Gms-7z

Hi,

I have started this now, luckily mine came pretty much spot on, the only thing really missing was the drill hole for the bridge ground, which i drilled (very nervously) into the pickup cavity.

Im doing a very basic natural finish to it, i have used linseed oil for the first few coats until i was happy with the colour and now applying crimson guitars high build guitar oil to shine up

i have filed the headstock fretboard down a bit on an angle as it may have rubbed on the high strings. ill keep going a bit until its even.

the neck pickup is very tight so i have to be careful when i glue the neck in as it needs to be pulled back about 3mm and the scale length lines up ok

Does anyone know what the 10.4 and 9.6 mean on the back of the pickups? im guessing its how tightly wound they are and the 9.6 is for the neck and 10.4 is for the bridge?

Im going to use the stock pickups for the beginning until i can afford to get them custom made to fit.

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Looking good.

I'd use a multimeter to check the DC resistances, but I'd assume that's what they indicate. And yes, 9.6k for the neck and 10.4k for the bridge. The pickup coils are naturally longer than 6-string coils because of the 7 strings and will use (very roughly) 1/6 more wire because of the longer length of the winding> Working back, those would equate to roughly 8.2k and 8.9k for 6-string equivalents. So certainly on the hotter side of things (assuming 42AWG wire).

thanks! thats great to know

whats best to finish an ebony fretboard to get a nice shine?

If you want an actual shine, then probably something like beeswax. But it is more normal to just use lemon oil on it , which will deepen the colour and add a small amount of shine if the wood's very dry.

Thanks, i have some lemon oil left over from the last build so will use that. the ebony is really good on this neck.

My kit pickups measured around 1k lower than the ratings listed. I'll probably mod something else on to the baseplate eventually.

I use mineral oil on fretboards. It's the main component of lemon oil and most of the fancy guitar neck conditioners. And it's really cheap.

I have nearly finished with the oil on the body now, the neck has a bit to go still.

Next job i'm going to do is glue the neck, i have ordered another clamp so i can use 2 and fingers crossed i get this right!

Some of the oil has bled into the neck pocket and down the neck, i'm just wondering if that will affect the glue and if should sand it back a bit

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That is looking nice

Titebond won't adhere well to finish. It bonds to the cellulose in the wood, so any finish stopping that happening will give a much weaker bond in those areas. What sort of 'oil' do you mean here? Tru-OIl, Tung Oil etc?


Always best to fully mask from a couple of mm behind the join line to stop accidents happening.

I would sand the areas with finish that will be glued, but I wouldn't try to remove all the finish as you'd probably have to take too much depth off and make the bottom of the neck uneven. Instead I'd probably just sand it lightly with P80 grit, to give a rough surface for the glue to key into and provide more grip than the basic finish will give. You should have more than enough good glue area to keep the neck firmly on.