GTL-1 First Build

So this is my first PBG build and my build of any kind. I’ve modded my old knock-off Strat to within an inch of its life, build a few stereo speaker kits and done a fair bit of soldering, so hopefully I don’t make too bad of a mess of this kit. The kit arrived at the weekend and I’ve been gathering tools and measuring everything, measuring again, and measuring again.

I had originally thought of doing a Gilmour-style flat black body, but now I think I’ll aim for something like gavinturner of these boards did with his Black Ash Tele. Only difference is I’ll wet sand the initial oil coats to fill some of the grain with the sawdust slurry. I can’t find Tru Oil here or get it shipped for a non-extortionate price, so I have some high build finishing oil and black water-based stain on the way from Crimson Guitars. That’s apparently a reverse-engineered Tru Oil copy, so we’ll see how it goes.

A few limitations (apart from my own abject lack of skill): we’re in a serviced apartment which is basically a hotel – so no windows that open and not great ventilation. Also we have a two-year old so the sawdust has to be kept to a bare minimum. And I’m only in Hong Kong for the year and I left all of my tools back home in Ireland, so the last couple of days I’ve been gathering up the essentials that I can’t borrow.

Not planning to seal or do any other grain-filling. Sprays are not an option and I want to keep the indoor sanding to a minimum. Actually, I’m going to have to go to a little square around the corner from our building to do any serious sanding. That should get some interesting looks from people…

So here's a mock-up with the neck and body hardware fitted:

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I'll use a coping saw to cut along one of these lines to shape the headstock:

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A couple of wood-only shots:

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And here's gavinturner's Black Ash Tele that I'm going to shamelessly (try to) copy:

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Now the kit seems generally good but there are a couple of issues with it:

You might see it from the pics above but the body centre line and the neck centre line are way off. I don't think that'll be too much of an issue provided I can line the bridge up with the neck correctly, which I think I can do. I got the Wilkinson upgrade bridge with the Tonerider Hot Classics so there isn't a whole lot of wriggle room in the pickup cavity. But I've measured it out and I can get the correct scale length along the neck centre line so hopefully the intonation doesn't end up trashed. Bit of a shame that the neck won't line up perfectly with the body though.

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The neck pocket isn't shaped to the heel of the neck either:

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I don't think that's going to be a huge problem. It seats in the pocket well enough and the gap will be covered by the pickguard anyway. I'll have a go at the bass-side corner with some 80 grit and see if I can shape it to the heel. If not, I reckon I'll just live with it.

I have to borrow a drill and our two-year-old goes to bed around 7, so the next part has to wait until the morning. Can't wait...

I've been very remiss in updating this thread. She's drilled, screwed, soldered, strung and making noise!

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Of course I made a few mistakes with the bridge placement, though. Mostly through rushing it.

You can see them here: I have to put the saddles back almost over the bridge mounting screws to get even close to proper intonation. The strings are not quite in line with the bridge either.

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I wouldn't be too concerned with that latter bit, the strings go evenly over the pickup pole pieces and they are properly spaced along the neck. I think the bridge misplacement is down to the Wilkinson bridge being shorter than the stock one, and me using the Tonerider pickups (of course I didn't read the forum threads about that before drilling).

Another pic of the bridge:

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Next stop will be to the hardware shops to try and find a dremel to enlarge the bridge pickup cavity and dowels to plug the existing holes. I did buy a chisel but I'm not very confident in my ability to neatly carve out more space, particularly in the rounded corners of the cavity.

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I'm very happy with the Grover tuners though, they're lovely and smooth to use and they hold tune perfectly. I've marked out a rough headstock shape that I think will work, reasonably close to a "standard" tele shape. I've got some templates printed out but I think I could live with what I've sketched.

The neck is good and straight even under tension (it barely moved from its unstrung position to its strung position), it needs maybe just a little relief but it plays well and the action is surprisingly good without any adjustments. The frets will need a full setup though, they're fairly uneven the whole way up the neck. I haven't done that before so it should be interesting...

I'm not sure if it's due to the fact that I've got the factory strings on, or the unfinished fretboard, or something else, but the Tonerider bridge pickup doesn't sound good at all. It's very rough and scratchy sounding. The solder connections are all good and the bridge is grounded so I'm not sure what's causing that. Hopefully it goes away once I've finished the neck and given the pickup more room in the cavity. Has anyone seen this happen before?

Lastly, my black stain and finishing oil arrived this morning. Took a while to get here from the UK but I guess that's to be expected. Once I've got the bridge positioning sorted I'll get started on the finish. It's gotten very warm and very humid here in Hong Kong lately so I think the finishing may take even longer than I had expected.

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Edit: looks like my phone camera pictures didn't rotate like I wanted them to. I can't seem to remove the uploaded photos in order t ore-upload them. Any ideas how to do that?

I wouldn't worry about any pickup rout enlargement being too neat. Just make sure that any existing holes are covered by the bridge plate when you move the bridge back.

The bridge pickup looks a long way from the strings. Raising it so that it's about 2mm away on the treble side and 3mm on the bass side should add in a lot more mids and bass, and increase the output.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Simon Barden

The bridge pickup looks a long way from the strings. Raising it so that it's about 2mm away on the treble side and 3mm on the bass side should add in a lot more mids and bass, and increase the output.

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[Facepalm] thanks for the tip, Simon. I raised it like you said and now it sounds much better. I'll have a crack at doing the bridge and cavity in the next day or two when time permits.

Also, if those are a set of 9s, I'd think about changing up to 10s. Teles always sound a lot 'thinner' to me with 9s, and I feel they need 10s as minimum. But then James Burton always puts 8s on his, so YMMV. Still, it's a fairly cheap and easy change to try out.

It turns out that I don't have the clearance to make a meaningful difference to the intonation - I've only got a mm or two from the edge of the pickup cavity to the front edge of the pickup cover. I might still remove some material and move the bridge. But I'm going to see if I can mix the stock cover with the Wilkinson compensated saddles to make a Frankenbridge of sorts, and see if I can position that to achieve proper scale length and intonation. Will mess around with that over the weekend.

I have however been playing with the colour. I have some black water-based stain from Crimson Guitars. It went on quite easily but it turned out a very matte black. The grain still shows up in certain light and at the correct angle but I wasn't sold on the overall effect, even though I know it would change with the oil finish over it.
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So I took a baby wipe and pulled out some of the colour. Not the best photo below, but the contrast between the grain and non-grain(?) sections showed through a little better and gave a warmer effect overall. Reasonably happy with that.
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But after I did this I noticed some sanding scratches which I hadn't gotten rid of as I went up to 320 grit during the finish sanding, so I went back down to 220 and worked up to 400. That's when I had a happy little accident:

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The black dye is a very deep indigo. Sanding it back lightened it up enough to create a sort of faded denim effect. The scratches I wanted to remove were mostly in the centre so removing them gave a sort of burst effect, completely by accident. I love this though, so I've changed the plan for the final colour and I'm going to go with this. The sanding removed almost all of the colour around the edges, so I'll have to go back over them with the black stain and I'll try to fade the edges in to create a proper burst.

I think the small, very light patches are high spots. I'll probably strip all of the colour and go over the body again starting at 80 and working my way up to 400, to avoid the same happening when I redo the colour.

Before I do that though, I have some very deep scratches to remove from the sides. I didn't spot these at all when sanding, they only showed up after the colour was applied. Could also be that I just missed them because I'm working under artificial light. I don't know if I made these when I started sanding at 180 grit or if they were made by the factory, but either way I'll take the sides back to 80 grit, then go up through the grits to 600.
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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Simon Barden

Also, if those are a set of 9s, I'd think about changing up to 10s. Teles always sound a lot 'thinner' to me with 9s, and I feel they need 10s as minimum. But then James Burton always puts 8s on his, so YMMV. Still, it's a fairly cheap and easy change to try out.

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Yeah I've got a set of Ernie Ball 10s in the cupboard, I'll throw those on next time I string her up. I've actually been using 9s on a Grote LP style guitar I bought a little while ago. It's been a looong time since I played regularly and my fingers needed to get used to strings again. I'll change those out too.

9's work pretty well on the LP scale length, you won't find the 10's that much heavier on the fender scale length. I used 9's a lot for a long time, but I've been using 10's and 11's a lot more recently and found I like them a more. There's more control or something. Does hurt your fingers for a bit though :P

I ALWAYS find scratches and things I've missed after the first stain (or undercoat) application. I just expect that as par for the course these days.

The faded effect is cool. I had an SG style project that I stained red, then Feast Watson black over the top. It ended up looking black inside and a deep cherry in full sun.

My TLA is sporting 11’s, most of my herd are 10s.
My Eastman Archtop is wearing. .013” x .056” just for contrast. 🤣

10s for me on electrics, except for my 5-string open G Vintage V130 LP Jr DC alike, with 12s.

I find a lot more scratches when actually applying the stain, as it pools in the deeper scratches which really highlights them. Then I can't unsee them, so it's out with the sandpaper, remove the scratches and re-stain.

I used to use 11-49s (D'Addario EXL115s) but I switched to 10-46 last year and love it. In hindsight I wonder why I stuck with 11s for so long. I still find large bends hard, but that's probably me rather than the strings. I might set up my tele for 9s initially just for the experiment.

Do people normally go heavier or lighter on Gibson scaled guitars?
I’ve used 10-52s on all my fender style guitars for years, need that snap, been a long time since I played a 24.75

The 'norm' is 9s for Fenders and 10s for Gibsons due to the shorter scale length of the Gibsons, which supposedly gives them a similar playing feel. Can't say it did for me. But a lot will depend on how your guitar is set up. It's a lot easier playing heavier strings with a low action, as you don't have to add so much extra tension to push the strings onto the frets as you do with a high action.

I've been using Ernie Ball Hybrid Slinkys 9-42 on my Fender and Rick since 1989 and recently Mangan or D'Addario NYXL 10-46 on Gibson scales.

As a kid in an Indie band, I didn't like Gibsons back then :rolleyes:

Edit: spaces.

Progress!

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Between work and life getting in the way and me nearly losing the will to live trying to get the scratches out of the endgrain on the sides, I hadn't done anything on the guitar for a while. So to get back into it I focused on the neck. Printed off a template and spent an hour with a coping saw and sandpaper cutting and shaping. Came out pretty well apart from near the nut on the treble side where I cut slightly inside the line. I was able to more or less mask that with a file and a lot of sanding. First pic is just after cutting/shaping, second pic is from last night with the first coat of Crimson's finishing oil on.

The fretboard is still raw, I'll apply the oil to it a bit differently from the rest of the neck but it does highlight how much the oil colours the raw maple. It's really humid here and the oil was still a bit tacky this morning after hanging for about 7 hours in my bathroom (I don't have a balcony or even windows that open!) so I think I'll be lucky if I get two coats applied per day.

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After getting somewhere with the neck I went back to the body. I finally managed to hide the scratches that I can't seem to avoid putting into the body endgrain by taking a little more time to follow the grain while sanding. It's very swirly so it took a while but it's not looking too bad now. I've given up on removing the factory scratch marks, they're just going to be a feature of the finished guitar.

I re-coloured the front and back then sanded with 400 grit to try to get a burst. With the way the ash absorbs the stain it's not perfect but it's not too bad either. Tonight I'll go back over everything with 400 to lighten the colour a bit, then redo the colour on the edges to darken them. I'm in the home straight now. Hopefully after tonight all that will be left will be clear-coating, fret dressing and final assembly.

Because I just can't leave good enough alone, I also got a set of pickups delivered from axetec in the UK - stacked single coils where you can engage one stack (slightly hot at around 7.5K) or both stacks together which are 11K in the neck and 16K in the bridge! The toneriders will still go in first. But I also ordered a spare pickguard and control plate, as well as some new standard pots, a push-push pot and a mini toggle switch to do some trick wiring with the new pickups.

The stain on the ash body looks great! I really like it a lot.

Also, to add to the conversation about string gauges, since my last comment I have put a set of D'Addario EXL125s on my G&L. They are a 9-46 hybrid set. Unwound strings from 9s, wound strings from 10s. So far I am loving them. A minor truss rod adjustment was needed though, and I still need a small intonation adjustment too. But they feel great.

First coat of oil on the body last night (the colour isn't as green in real life):

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I doused the body in the Crimson finishing oil and used 600 grit (initially) to create the slurry. After just one coat the grain is very close to completely filled. You can feel just the slightest bit of grain when you run your fingers over it. The sandpaper did remove a little of the colour around the edge of the burst and on the sides, though, so I switched to 1200 grit halfway through. I'm not a huge fan of relics, but that bit of it isn't too bad.

I thought that the colour in the middle would get a bit "dirty" from the slurry picked up from the black parts around the edge and sure enough it did. I considered sanding the colour off and redoing it, but with the hardware dry-fitted it's much less noticeable and I kinda like the overall look.

I'm going to do another coat tonight, try to get one done in the morning and see how it looks after that. This first application was a soak and grain fill coat, so the finish should start building up from here.

The neck has had four straight coats of oil and a oily wet-sand with 1200. There's a nice, thin finish on it now which feels surprisingly hard, if a little bit squeaky. I put one very thin coat on the fretboard this morning and I'll do a few more until it feels built up enough. Then on to fret dressing.

Building up the finish, four (I think) coats in. Slow going because the humidity is 85%+ most days. It's coming along though, it now has a decent satin sheen.

I followed Crimson's guide for the first three coats: pour on a generous amount, then wipe off the excess after a few minutes. I'm starting to run low on oil so I put the last coat on in the standard tru oil style, a super-thin coat wiped off quickly. This went on on Sunday afternoon and it's still tacky now on Tuesday, even after moving the guitar to a bigger, better-ventilated room.

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Link to an Imgur gif showing the sheen seeing as the link wouldn't embed:
https://imgur.com/gallery/ch8dpTn

And the neck:
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I've got 5 coats on the neck. I tried rubbing the oil into the neck with my finger but no matter how well I rubbed it off, I couldn't avoid some pooling by the frets. I switched to just using a rag for the last coat. Which is also still tacky. Once this dries I'll get started on dressing the frets.

Once the body dries I'm going to do a light sanding to get rid of some crud which has stuck to the latest coat, and maybe a wet sand with 1500 grit, not sure. Then a few more thin coats followed by a final coat of mineral spirits/oil 50:50 mix and I'll call it done.

You can only upload 4 photos per post. So if you want to upload more photos, you just have to break your post up into two or more posts.

High humidity affects the way a lot of of finishes dry. Unfortunately you just have to wait.

Looking good though.