My First Ever Build / EXA Kit

So my son is a huge Metallica fan, and has worn me out asking for an Explorer style guitar. I gave him the kit for Christmas, and we've had a great time building it so far...

He wanted to do a copy of Hetfield's "Eet Fuk" guitar, and when Mom put her foot down against that logo we found a compromise with her and decided on a 'tribute' version with a different slogan. We are pretty proud of what we've accomplished so far.

Attachment 33221

My boy sanded and sealed repeatedly with progressively finer grits until the body and neck were smooth. I blended the Olympic White using some acrylic craft paints I had laying about my shop and we put on about 6 coats with fine grit sanding in between.

I remembered to do a mock-up before we went any further, and sure enough the humbucker pockets needed some work as well as the holes for the pots and the switch.

We used several coats of Tru-oil for the finish which was super-easy and gave us great results. The graphics were printed using my computer printer and water-slide paper.

I was unsure of how to make sure the neck-angle was set properly, so we decided to go with a bolt-on instead of gluing the neck in the pocket. That way if it needs adjustment it's not a big deal.

Attachment 33226

I set and aligned the humbuckers today and when his mom wasn't looking, my son set the 'finger' stickers he ordered on the fretboard. As soon as I figure out how much of the powder coating I need to remove to get a good ground, I will attack the wiring (my Achilles heel) tomorrow.

Thanks for letting me share!

Hi Daw, looking good.

Pretty brave doing a solid cover over Ash as it has a habit of grain poking through eventually once all the sealer has dried out and shrunk back. I have used Tru Oil on all of my builds and from my experience it usually ages/yellows fairly quickly and you may find the Olympic White ends up a slight shade of butter/cream colour. Poly or Acrylic seem to be best for locking in a colour and prevent the rapid aged look.

Over the next couple of weeks I intend to do a new topic showing all builds now vs when 'finished' to show the level of 'ageing' when using Tru Oil. Some colours work better than others.

As for removing powder coating, the earth wire goes into one of the post holes and all you need to do is use some sand paper on the section that goes down the hole so that a proper contact is made.

Cheers, Waz.

Admittedly, I was unfamiliar working with Ash, and found out after the fact about the grain showing... It was maddening.

Were we not already so committed I would have restarted and done it differently but several extra coats/sanding got it to a point where the grain was minimal and the boy was happy with it. (And that's what matters, right?)

I'm sure I overdid removing the powdercoating for the grounding but there's continuity all the way to where the wires string through the tailpiece. I was worried about the wiring overall but aside from reversing the hot/earth wires on the input jack (which I quickly identified and corrected) all went well!

I'll be happy to contribute to your before/after project if you like.

Attachment 33362

Sorry to necro here.
How did you go about converting the set neck to a bolt on?

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Originally Posted by scottgze

Sorry to necro here.
How did you go about converting the set neck to a bolt on?

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Hi and welcome.

It looks from the photos that Daw simply uses a standard Fender-style neck plate, drilled four holes in from the back and fixed the neck in place.

Probably not the best way to go about it as the depth of wood at the base of the neck pocket isn't that deep, so will be a lot weaker than the base of most bolt-on neck pockets, which are normally at least double that thickness. The neck will also lose the extra strength at the joint from being glued at the sides. On the plus side, Daw did move the plate back a few mm further than normal, so the two front screws aren't on the very edge of the pocket. So whilst it's probably not going to simply fall off under string tension, the neck itself will not be held quite as rigidly as if it had been glued in place.