akvguitars

I've used the tanin staining method with walnut to great effect in the past. It chemically changes the color of the wood, and can set in quite deep, so wear and sanding doesn't have the rub off effect you can get with stains and dyes. I use white vinegar in a jar, put some steel wool in it, and cap it off (it's stinky). Let it sit for a week or so, until the steel wool is gone, and the mixture has a dark amber/light rust color. Rub or pour on the walnut, and let sit for a bit before wiping off. The rusty mixture will react with the tanins in the walnut, and oxidize it almost completely black. Wipe some oil on it to seal the wood from dirt and grime, and it pushes it right to black. Good luck!

HA! I didn't have a shop when I first started building, and did most of my work in what I like to call "Japanese woodworking" style; sitting on the floor. Even now, with a shop, I find it's easiest for me to carve a neck sitting cross-legged on the floor, holding the heel with my feet, and the headstock in my belly. I've tried clamping the neck up to shape, but it doesn't feel as right to me...

I work in a music store doing repairs, and I think that the high end gear is a bunch of junk. I just got a new Gibson Songwriter in tonight, and the first fret wasn't even seated! The open strings were all buzzing horribly, and I had to take the fretting hammer and super glue to it. RIGHT OUT OF THE BOX. Fenders and Gibsons can't hold up to the shipping as well as the foreign guitars, for some reason. I've had to send back twice as many Gibson acoustics for the 14th fret hump than foreign. I've NEVER seen the 14th fret hump in one of the brand new Yamahas or Takamine Jasmines, which are pretty cheap guitars. I've got an $850 Taylor with laminated sides and back, and a $300 Yamaha with solid rosewood sides and back, and a solid top. The finish is great, the woods are amazing quality, and the setup was ready to go right out of the box, just needed tuning. When recorded at a studio alongside a Gibson dread, the Yamaha sounded much sweeter and responded much more accurately to what the player was doing. I've had to level the frets of our $4000 Koa Taylor right when it came in; countless examples... All in all, I'm absolutely not impressed with American FACTORY guitars. At all. Even if I didn't do the work myself, I'd still rather get better quality, attention to detail (anyone seen how many file marks the stupid Gibson Les Paul binding method leaves?), and value, and skip out on "brand name" nonsense. I'd be getting a full setup, fret dressing (semi-hemi, baby!) and changing pickups regardless of whether I got an Epi or Gibby. Fender's hit or miss. I've played an amazing Squier classic vibe strat that outplayed ALL of the Fender strats in the store, tone and feel. $1800 Eric Johnson strat? Hype... Not to say there aren't some cheap clunkers and lemons, but in my experience, the American factory made guitars just aren't worth anything near the money. Except maybe PRS, but only once you get past the $1500 mark. Just my two centavos.

What about the Parker fly series? They use the adjustable pole pieces screwed into the guitar to mount, if I'm not mistaken. You do it that way, you can do away with the entire baseplate, saving yourself about 3/8 of routing.

umm, am I the only one that's faced his vice with plywood so as to not mar guitars??? Most vices have screwholes so that you can attach something to the faces. Grab some scraps, screw them on, and crank it down without fear! Another bonus is that the screw will dent the wood, so it holds it even tighter. I've used this method for this exact issue, and it worked wonderfully. Cheers, Kyle.

If you did a spacer under the fretboard to lift it up, you could hide it with binding. Just my 2 cents... kyle

Hey, Woodenspoke and NotYou, I'm in north Denver also! Are there any amateur luthier get togethers up here? I've been up here for 7 years, building for 5, and have only connected with the retail repair people when it comes to building. I'd love to get together with you two and talk shop. Kyle.

You would need a 1" thick piece if you plan on doing a one piece neck: no separate fingerboard and skunk stripe in back for the truss rod. If you have a separate fingerboard, you only need 3/4 " for the neck (1/4" for the fingerboard).

With a floyd rose!

Hey all, So I have an ibanez s540 that I refinished long ago. I'm thinking of changing the look yet again, and would like to veneer the front of it, but am curious how to get the flattened veneer to "wrap" around the compound curves of the top. If it were just a radiused top like Brian Moore uses, it would just bend right around, but I'm worried that since it's a domed top, the veneer will fold or overlap on the lower bout. Will the veneer stretch a bit to conform (maple burl, probably), or are there any tips to getting it on tight and clean? Thanks for the help. Kyle.

The video was halfway over before I realised he wasn't making a cutting board...

You should use whatever thickness it takes to build up to the total width of the neck. I mostly use 3 pieces of 3/4" as they are wide enough together. Another bonus is that 3/4" wood is easy to find flatsawn, so when all the slices are cut, they are all quartersawn. You can fool around with different configurations of width according to what you think looks good, as long as the overall width is wider than the end of the fretboard.

If you're set on white dots, something I've seen done before that looks REAL good is to have a dark outline. Maple fretboard with white dots outlined in black. I've seen the reverse done on a lot of QUALITY guitars (ebony fb with white, mop, abalone, even brass rings around a black dot).

I've run into this problem before, as I use mostly hand tools (no jointer, just hand planes!). What I usually do is make the headstock piece a decent bit thicker than the finished dimensions. If the headstock doesn't square up right away, I'll plane the high side down, in all directions, until the top of the headstock is flat and square to the neck. Then I'll take on the backside of the headstock until it's flat, square and uniformly the dimension I want. Takes a decent amount of work, but it's as accurate as any machine job I've seen.

just curious; thanks! I am going to go ahead with making the bodies. maybe at some point in the future I'll do a one piece guitar out of mahogany. Not because I think there's going to be any big difference in tone, just mostly as a novelty and to see if I can do it. thanks again for the replies.