Kick's first build LP-1MQ Red Widow

[GregLane]

Hi Kick
I finished a LP-1MQ earlier this year and have just found your build diary as I have not been on the forum for a little while. My veneer join is perfectly straight. I agree with Simon that I would not be happy with the skewed veneer and noticed a couple of other anomalies.

Yours is the first MQ I have seen that does not have a bolt-neck. The bolt-ons have totally different neck connection cutout (what ever you call it). Check the photos on my build.

I then had a look at the advertisement for the LP-1MQ and it says that it has a bolt-on neck. There is a photo of the bolt-on neck with screws hole in it for the bolts (as mine did) but the photo of the body does not have the bolt holes. The neck socket in the photo is the same as the glue in LP's but it does have quilted veneer so it is a new photo.

BUT if you look carefully at the photos I think I can see the veneer is crooked. (I don't think it is too much Bundy). I think you have the first of a new batch of LP-1MQ's with crooked veneers and Adam has not updated the advertisement totally. I doubt if the neck in the advertisement is the same as yours.

Let me know what you think.

Greg

[stan]

Hey Kick, great news on the new job - congrats

[Kick]

Thanks Stan! Changing from the IT business to a construction company is a jump but I already feel at home

@GregLane: I checked the website also and I must admit it is a bit confusing. In the large image I see a neck that is a set neck but in the smaller images I also see a bolt-on neck. And even the description is mentioning a bolt-on neck.

I must admit that I only took the large image as what I ordered and I expected to get a kit with a set neck (which I did).

About the veneer join; I'm taking the body to school tomorrow (I am following a woodworking course) to have the teachers take a look at it. Hopefully they have an idea to mask the join so that when I'm gonnan stain it, it will be not visible anymore.

In the meantime I ordered two bottles of fountain pen ink (bright red and black) and I'm gonna do some tests on scrapwood to see what ratio water/ink would be the best.
And I finally decided what shape the headstock will be; a bit like the ESP LP style but less pointy.

Now all I have to do is find some spare time...

[GregLane]

Good Luck Kick. I was warned when I joined so I feel I should pass it on. IT GETS YOU IN, YOU GET THE GAS.
I will be watching with interest.

PS "All guitars should be red" hihi

[Kick]

Ok, today is the day that I will make a start! Since my last post I received my orders in the mail; a little jar of Rustin's Grain filler, a bottle of Tungoil and two colors of ink; bright black and bright red.

I drew a line on the headstock and I wil start with sawing it. Next I will try to remove the glue spots on the veneer of the body. Three teachers at school agreed on the best approach; using some warm water on the spots and try to scrape the glue of with a toothbrush. Hopefully that will work because I do not want to sand them of. I need all the veneer because I have to sand between some layers of the staining.

My only thing is that I still have not decided on the finish of the back of the body and the neck. Looking at the jar of grainfiller it looks as if it is not enough to cover the back, sides and neck. Since I will use the Tungoil to harden the finish I think I will go with the staining of the back and neck as well. I'll probably will do a 'small' burst on the headstock as well... Anyway, lot's of things to do and rethink

I will make some pictures later!

[Kick]

I made some progress today. As you can see everything I need is at hand:





As said before, I marked the shape of the headstock and took my handsaw to cut it out. I'm pretty happy with the result



Next, I taped of the neck and started sanding. I started with grid 120 down to 150, 180, 240 and ended with grid 320.



I did the same on the back and side of the body and everything is feeling very smooth now.

[Kick]

I also had a good look at the glue spots and the veneer itself. As you can see there are some big glue spots and small spots.



I took my teachers advice and used a little warm water and a toothbrush. I wetted the toothbrush and gently rubbed the spots until they vanished and then swiped the spot with some papertowel.
I had to perform this 5 times on each spot (of course letting it get dry in between).
As far as I can see it helped so I'm very happy with that as well!

When looking carefully at the veneer I can see some very rough area's. It looks as if the veneer has some little cracks and scratches. I used a little flashlight to get it more visual as you can see on the picture.





Do I need to sand that down with grid 600? Or is this not nessecarry since I'm gonna stain the body and finish it with lots of coating of Tunoil?

At last for today I wanted to do some little test with the ink. Just to see if I can figure out the ratio of water/ink. I found a piece of plywood with almost the same color of the veneer.

[Kick]

Ok, time for the test! Here I used 1 to 5 ratio (1 part ink and 5 parts water)... Not really what I was hoping for. I also realise now that the ink is just ink and not concentrated ink...



So, as I said; lot's of rethinking

[Simon Barden]

I like the headstock.

I would lightly sand to remove the worst of the marks in the veneer. As long as you don't go any deeper than the bottom of the scratch marks you'll be fine. If you can see the marks now, you'll probably see them through the finish.

You do need to be really careful with applying water to the veneer. It's very thin, so too much water and it soaks through to the glue holding the veneer on, it weakens the bond and the veneer has been known to bubble up. It's all fixable, but it's all trouble you don't want.

[Kick]

Hi Simon, I was really carefull not to use too much water. I just checked the body and all is well

In my enthousiasm I only forgot to put on a latex glove so now I have red finger tops LOL!!