jaycee

That harp guitar is simply gorgeous. Theres so much wood to look at. I bet it will sound so nice when finished. When I see stuff like this and the other pics posted on here it is inspiring helps us to keep going I think

If you leave the wammy bar off you could have a body thats 35mm thick, and use whatever timber you like

The tension caused by the strings is huge, off the top of my head I think it's about 8-10kg per string. so 60 kg of tension when all the strings are in tune!

I live in London you idiot. And i'm suppossed to know that - how about filling in your profile dick for brains ! Maybe you guys both from the UK could have a duel at dawn to sought out your differences

Well I may go and get £2000 worth of dollars wait until the exchange rate changes in favour of the dollar and change it back into £'s ............If I had £2000 that is.........

I live in Barry about 8 miles from Cardiff, so it's only 20 min by train, easier than taking the car i'm in there every couple of weeks any way I just went online and they list it and it says thats it's available. Great idea I wouldn't have thought of checking online thanks I checked online to see if my local library has the book and they do. Only thing is they are closed until January because of moving into a new building

Thats a great offer thanks. I have to make sure my sheep are secure first, and I am going into Cardiff in the next week or so which will give me chance to check the library, they had a few guitar making books in there but I can't remember which ones they were. But I may yet take you up on your offer P.S. Just don't send the crazy cat 'round with the machine gun Cheers

OK thanks guys. So I will decide the thickness on the sides when I know what wood I am using

When I was building my Strat I wondered about the same thing as the gap between the bottom of the fretboard and top of the scratchplate looked odd. I went into my local guitar shop and the gap varied between manufacturers, some sat right on the plate whilst others were proud. On the Fender Strats there was a 1mm ( or there abouts) gap I preferred the gap to be smaller and so I made it that way

On my plans for a 12 string it recommends 2-3 mm thick sides ( = 0.098 inch which is 2.5mm) whats the thinnest that you guys reccommend

Exellent tutorial. Even though some didn't agree with your way of doing the job, you thought it through, took your time and it worked out fine. I drilled the holes for the machine heads on my guitar using a router with the correct size router bit and they came out perfectly square and clean (which you would expect) someone didn't like it and said I should have drilled them. But as with your way of doing a fret job they came out very well and I bet you'll do it the same way on your next one.

I took it to the shop where I got most of the hardware from and the guy in there who plays in a local band was well impressed with the sound and build as are all of my guitar player mates. As this is the first electric I have owned i'm well pleased with it.

Here is my Strat made on a tight budget The neck is made from 2 Pieces of laminated Ash glued along the length of the neck, and a small piece joined to make the head stock wide enough. This I had hanging around for about 10 years. You can see where the joint lines are on the back of the neck just to the right and left of centre, with the difference in grain I think looks quite cool http://www.picspirate.com/img/5262cb6ad4d2.../picture066.jpg The fretboard so I was told is American Oak..salvaged from a bank skip whilst it was undergoing a re-fit. The inlays are a mixture of MOP N Z Paua Abalone and Pink MOP http://www.picspirate.com/img/ad9f8abd695a.../picture063.jpg The body use to be a floor joist presumably pine which must be at least 60 years old. Which is 30 - 33mm thick and took off the shelf parts http://www.picspirate.com/img/88170350a1c7.../picture065.jpg You can see the joint line in this pic to fill out the headstock http://www.picspirate.com/img/432b01f39389.../picture062.jpg The pickups and pots came from Ebay for £7, Scratch plate was a "take off" £3, everything else was new £65 Labour was free and Al heeley donated a tone pot . (its the second one) Its something I thought of for ages and am so glad I made it .

I have made a strat which is 33mm thick using standard parts. It looks to me that if you put the body through a thickneser taking off small layers at a time you would be left with at least a 40mm thick body, which should be thick enough for a guitar of some description.

I am running win 98 and use firefox and it sailed past me also. I have AVG and Zone Alarm running

Did the problem just appear? Or did it appear after some change? I had a simillar problem with a set of strings that would go out of tune quickly, turned out that the nut slots needed cleaning

I am thinking of tracking the book down and getting it as a few forumites have mentioned it in thier posts

I have to agree with the others unfortunatly. Make another joint. Theres a tutorial a few actually but one that sticks out in my mind is to make a "wedge " shape mitre type box with the sides being 13 degrees the neck sits inbetween the sides and router off the excess wood on the neck and headstock. You then have a perfect joint and glue it up using Setch's simple but effective way found here http://www.setchellguitars.co.uk/ant/blog/?p=121 hope that helps

Or you could try here if in the USA http://www.guitarbuildingtemplates.com/ Or here if in the uk http://simnettguitars.co.uk/bb/viewtopic.p...light=templates

OK Thanks guys some more food for thought. Maybe I might try bending and see what type of results I get. As you pointed out Rich I ( as well as others it seems )do have this impression that bending is harder than it actually is . But then again I thought building a guitar was going to be harder than it was. I suprised my friends as well as myself

I looked into the writings of jamie Andreas recentley and I think what he has to say about practise is very good, so interested was I that I have bought the book $42 there abouts which includes shipping to the UK. Now I am not one with plenty of cash to spend in fact its the opposite but from what I read after printing out 15 of his essays made sense and helped me memorize pieces of music which I didn't believe I was capable of. If any one is interested www.guitarprinciples.com.

I suppose it all depends on where you want to be in 12 months time. Playing the same old stuff half way through and a few more half learnt tunes ? Or having a good selection to play when asked "play me something" I suspect it's the latter Go with the schedule you have written down it will focus your practise time into a 1. A structured routine. 2. You will actually be learining something 3. Having something down in writing is comitting yourself to learning how to play. If you let the schedule lapse you can come to your senses and return to it. If you don't have one you have no schedule to return to. set yourself goals to learn a song completely start to finish in a certain period of time (make sure it is a realistic time period) If you know it off by heart well done, then check the tempo and fluencey of the piece. If youdon't know it off by heart then thats your next song to learn. Don't beat yourself up just be determined and consistent And enjoy it

I am thinking of a 12 string acoustic fir my next project. Rather than heat and bend the sides I thought of getting 0.6mm thick veneers and glue together 3 or 4 pieces to make the sides. 0.6mm veneers will bend easily enough, clamp 2 together in a body mould and add others when set. What do you guys think of the idea ?

I have printed out 38 pages of essays and it has got me thinking about sitting position, hand position etc. theres an experience given about a pupil who almost contorted her left hand as she moved from a G chord to an C chord she / he ( jamie) said it was painful to watch, so I am becoming aware of what parts of my body are having "sympathetic muscle tension". I coach squash and I suppose with any sport if your muscle are tense then you cannot hit the ball in the way that you want. When I was doing some finger exercises I found my right shoulderblade working its way up to the back of my head!. Theres plenty of material out there that tell you what to play, how long the note is when to play it but unfortunately not the position you have to be in when you play the notes or chords. So it seems I will probabley shell out the money being the exchange rate is pretty good at the moment and buy it. Thanks for your input guys