1st Build 27" Bariton Tele AK27

Hi there,

i am Sascha from the outback near Munich/Germany and this ist the build diary of my first guitar kit. I got the GTH-1 kit but with a 27" neck with an ebony fretboard and i am pretty happy with it. Everything looks really nicely done, the grain of the body is very even and dense, the grain on the headstock looks amazing, so all in all it seems like a perfect kit to make a beautiful and good sounding guitar.

The body came with just the neck pocket and the cavities for the pickups and electronics routed. So my first tasks where drilling the holes for the bridge and the neck. When i ordered the kit, i thought that the holes for the bridge would be pre drilled as they were on the pictures of kit in the online shop. But as they have not been drilled yet, i took the chance to go with another bridge than the one that came with the kit and ordered the Schaller 3D-6 Bridge.

After thoroughly reading the instruction manual and watching nearly every video tutorial i could find i finally startet measuring and marking everything i would need.

http://i.imgur.com/CLPvRKSl.jpg?2

To check the correct alignment of the bridge and the neck i ran a string loop through the bridge and the holes in the headstock where the machine heads will later sit and stretched the loop with the vise on my workbench:

http://i.imgur.com/dvBWWVCl.jpg?1
http://i.imgur.com/FzDoMN3l.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/Jl8IznLl.jpg

After i convinced myself that everything is in its place i marked everything and started drilling. I drilled the holes in the neck pocket with my drill press, the holes for the bridge had to be drilled manually as my drill press was not big enough to drill that far in the middle of the body. But everything really came out as i wanted it to be and i am pretty happy about that.

http://i.imgur.com/tQA4EIcl.jpg

After drawing dozens of different shapes for the headstock i could finally decide on one of them (actually the one that was my favorite from the beginning, so i could have skipped all the drawing and just had gone with my first favorite). So yesterday i sawed and sanded the headstock shape and i am also very happy about it:

http://i.imgur.com/99ot0wCl.jpg

It still needs some fine tuning, but i will do that in the process of sanding the whole neck for preparing it for the finish.
I haven't decided yet, what finish i will apply on the neck, but i want a really smooth and natural feel on it, so i am hoping to find some hints or suggestions on this in this forum.
The body will be painted matt olive/wood green, but i also don't exactly know what kind of lacquer and grain filler i should use for that, so i would be happy to get some suggestions on that, too.
Here is a little mock up i did on how everything should look in the end:

http://i.imgur.com/0ZyYmJ7l.jpg

I'm gonna put some black and creme Dimarzio pick ups in there and the knobs will be Fender Strat style ones in creme. All the other hardware will be black.

So all in all i am really looking forward do building this guitar and i would be very happy if i can get some suggestions and help here :-)

Cheers
Sascha