Demon K-V

[NedRyerson]

Went up to the vacation home to meet with an HVAC service tech to look at our A/C unit.  And since my K-V body arrived before I left (as shown in the Out of the Box thread), I brought it up to work on.

In between bouts of painting the bathroom, mowing the ¼-acre lawn, and chatting with my mother-in-law (she lives up here, which was the main impetus of us buying the house), I assembled a DIY workbench (a couple of 2x4s and a 1/2" project panel from HD) because I really just wanted a bench vise.

Materials for the bench were cheaper than buying a pre-fab, even the disposable garbage from Harbor Freight.  I did mess up the assembly, though.  The frame for the bench top isn't square, and by the time I realized it, it was too late.  But that was another learning experience.  Anyway....

 

[NedRyerson]

Since I wanted the Strat boat-style jack, I had to expand the jack hole (hah!) that I asked Warmoth to do.  The plan sounded great in my head, but when it came time to do it, I naturally wondered if I was about to make a $240 mistake.

I taped the area and marked out the outline that I'd need to cut and sand to make the plate fit.  I drilled a starter hole at the "south" end of the jack plate, then used my jigsaw with the scroll saw blade to cut out extra material.  Then it was time to get to work with the barrel sander to do the fine-tuning and shaping of the expansion.

Scared out of my wits, but it worked.

(original posted as 1st attachment for comparison)

 

[swarfrat]

You made Aaron cry with that Jack installation. (But I approve)

 

[NedRyerson]

You made Aaron cry with that Jack installation. (But I approve)

:laughing11:

 

[PhilHill]

Nice job on both projects. I would suggest tying the bottoms of the bench legs together with more 2x boards, or even 1x3 boards. You'll find the whole thing is much less prone to wobble then. I like the jack conversion too.    :icon_thumright:

 

[NedRyerson]

Nice job on both projects. I would suggest tying the bottoms of the bench legs together with more 2x boards, or even 1x3 boards. You'll find the whole thing is much less prone to wobble then. I like the jack conversion too.    :icon_thumright:

Definitely next on the to-do list.  Had it in the original diagram to add a bottom shelf to it, but with it being completely off-square, I'll have to reevaluate. Which is a euphemism for "get mad at myself and tear it apart to rebuild it properly, you flippin' amateur."

I know I can.  I just got discouraged with myself when I saw the mistake and had to go wallow in self-pity for a while.

But thank you.  I'll probably be rebuilding it over Labor Day weekend.  On the flip side, I coated the right front corner of the plywood top with gloss poly so I have a place to set my beer bottle down while working  ccasion14:

 

[PhilHill]

On the flip side, I coated the right front corner of the plywood top with gloss poly so I have a place to set my beer bottle down while working

The sign of a true professional... ccasion14:

 

[NedRyerson]

"Gabe, 'Ridiculous' just happened!"

I found a set of humbuckers with gold pole pieces.  I was looking at Dragonfire already because reviews in both text and video showed that there was little difference between them and, say, Seymours as far as someone like me -- a total amateur who's not recording or playing gigs -- could ever really distinguish in the same guitar.  I'm not going to be doing any experimental swaps and then posting a YouTube video to explain my findings

I had originally wanted to get SD's Nazgûl/Sentient set.  Because freakin' Nazgûl!  $190 was a tough pill to swallow, though.  So I decided to settle on Dragonfires after a bunch of reading and comparing.  Figured I'd go with the plain black Screamers with gold rings.  Then I dug deeper into their choices.

The Hexbuckers come with a choice of colors for pole pieces.  SOLD!

Black Hexbuckers with gold pole pieces and gold pickup rings.  Just under $78 for the set.  Less than the price of either the Nazgûl or Sentient by itself.  And the only reason I wanted the Nazgûl was because of the name, really.  I do like Duncan pups, otherwise.  I have a set in my blue Mockingbird, as well as the "Duncan-designed" in my Jackson (and that guitar is loud).

But in the end, $180 vs. $78 was where I went.

 

[bagman67]

The difference between the Duncans and the Dragonfires is that Dragonfire lets you have the pleasure of rubbing the excess potting wax off the bobbin tops.  You lucky boy, Ned!




But seriously, nice grab.  No point in spending a mint if you can get quality you appreciate for less.  I hope these turn out well for you.

 

[OrcJuice]

I had originally wanted to get SD's Nazgûl/Sentient set.  Because freakin' Nazgûl!

I hear you! I'll be following this build closely. My son (11) has gotten into playing guitar over the quarantine and absolutely loves Amon Amarth.  arty07: :headbanging: (Viking Death Metal).

His first guitar is a Jackson RR Vee, in a smaller scale. I already decided I'm going to build him a Vee if he sticks with and I cut my teeth building myself a Hetfield inspired Nomad.

ANYWAY! The Sentient/Nazgul is exactly the pickups I've been looking at for his future build!

 

[aarontunes]

You made Aaron cry with that Jack installation. (But I approve)

 

[aarontunes]

Actually, this is pretty well done. It's surface-mounted on a relatively flat surface, like it's supposed to be. Looks good!


The jack on my ESP EII-ST2 is a different story. It's mounted on a curved surface. To do this they had to do this weird inset mounting. It looks like it was routed with a rusty spoon, and painted with the tempera paint little Sally had left after finishing her 6th grade science poster. A blight on an otherwise stellar guitar.


A quick internet search and I couldn't find a picture of the rout in question. ESP must have purged the interwebs to avoid embarrassment. It can now only be seen on the dark web next to the Star Wars Christmas Special.

 

[swarfrat]

Oh my. The Star Wars Life Day Special was like Total Recall for me. I had memories. But they were vague and totally did not square up with the rest of what I knew about star wars. It wasn't until a few years ago that I was able to confirm that those outlandish cheesy memories were legit.

 

[NedRyerson]

I had originally wanted to get SD's Nazgûl/Sentient set.  Because freakin' Nazgûl!

I hear you! I'll be following this build closely. My son (11) has gotten into playing guitar over the quarantine and absolutely loves Amon Amarth.  arty07: :headbanging: (Viking Death Metal).

His first guitar is a Jackson RR Vee, in a smaller scale. I already decided I'm going to build him a Vee if he sticks with and I cut my teeth building myself a Hetfield inspired Nomad.

ANYWAY! The Sentient/Nazgul is exactly the pickups I've been looking at for his future build!

To note for the record, I'm a big fan of Amon Amarth.  Would love to see them in concert, but I'm an old family man now.   Nonetheless, raise your horns, raise them up to the sky. We will drink to glory tonight!

(and it's a killer frickin' riff in that song, too)

I've been applying multiple coats of satin wipe-on poly for the last few days now.  Trying to get a coat in when I pull into the garage after getting home from work, so that I deliberately force myself to not mess with it before a coat fully dries.

 

[NedRyerson]

Re: The Star Wars Christmas Special

Of such dark days of yore shall ne'er be spoken in times hence.  It has been forbade...en...eth (I'm not that good with ominous melodramatic language).

 

[JaySwear2]

What cool project! Love that Strat input, even if it's not for me. Looks extra-extra custom

 

[NedRyerson]

She's looking much different now:

Ignore the dust and debris particles. I'd just done a dry brush-down with a scrap piece of cloth before these photos. It's actually much cleaner right now in reality.  This is before the multiple coats of lacquer I sprayed last week.

The red tint in the beveled edge is a reflection of the red shirt I was wearing.

The gold Gotoh 510 mid-size 3+3 tuners arrived a few days ago, too.  Still working on saving up the scratch to order the neck.

 

[NedRyerson]

And neck & the rest of the hardware order has just been placed as of 2:30pm ET, Sep. 18, 2020.

 

[NedRyerson]

Fretboard mockup, courtesy of Warmoth's design page:

Headstock design:

Got a thin project board to practice the cuts and shaping for the headstock, with the added bonus that it'll act as a template.

And current status with some hardware placed:

I'm probably going to be staring at that dent in the lower wing near the jack forever, because I was careless while polishing.

 

[PhilHill]

You have some excellent design ideas there. That's looking good. And that's not a dent, that's character that lends individuality to your build... :icon_thumright: :icon_thumright: