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Just turned up today. I'm building this as a surprise gift for a friend and he has no idea. He's a bit of an Arsenal fan (yet we're still friends somehow) so this will be painted red with a bit of white and with a Gunners logo or two - just have to work out where they're going.
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Down? :D
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Been a bit slow with this. The weather hasn't been conducive to spray painting outdoors from a can.
Did the grain fill and undercoats a few weeks back and then got around to laying down some colour and a decal on the weekend.
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The face of the headstock will be white and thinking of spraying the pickguard white also, but not sure how that will turn out, though.
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A bit of research on painting pickguards has pointed me to a Krylon Fusion for plastics. Would love to hear from anyone that's done this. I'm concerned about the durability of a painted pickguard. They make the Krylon Fusion in a clear gloss so would it be beneficial to to finish with a few clear coats to protect the white or is that a waste of time?
I considered buying a white Flying V pickguard but a standard Gibson pickguard doesn't line up with all the holes. Didn't even bother checking the dimensions but I'd be surprised if they're the same. A few extra holes that go nowhere would be kinda crap.
If you buy a pick guard blank in triple ply white you could use the one you have as a template. It’s quite easy material to work with.
Didn't think of that. I'm always trying to find the most difficult solution for some reason.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sonic Mountain
https://www.realparts.com.au/pickgua...ite-3-ply.html
These guys are really good. Measure what you have, you might need the larger option.
I second this, I did exactly this for my 3 ply pick guard on my AJM build
Finished the wet sand and polish. Only done by hand so not the best job but still looks decent. Now for my next hurdle that I didn't foresee.
Never done one like this before with all the pickups and knobs mounted on the pickguard but still needing to route the wiring through drill holes in the body. Makes for a very awkward soldering job because I need to balance the pickguard near the body while doing all the soldering so I don't have a crapload of cable to bundle back into the cavities. As much as I hate the idea, might be worth doing this with plug-in connectors so I can solder it all and route cables through, then just connect the plugs just before I mount the pick-guard.
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Here's the almost complete kit. Didn't trust myself to do a decent job of cutting out a pick guard given the detail, so I ended up spraying with the Krylon. Completely forgot about the jack mount plate so I've given that a few coats today and I'm just waiting for that to harden.
Just dealing with a possible grounding issue which will require me to dismantle to investigate. I have grounding from bridge to jack, but I'm getting a buzz when playing through the bridge pickup. Also getting it through the neck pickup but I can pretty much eliminate it by turning the tone to minimum treble. The bridge tone put has no effect on the buzz however. Not really sure where to look but I'll pull it apart and draw out a schematic of my wiring and start testing things.
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Finished. Waiting for my mate to come and pick it up - he still has no idea at all. Fixed the issue with the humming - didn't properly ground the volume pot. Fixed that, moved the bridge grounding to the back of a tone pot and added copper shielding in all the cavities. Here's some photos...
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I think isolation is a perfect excuse to start a new kit...
Looks is superb. Well done and look forward to seeing your next kit. Your mates gonna be stoked
My mate was speechless. Hopefully it will make his isolation a bit more enjoyable. Of course I'm now getting requests from other friends. Looking at a zebrawood tele for another friend and just hitting it with tru oil, but I need to find some examples of how this might look before I commit. If it looks too good, I might just end up keeping it and letting him have my tele I built a while back instead. :-)