The Quilted Maple Soloist (UPDATE- Fixed and Complete). BEAST!

[DangerousR6]

That turned out absolutely awesome, and I agree, maple, maple, and more maple...One of my absolute favorite woods. Also the material I used to machine those parts is brass. Glad I could help save such a beautiful guitar... :headbang:

 

[rgand]

Yeah, I about lost it on my local 'luthier' guy.  Glad to have it come through okay.  The body alone was about 900 with shipping.  I think I may enter it in July GOTM.  Right now, I just can't quit playing it.  This will bring years of joy.  One of the lines in my will is "ALL HEIRS AGREE THAT UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHALL THEY (OR ANY OF THEIR HEIRS OR AGENTS) SELL, ALIENATE, OR ENCUMBER THE GUITARS".  Heh.  :laughing7:

Definitely enter it in the GOTM.

 

[stratamania]

This looks great and glad it got sorted out.

Well done Cagey and Dr6.

A new Hannes bridge mod is born.

 

[Surf n Music]

Stoked for ya and the turn out!!

 

[swarfrat]

Kintsugi (金継ぎ?) (Japanese: golden joinery) or Kintsukuroi (金繕い?) (Japanese: golden repair) Defined as "to repair with gold",[1] is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum, a method similar to the maki-e technique.[2][3][4] As a philosophy it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise

 

[Re-Pete]

That turned out absolutely awesome, and I agree, maple, maple, and more maple...One of my absolute favorite woods. Also the material I used to machine those parts is brass. Glad I could help save such a beautiful guitar... :headbang:

I've just seen this Thread, great work! You better keep those measurements on file....that extra brass will add sustain like those 'sustain blocks' on the old Yamaha SG2000's. Also with the cover plate, it makes minuscule inaccuracies not so critical...and easier to fix.  :headbang:

 

[fdesalvo]

OUTDAMNSTANDING!!!!!

 

[DangerousR6]

That turned out absolutely awesome, and I agree, maple, maple, and more maple...One of my absolute favorite woods. Also the material I used to machine those parts is brass. Glad I could help save such a beautiful guitar... :headbang:

I've just seen this Thread, great work! You better keep those measurements on file....that extra brass will add sustain like those 'sustain blocks' on the old Yamaha SG2000's. Also with the cover plate, it makes minuscule inaccuracies not so critical...and easier to fix.  :headbang:

Yip, got it all saved...Just in case it comes up again... :icon_biggrin:

 

[Steve_Karl]

Yea!
First time seeing this thread for me also. So glad it worked out!

 

[MikeW]

Wow. Great save guys. I was on the sceptical side when I saw this originally. Great idea for a fix too. And congrats VikingRed on a really nice guitar. Looks like a killer!

 

[Re-Pete]

That turned out absolutely awesome, and I agree, maple, maple, and more maple...One of my absolute favorite woods. Also the material I used to machine those parts is brass. Glad I could help save such a beautiful guitar... :headbang:

I've just seen this Thread, great work! You better keep those measurements on file....that extra brass will add sustain like those 'sustain blocks' on the old Yamaha SG2000's. Also with the cover plate, it makes minuscule inaccuracies not so critical...and easier to fix.  :headbang:

Yip, got it all saved...Just in case it comes up again... :icon_biggrin:

Maybe you should be talking to the manufacturers and even Warmoth about this mod? Get them to offer the modded routing and you offer the plates through Warmoth site?  :icon_scratch:

 

[swarfrat]

That's.a gorgeous save, but unless I misunderstood it, making it that way to begin with would have only required an even bigger repair plate to fix the original error. It doesn't make it immune to alignment errors.

 

[Re-Pete]

That's.a gorgeous save, but unless I misunderstood it, making it that way to begin with would have only required an even bigger repair plate to fix the original error. It doesn't make it immune to alignment errors.

Oh that's right. The Bridge route was done after the body had been despatched from Warmoth and there were alignment errors made. Maybe Warmoth could make the route available and have Doug's mod added to their routing so there's some product to sell with it? I'm just seeing a win-win with Warmoth offering an extra bridge routing and Doug selling brass plates to Warmoth... I take it that bridge is still available for sale elsewhere?

 

[Cagey]

That's.a gorgeous save, but unless I misunderstood it, making it that way to begin with would have only required an even bigger repair plate to fix the original error. It doesn't make it immune to alignment errors.

Right. The original error was in routing by hand and drilling with twist drills. The routing problem was obvious. You had to take it apart to see how the other problems occurred. In drilling all the way through the body with a relatively small twist drill, the bit wandered on its way through and the holes ended up in the wrong places on the opposite side. So, he ended up with mounting holes that were on an angle which moved the bridge off center.Then, the larger holes were also drilled with a twist drill, so the bit wandered right on the surface and chewed things up. You can't take that large a bite out of wood with a twist drill if you want a clean hole. Plus, it left a seriously concave bottom in the hole, so the bushings didn't sit right.

What had to be done was get all the holes filled, then be re-drilled much larger so a consistent and straight plug could be put in them. Then, the proper (smaller) holes were drilled in the new plugs, but only halfway through. Those holes were then used as indexing holes (I built a jig for the drill press) to finish the holes from the rear. This kept them all straight and properly spaced. Then, because of the backing plates I had Doug make, the larger holes were no longer necessary. I just routed cavities for those using a template and mortising pattern bit. If you were to do it according to how Hannes instructs, you would use a Forstner bit to get a clean hole with a flat bottom.

It would be nice if Warmoth offered that route, because the whole thing would be a lot less frightening if it could be done without any finish on the body. But, I'm not sure how much of a market there is for those Hannes bridges. They're nice - they look good and they're comfy - but they're also pricey. The only other criticism I'd offer is the saddles tend to fall off very easily when there's no string tension on them.

 

[DangerousR6]

That's.a gorgeous save, but unless I misunderstood it, making it that way to begin with would have only required an even bigger repair plate to fix the original error. It doesn't make it immune to alignment errors.

Oh that's right. The Bridge route was done after the body had been despatched from Warmoth and there were alignment errors made. Maybe Warmoth could make the route available and have Doug's mod added to their routing so there's some product to sell with it? I'm just seeing a win-win with Warmoth offering an extra bridge routing and Doug selling brass plates to Warmoth... I take it that bridge is still available for sale elsewhere?

That would be cool, but it's not my mod. It's Kevin's mod, I just made the parts...But thanks for the props... :icon_thumright:

 

[Verne Bunsen]

Thanks for the run down, Cagey. I was quite curious as to all the details. Phenomenal work, really tremendous.

 

[Cagey]

Thanks! And if you ever need a Hannes bridge installed... :icon_biggrin:

 

[vikingred]

Thanks again to Cagey and DR6 again for the nice save.  I'm still playing this beast for hours and a it is awesome.  This experience shows me that it is essential that when having a luthier perform a task to use someone who's had experience with the exact thing you need done.  I should have sought out someone who's done Hannes bridge installs before. 

 

[Cagey]

You're welcome! And what's making it play so well is only partly the bridge relocation that put the strings in the same neighborhood as the neck. I also leveled, crowned, dressed and polished those frets so when the truss rod is adjusted to make the neck flat, there's less than .001" variation in fret height from one end to the other, and they're super-slick. Put .008" relief in the neck before stringing it up, and we're good to go. String it up, cut the nut slots to get ~.012" clearance at the 1st fret, set the saddle heights properly, and it plays like a dream. The threaded inserts I installed insure the neck has a very solid connection to the body so there's no vibrational losses, and all that Maple says "I'm gonna hold this note all day!"  :icon_biggrin:

 

[DangerousR6]

Thanks again to Cagey and DR6 again for the nice save.  I'm still playing this beast for hours and a it is awesome.  This experience shows me that it is essential that when having a luthier perform a task to use someone who's had experience with the exact thing you need done.  I should have sought out someone who's done Hannes bridge installs before.

:headbang: arty07: