CNC'd Telecaster

[DarkPenguin]

So I started this ...

[youtube]https://youtu.be/g9TdYOy_jQc[/youtube]

Padauk fretboard. Ambrosia maple neck. Most of the heavy lifting is being done by the CNC. Shaping is being done by me.

There have been some mistakes. Like the first attempt at a body. Like the board for the neck being in the CNC a little wrong. Like the pin holes being a bit big and the truss rod slot being WAY too wide.

Going to buy some wood for a body. See how that goes.

Not sure what pickups I'm going to use.

 

[Cagey]

If that's all that went wrong on the first go-round, I'd call that a well-qualified success! I make more mistakes than that making pancakes  :laughing7:

 

[DarkPenguin]

The next step is to CNC a block to clamp the fretboard on to the neck.

Haven't figured out how to make either fusion 360 or estlcam do that. No idea what is up with fusion. Estlcam crashes.

Oh, well.

 

[DarkPenguin]

I bought 8 feet of 2"x7" ash. Thinking of doubling up some padauk and putting it between the two halves of ash to match the fretboard.

 

[swarfrat]

By all numbers Ash ought to be a darn fine neck would. But Leo never blessed it, so good luck convincing guitarists to try it.

 

[DarkPenguin]

Is Padauk supposed to be chippy? Case it seems to be and I think I need to glue down some frets.

 

[Cagey]

It's a bit like Maple as far as chipping/tearout are concerned, so the same cautions apply. Be careful of direction of cut, and you'll probably be ok.

 

[DarkPenguin]

The frets solved themselves. I'm no expert but I don't think re-fretting the neck before it is even carved is standard operating procedure. What I am sure of is that you don't want to drop a guitarneck, fretboard down, onto the pile of files and rasps you're using to carve the neck. That, uh, wasn't good.

 

[DarkPenguin]

All righty. I've scrapped this and now am working on a canary neck with cocobolo fret board.

 

[Cagey]

Been a while since we've seen any Cocobolo around here.

 

[DarkPenguin]

So my guitar building season is being shutdown. After thumb surgery and the appropriate rehab time we're looking at 6 or so weeks at a minimum. By then it will be winter. (In these here parts, anyways.)

So some mistakes were made on the CNC but at least I made them where there was plenty of stock.

It came out fine.

Canary and cocobolo. The fretboard is really rough at this point. I haven't figured out how to smooth things properly. That said the radius appeared to be right. But having to sand off all the tooling marks means that I need to deepen the frets again.

Mounting the fretboard. Clamps are cheap. This is on there good.

It is being attached to an ash body. The body will, if I do it indoors, be a dark burst with wipe on poly.

The body waiting for an appropriate sized router bit.

The neck waiting for frets.

Finally trying to figure out what to do for dot markers. Might use carnary if I can cut the markers cleanly. Might use this stuff...

That's glitter glass of some sort encased in super glue.

Not sure what I think of that.

 

[Cagey]

I think before I'd use super glue as a molding material I'd want a long-term study of its aging properties. Especially in large globs like that. How much does is shrink? Does it discolor? Also, as tight as it dries, is it really hard enough to stand up to strings and fingernails? If it doesn't work out for whatever reason, it's probably going to be a nightmare to get out for replacement later.

 

[DarkPenguin]

That is true. I know people do use it but the same people use things that I know have no longevity. (Although UV fade resistance probably doesn't matter for something played on stage.)

 

[Cagey]

Costs a bit more, but there's such a thing as "Casting Resin" that might work as well or better.

At least, it's sorta designed for that kind of thing, where glue isn't. It's crystal clear, so you could still do the glitter thing, and I think they even sell dyes for it if you wanted color.

 

[rgand]

I've used casting resin before. It's easy to work with and yes, you can put coloring or glitter in it easily.

 

[DangerousR6]

I think before I'd use super glue as a molding material I'd want a long-term study of its aging properties. Especially in large globs like that. How much does is shrink? Does it discolor? Also, as tight as it dries, is it really hard enough to stand up to strings and fingernails? If it doesn't work out for whatever reason, it's probably going to be a nightmare to get out for replacement later.

Loctite 2 ton 2 part epoxy would work just fine, minimal shrinkage. So you'd probably have to overfill just a touch, but once it's there, it's there. And it dries clear or you can add a dye to it. :icon_biggrin:

 

[DarkPenguin]

Another 3 weeks in a cast. Looks like finishing this is going to become a spring project.

 

[DarkPenguin]

I went with canary for inlay material.

 

[rgand]

Canary sounds like it could make a fine inlay material. When you have a chance, a pic of those inlays would be nice to see.

 

[DarkPenguin]

Where we is with this.

[youtube]https://youtu.be/uxqPOrzNKGM[/youtube]