a leak coming from there only when the compressor is turned on, but doesn't let air out when switched off.

Is there a way to fix it or is it totally screwed?

I'm going to have an Earvana nut on my current build. I've never tried a compensated nut before but I'm hoping I installed it in the right place

It looks like you have placed an OEM Earvana nit into the ordinary nut slot in a standard Fender board. If so, you are in the wrong place. The idea is to move the breaking point of the nut towards the bridge. If you place an OEM nut in the ordinary nut slot you will move the breaking point away from the bridge.

I have installed quite a few Earvana nuts and I think that you should wait for the Floyd Rose drop in retrofit nut. It’s not out yet. Out soon. And they said that like two years ago too…

That is actually a StewMac board, and if I remember correctly the nut slot was so thin I had to widen it to fit the earvana, and I widened it towards the bridge direction. I think I even emailed the people at Earvana to make sure I went forward the right amount. That was a while ago though, and now you have all got me second guessing whether I did it right or not after all.

Hopefully I'll have my spray equipment set up to finish it on the weekend and then I'll be ready to set it up and try it out.

I thought about not cutting the first three fret slots and stringing the guitar and intonate at the twelfth fret and use a piece of wire to figure where the frets should be to be in tune and mark each side of the wire. I guess you would end up with those crooked frets if you did that. Very hard to cut slots like that without a CNC machine as well.

I have seen where there is a bend just around the B string. What they do is cut off the tang where it is bent then just use a straight slot for the non bent part.

The water separator you are talking about is the thing you put just below the handle of the spray gun right?

And by air dryer you mean some thing totally seperate thats not connected to anything? The only dessicant I know of are those little packets (that look like sugar sachets) that get shipped with some products.

No, there are no audible leaks when it's off and up to pressure.