Simon B's Custom ES-1/ES330 style build

[Simon Barden]

It's certainly a lot better than the previous purple!

[Guvna19]

Simon, that is looking superb to me! Your persistance is a credit to you... and when that gets the top coats, I'll bet the flame / grain will come alive. The binding sets it off real nice.
Great to see you back in the thick of it mate.

*As a side note and first time mention, I'm looking to name my JB4-A - "Blu-Healer" , as I'm finding the guitar building gig very therapeutic and a welcome relief to my own anxiety issues. Even when I stuff things up a bit, I like to remind myself that a blind man will still hear the bueatiful sounds our guitars make.

Enjoying watching your build(s) and all the wise input you add to the forum1

regards
Guv

[Simon Barden]

I must say it is currently making me want to get up and do things in the morning. It's hard to break away from just sitting in front of the computer in my dressing gown and post on forums until lunchtime and then get dressed, but I was up and working away early today!

You do need to know that there's only so much you can do and let the small things go. There's a mark on the side of the top front horn that obviously came from a stain run when I was staining the top or bottom and didn't notice it and wipe it off straight away. It's not blindingly obvious, but I know it's there. And it will now stay there because I'm only going to mess something else up if I try and fix it (if it is even fixable). A lesson to be more careful in the future and inspect the sides after every stain coat.

I started out using a fairly big bit of sponge to apply the stain, but that sponge held far too much stain and the slightest squeeze sent a flood of stain over the surface. That got cut down several times, but even now, it's probably a bit too large.

[Simon Barden]

As I didn't successfully block the F-holes when staining, there were quite a few stain runs that were visible through the F-holes. So I've just painted all the visible parts of the inside with undiluted black stain to tidy things up. I wiped the binding with some white spirit and that seems to have got the last of the red residue off. The body is now hanging in the spare bedroom with the window open to get rid of the smell.

I've now got to concentrate on the headstock.

[Marcel]

On jobs that weren't guitar builds I've had to darken things up a bit and had reasonably good results using a light to moderate concentration of Brown stains. Both the Keda Powdered and Ubeaut liquid sets have a Brown that might be suitable.

Might be a bit late, and there is a high chance it is not suitable here... just putting it out there for others following this thread...

[robin]

Ah, that's more like it Simon, I love the colour now. With some glossy goodness on it will come up a treat. Well done on the perseverance, and getting out of your PJs.

rob

[Simon Barden]

Nuts!

Well, a nut. The one on the neck. Took the plastic one off then found that my standard 43mm wide bone replacement was far too wide. 'Only' by 2mm, but the string spacing on it is a lot wider than on the original, so isn't going to work. 41mm wide nuts are a rare breed, so it's blank bone time and shaping my own nut.

In other new, I've been Tru-Oiling the body (and neck) and it's now ended up a much deeper red. It's a clear day today, so hopefully in a couple of hours when the sun's in the garden, I can take a picture in decent light. There's still frost on the grass, so it can do with warming up a bit too before I venture out!

[Grubsta]

It's coming along nicely Simon looking forward to an updated progress pic. I enjoy reading your threads there always informative.

[FrankenWashie]

Nice progress Simon, hopefully the uk weather plays ball and we get to see some pretty piccies!

[Simon Barden]

And here are the pictures...

Top:




Back:



Neck (rear):



That's with the Tru-Oil sealer and then a few coats of Tru-Oil applied.

It's darkened considerably and doesn't look as bright a red out of direct sunlight, a bit more like maroon.

There are those couple of awkward spots on the back that had shown themselves up before. I'm in the process of darkening those a bit so they don't stand out as much. The back is a bit patchier than I thought it would be, probably a result of me trying to sand back, before I tried adding some other stain colours. I won't do that again.