A new prospect.

[PhilHill]

No kidding. I had an urge to build an acoustic a few years back, but after watching a few videos, I decided I couldn't afford or justify the massive specialty clamp collection I'd need.

I remember watching a tv video one time about a small Mexican village where all the residents were involved in making guitars in one way or another. It showed one of the people who actually did the construction to demonstrate that they used only two tools, a saw to cut the basic pieces, and a handmade knife that they used to do EVERYTHING else. It was kinda fascinating actually. Their clamps consisted of cloth and rope.

 

[PhilHill]

Some surface sanding and a little naptha and we start to get an idea what the back will look like. 




. Maybe.

:headbang:

 

[mayfly]

That's really nice!

Oh and I think we need to have some kind of clamp competition 

 

[PhilHill]

That's really nice!

Oh and I think we need to have some kind of clamp competition 

Thanks. Interesting idea, do you mean like number of clamps owned, or how many clamps can you attach to a one sq.ft. board.

 

[mayfly]

I don't see any reason why we could not do both...

 

[rgand]

Damn, Phil. That looks good!

 

[PhilHill]

Damn, Phil. That looks good!

Thank you. So far I'm a happy camper. What I'm wondering though, due to the fact that the sides are each two pieces, is how the grain pattern on the sides will look. No way of really knowing until the body shape is cut. Keeping my fingers crossed.
And beliweve me, it's not easy to type or run an orbital sander with your fingers crosssed. :doh: :headbang:

 

[Hendrix]

nice wood , looking forward how it comes out  :glasses9:

 

[PhilHill]

nice wood , looking forward how it comes out  :glasses9:

Thank you. I'm looking forward to how it comes out myself. I don't really plan ahead too much on these things, certain things I pay attention to like where wires have to go and some of the clearances but the rest I just kind of get inspired as I go along. So I don't often know how it's going to look until near the end. :dontknow: :icon_thumright:

 

[rgand]

I don't really plan ahead too much on these things, certain things I pay attention to like where wires have to go and some of the clearances but the rest I just kind of get inspired as I go along. So I don't often know how it's going to look until near the end. :dontknow: :icon_thumright:

This is the best approach. You will seldom be disappointed when you don't have definite expectations, other than that it will work out.

 

[Hendrix]

I agree this is the best approach too .

As the Jimi Hendrix tribute guitar body and neck I buy 3 years ago, I just keep on planing a lot , something like I want to learn Zbrush made jimi burn his guitar photo into CG sculpture and 3D  printed it beside bridge , but that never happened as it too difficult to start it .
So when I forced myself to just do something first last month  , I got idea when I dye the colour first, why not just paint it on back , it much bigger place to work on .
So planing too much can lead to all kind of unreality hope , hard to start , but just doing it one smaller step after another, can get much more clear and achievable idea .

Something’s like this TED talk, highly recommend:
How to Achieve Your Most Ambitious Goals
[youtube]TQMbvJNRpLE[/youtube]

 

[PhilHill]

While waiting on the body templates I ordered to get here, I made a quick and dirty template for routing the hollow body pockets. Following SOP by hogging with the forstner bit, (Let us all take a moment to give thanks for the miracle that is The Forstner Bit. :hello2 then routing just short of finish depth. It's not going as easy as I'd like because my router's base is a little small, but I don't have the material on hand to make a larger one. This will be rectified in the future. However, so far it's working with careful balancing and a lot of cussing. Anyway progress is being made..

.

.More to come. In the meantime, remember that old bit of hard learned wisdom:"Have you ever looked at your Ex and thought, Was I drunk the ENTIRE relationship?"

 

[rgand]

'''(Let us all take a moment to give thanks for the miracle that is The Forstner Bit. :hello2...

I'm with you on that. :icon_thumright:

 

[PhilHill]

A little more progress. I flattened out the bottoms of the chambers and decided I wanted something more dense under the bridge than redwood, so I put a piece of walnut in there. Still have to surface it all a little. Still waiting on the templates to go further. Don't really have the tooling at this point to properly make my own, so I had to order some.

. I have received some of the other parts though so I'm happy there.

Time will tell. More to come at some point. :headbang:

 

[rgand]

You're coming along nicely. That's a good idea to put the walnut block under the bridge.

 

[PhilHill]

You're coming along nicely. That's a good idea to put the walnut block under the bridge.

Thanks. Yeah, while the redwood seems nice and resonant it's still a rather soft wood, so I felt that something harder would be better. It's getting a Gotoh 510 wraparound bridge, so those posts need something dense to grip on. I'll also have to angle the neck pocket a degree or two to compensate, but that shouldn't be a problem. I'm happy with how it's coming along considering the situation we're all in right now.

 

[Hendrix]

you going to build a neck through or blot on ?

look like it can be neck through add on later.

 

[PhilHill]

you going to build a neck through or blot on ?

look like it can be neck through add on later.

I'm actually trying to decide whether to make it a bolt-on or a set-in neck. A Warmoth Tele neck that I have is setup for bolt-on, but it has enough surface area at the mounting point i believe, that it could work as a set-in neck if the bottom, bass side, and heel were sanded for wood to wood contact with the pocket. But this would also call for me to put a notch of some kind in the body to allow for access to the truss rod head at the heel. It's a Vintage/Modern neck with the side adjust for the Truss rod as well as the heel adjust. I'm still undecided. :dontknow:

 

[Cagey]

I could be wrong, but I can't see that working well. You'd end up with a half-asssed lap joint which, while not the worst thing on earth for many things is not the best mechanically. Even the old Gibson Melody makers/SGs/Les Pauls, apart from their weak scarf-joint headstocks (essentially the same thing) were notorious for snapping off. Remove what little mortise/tenon integrity such a thing would have, fuhgeddaboudit. Plus, they're tuning nightmares/tone suckers.

I don't know what they were thinking about with those designs...

You'd have more to work with on a Tele-style body/neck, if you rethink it with the thought in mind of making it a whole new thing with that shape, but not that assembly.

 

[PhilHill]

I see your point about trying it with the body and neck both having the standard shape and dimensions. It would require the body pocket to be longer than normal, and the neck to be reshaped at the back to increase the mounting surface, and to allow the neck and body to be blended together some what. A potential pain in the posterior no doubt. I've done similar things before on a Squire and an Ibanez and it worked out OK. But I always had the feeling it was due more to luck than design. I'll probably end up sticking with the bolt-on mount, as I'm not as patient as I once was, but I've kinda been speculating lately about trying the conversion again just for the aggravation of it. However, yeah it is usually better to design the whole thing as set-in from the start. :headbang: