Leaderboard

First Warmoth STRATOCASTER Guitar Assembly Completed

A

Ardie

Junior Member
Messages
72
:blob7: Hi everyone!
Its been  a while to get this project to push thru, at last its coming to reality. Im leaving here in Singapore...machinist and a Fixture designer as my regular job. Well ordering parts from Warmoth and send it here in Singapore is convenient i dont have any problem at all, Infact Im planning on my second order. Been playing for around 10 years now. I have used several guitar but I never had used Stratocaster guitar. I find this forum very interesting, informative and helpful for new newbies like me in Guitar assembly.

Here are the specs:
Warmoth Strat body: POPLAR  DIY finish by me (if ur interested on how i did the finishing, U can check out at DIY finishing thread)
Warmoth NECK: Vintage modern 22 fret warmoth neck Rosewood/Maple with Std thin contour,  1 1/16, compound radius, 25.5 in, cream dots.
Neck Finishing: neck finishing vintage looks.. you can check out a separate topic i posted at DIY thread on how I did the neck finishing.
Nut: i plan to do LSR for this neck.. contemplating to save it to the next project and use standard Bone nut.
Tuners: Wilkinson Tuners
Bridge: 6 Hole Vintage Wilkinson tremolo (modified saddle)
Pickguard: Perloid... Ihave tried the B/W/B still the White Pearloid luks better on it.
Swithch: 5 way switch
Pickups: Fender Noiseless pickups "Cream"

:headbang1: Here are some of the Photo of my assembly  :occasion14:
PS: By the way Guys I have made the finish on the NECK i think most of U are wanted to know the progress of the Oil color that i used for staining the maple wood, to get that vintage looks...Im hesitating to post it coz i have put some Fender decals..Is it allowed to post those photos with Fender decals?
 
Bridge Assembly
 
Looking good, Ardie.  TO be honest, in the thread where I've been following your body finishing work, I have not found the color or finish that attractive.  Now, seeing it with the polished finish, I find it much more attractive.  You've done a nice job.

Bagman
 
bagman67 said:
Looking good, Ardie.  TO be honest, in the thread where I've been following your body finishing work, I have not found the color or finish that attractive.  Now, seeing it with the polished finish, I find it much more attractive.  You've done a nice job.

Bagman
Click to expand...
Thanks Buddy the Iphone that im using doesnt makes justice on the finish... i will used a better camera once all completed.. thanks again cheers!
 
lookin very good!!
I bought a poplar body once, and wanted it to look like this..
unfortunately, after I applied the brown, the whole thing turned purple.. I did try to rescue it, but went too crazy with sanding the stain off... after I was done, I only had a small , flat piece of wood left... true story!
 
Märkeaux said:
lookin very good!!
I bought a poplar body once, and wanted it to look like this..
unfortunately, after I applied the brown, the whole thing turned purple.. I did try to rescue it, but went too crazy with sanding the stain off... after I was done, I only had a small , flat piece of wood left... true story!
Click to expand...

Hahaha :laughing3: i do agree with Märkeaux.. honestly I got some Issues also on this body that was during the curing process of the Tung Oil. i didnt notice while sanding betweens coats of Tung that i have sanded that much and its reach the layer where the stain been applied.. its quite ugly and the color seems differ form the rest. So what i did i sanded down to remove the layer of Tung oil (front face only), luckily the Tung oil was on the initial stage application.
Well All i can say is DIY finishing takes alot of Patience, research and trial on scrap wood. As you can see the POPLAR wood was to clean and Plain doesnt have that greenish wood strain on it.. thats why i decided to stain it..I used American Wallnut stain color from COLRON.. and the POPLAR body just absorb the stain making it very rich in color.
The trick here is just lightly sand the finish stain wood then apply as much coats of Tru/Tung oil, once you have that much of build up of protective coats then we can do wet sanding..Again coats after coats of Tung oil...lastly waxing and Polish to finish..

Thanks CHEERS!


 
pabloman said:
I thought poplar wasn't supposed to take dye well. This thing looks great!!! :party07:
Click to expand...

:sign13: hi Buddy..Based from my research its not very Popular for staining..maybe bcoz this wood doesn't have those beautiful wood grain..but it did absorb stain that much.
I used Oil stain based for this project. Well my goal is to get that Wallnut color effects on the poplar wood The POPLAR wood that i have the wood grain was very clean and plain. Im confident it will be a good candidate for staining, but of course i did it first on a piece of scrap wood. U can check out Back face of this guitar.. the wood absorb the Oil stain evenly. Its important to check out the wood grain first before deciding in staining it.
As you can see the photo below how the POPLAR wood absorb the stain evenly at the entire face..
 
It's not that poplar won't take stain, it's that it takes it unevenly and often has a greenish tinge to it, and the grain isn't very prominent or interesting so there's not much call to show it off. Of course, not all pieces are created equal, and some colors are complementary, so it's quite possible to get good results. Your walnut stain is looking good, for instance. But, normally, you'd put an opaque finish over poplar.
 
Cagey said:
It's not that poplar won't take stain, it's that it takes it unevenly and often has a greenish tinge to it, and the grain isn't very prominent or interesting so there's not much call to show it off. Of course, not all pieces are created equal, and some colors are complementary, so it's quite possible to get good results. Your walnut stain is looking good, for instance. But, normally, you'd put an opaque finish over poplar.
Click to expand...

+1, the grain on poplar tends to look gross when you stain it. I stained some poplar as my first warmoth piece too, back when I thought all stained wood looked the same and was attracted by poplars low price. The piece I had was pretty ugly though, haha. This is looking great though ardie :icon_thumright:
 
:blob7: Hi Everyone! ....Here are some updates TUNING Head Assembly.
Wilkinson Tuning Heads Chrome
 
:blob7: Hi Everyone! ....Here are some updates NECK Assembly.

1. FENDER Neck Plate Chrome
2. Warmoth Neck " the neck seat perfectly"
 
Very nice...... :icon_thumright:

By the way, what is the fascination with putting Fender decals on a Warmoth?  I've seen it done many times.
 
Pickup Wiring in preparation in progress..

1. 250K pot from FENDER
2. 5 way switch FENDER
3. Copper shield from Warmoth
Hi guys Im still contemplating which pick guard color and Pickguard cover should I used to match with this assembly. see photo below  :occasion14:
 
Tough call on the pickguard. I think I'd start with the pearloid. You can always change it later if it doesn't settle in and make friends.
 
lafromla1 said:
Very nice...... :icon_thumright:

By the way, what is the fascination with putting Fender decals on a Warmoth?  I've seen it done many times.
Click to expand...
Thanks alot guys for ur comments... Merry Christmas to all of you  :occasion14:

lafromla1 for me there's is no big deal on the decals, and im not fascinated either on the the said Brand. Its just since this is my fisrt guitar assembly wanted to put as much details as possible. Its a challenge for me as a newbie to try out everything out there available for this assembly. The decals is nothing compare to the excitement every time I came home from work.. and immediately working on this project. Its just a decal for me as part of the detailing process..The highlight on this project are knowledge, experience, patience and effort I put on this project. looking forward to my 2nd project  thank you guys cheers!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

ScottDR
First Warmoth body and neck has arrived - Mustang!
2
Replies
22
Views
1K
ScottDR
ScottDR
Krvnrch
First Warmoth Assembly!
Replies
7
Views
277
Krvnrch
Krvnrch
NovasScootYa
The Start...
Replies
7
Views
246
Strat Avenger
Strat Avenger
N
First Warmoth build - thanks to the forum for so much great advice!
2
Replies
22
Views
940
Nuklball
N
Ozopart
Fender Neck Question
Replies
12
Views
587
Rick
Rick
Back
Top