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Putting the failure of the last ST1-A project behind. thanks to the guys at Pit Bull for the great customer service. They replaced the faulty kit.
This is a full reset. The first kit was to be a Cherry Burst, this time I am cutting my losses and am doing it in Butterscotch with a Cinamon pick guard and all the silver hardware. in my minds eye it looks good. hope it turns out that way in reality.
Kells - hope #2 goes well. All the best with it and will be watching with interest.
all the best - colours sound nice and classic and edible...
Reset kit has arrived, No return mailing slip for old mate Fauwlty Strat, sort that out later.
Kit unpacked. Neck started first up. Oiled the fret board, and marked out the headstock.
Standard Strat shape. not sure what Vintage it is. I have a PDF with about 7 headstocks. I just picked one I like, it's out of a piece of mdf offcut, for routing after Jigging.
Yeah Yeah I know I need to tidy up my work bench. LOL
Off to Newport next to see if my Son's kit has been left on his door step
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your plans sound good Kells, can we please see a picture of the ash body ? always good to see the grain on these
Hi Wokka, No worries. I haven't looked at it yet my self. I opened the box counted the bits and took off to the shed with the neck in hand.
Now this is interesting the grain pattern has a herringbone look to it. this might call for a reassesment of the colour choice for this body and maybe some Black inking. Any suggestions welcome
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http://www.pitbullguitars.com/wp-con...217_173126.jpg
wow nice grain Paul, has the back of the body been stained ? its got a hint of red in the colour
Hi Wokka,
No this is how it came out of the box, it's pure nude timber. There is no differnece in the front to back. so that red colour may have been caused by the red eye setting on my phone. :) Oh I know what it was, one pic was taken outside the other was inside.
Cheers PK
Hi Paul, maybe the back photo was taken late in the afternoon sometimes gives objects a redish tint.
Anyway you must be happy with the replacement kit, should come up a treat with butterscotch
Hi Wokka,
I hope so I posted a message to DB about puting a Black or Brown ink under the Butterscotch to bring up the grain a bit more, but I'm still waiitng on a response. I don't want to spoil the butterscotch if the Inking doesn't work on the Ash.
Cheers PK
no worries Paul, you could always try and small portion of inking on the ash and put butterscotch ontop to see how it works, and if it doesn't sand it back. I'm not sure if the ink will work, probably less chance of working the darker the inks
Paul, DB is away this week, so he may not see your post. You might have more luck emailing dingobass@pitbullguitars.com or maybe someone else here can advise. I'm sorry I'm no help.
Hi Adam,
I threw it open on the forum in this trail as well the Hints and Tips on Buterscotch trail as well. I have been thinking about maybe the Ash won't take an inking too well. I've got about week till the Wudtone arrives
a bit bored waiting for Wudtone to arrive, so sanded and sealed two strat necks as well as the two Long necks(no they aren't beer, settle boys). One of the strat necks is waiting on it's shipping ticket, but thought I may as well have a tinker with it. I've shellacked the two long scales. and sanding sealed the two strat necks, well they are all strat necks really. just can't fit the long scales to a pre pocketed strat body. but as far as pocket size and shape thy are all identical
I cut the head shape of the new strat neck and it has come out pretty damn close to the first one I cut.
I like that shape it is not a common Strat shape that I have seen around. it has a bit of a reverse curve on the cut up into the bottom side. I like it .
Also got the Cinamon scratch plate. the lines across it are the protective plastic sheet
Cheers PK
Pics here
The story behind the two long necks(they are 24 fret, or dubble octave) is that; I bought one off ebay, and they neglected to wrap the ends properly and the end of the fret board got shattered. So I bitvhed and for $10 they sent me a new one. But ever resourceful me I fixed the dammaged one. Jimmy Oastler at Underground Music ffound it hard to pick the damage, I fixed it that well. :) But hey that's me Jack of most trades, master of none but the open bottle of beer. :D
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Just reailsed I am going to have to get a new stand when I finish this strat. All the girls lined up below. the 335 still the bain of my life but comming a long slowly. I am working on an idea for a binding scrapper based on an idea from AJ. I have a ton of binding in the shed, so I an going to glue together a guide that will only allow the blade to scrape the binding, made out of .....binding....
http://www.pitbullguitars.com/wp-con...218_174620.jpg
looking good Paul plenty of necks there !
thought for a minute the pickguard had flames !
With regards to the inking as I suggested before you should try a small sample on the ash body then sand it back and wet tag it to see if it has made the grain more pronounced. If you don't want to test it on the body you could try it in the neck pocket or trem pocket so it would be hidden and save sanding it back to bare ash
Under the pickguard is the place to play with the inking.
Cheers PK
good thinking PK, are you going to try that out ? make sure the ash is sanded to at least 240 grit paper
I have a roll of 240 grit and some W&D 360 grit I usually finish with 1200 grit followed by 0000 steel wool. so we'll see what happens. a patch or two. prob with butterscotch is it's a multi layer application. DB has to make it up special. He's back next week. so lots of discussion will be had before anything goes down.
kells80aus, not sure you should be going up to 1200 grit when using Wudtone. 1200 grit tends to polish the guitar and that will prevent the Wudtone from penetrating the wood properly. You may well end up with a 'patchy' guitar as a result of over sanding / polishing.
Hi Gav, Nah the 1200 hundred is for finishig.
OK, Something, bad or something really Bad. Whoever has set up the CNC to drill the neck holes in the body needs to move them south a few mm. The neck hole centres are set at 6 mm from the edge. the screws are 4 mm dia, this leaves only 4 mm to the side of the neck from the edge of the holes. I checked it against the kit in the grarage that's waiting for it's shipping docket. The holes are teh same on both kits. they need to be moved south a couple of mm so the holes set up equi distant from the side of the neck. This needs to Be QC'd. :D
Any how, What the 'Nitro'(swear Word) I've pushed on regardless.
8O more neck holes one set is closer to the edge thant the other side... they should both be the same distance from the edge. It's a future point of failure. :D
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Next. Mock set up then hole drilling. I got a bit carried a away and drilled the holes for the tremlo. never done a strat before. Ok drilled em about 5 mm too far back. but. Plugged the holes with timbermate and redrilled em further forward. ...... mmmm 'NITRO' drilled em about half a mm too far forward. means I have to trim a bit off the scratch plate. I went through all the thoughts of filling and redrilling, but though no real point. U can see a 1/2 mm of the tremlo route
http://www.pitbullguitars.com/wp-con...estart-006.JPG
The next four hours I spent applying and sanding a slurry of timbermate as a grain filler. BEER O'CLOCK, well it was two hours and three beers ago.... 80
Cinamon scratch plate, if I can get the holes to line up.You to try and imagine the Butterscotch colour on the body.
8-)
http://www.pitbullguitars.com/wp-con...estart-007.JPG
That's going to look sweet Paul. Bugger about the holes and drilling, etc. How's the scale length going with all these moves?
Hi Brendan,
How I managed to mount the tremlo in the wrong spot? I forgot to measure first. When I re-measured and re-drilled I reckon I went about half to 1 mm too far forward, but as I'd wound the bridge pieces forward I have plenty of adjustment. I am used to setting up Gibson styled guitars with their offset bridge. I guess I was so focused on the tremlo that I completely forgot the scale length.
Adam, If you read this I still have the other strat to send Back, Bones didn't put a mailing slip in the box. Oh and it's now Cherry Red(Shellaced). :D actually looks nice. But has no holes drilled. Never quite got to that.
part.
Cheers PK
This is the original Strat with three seam cracks. I was bored so I shellaced it with Stew Mac Cherry Red. Actually think it looks pretty cool
http://www.pitbullguitars.com/wp-con...-STRAT-003.JPG
Pitty Paul - the first one was looking hot!
Hey Paul, please see my email response. Cheers
For those interested in the Finish on the Red Strat above, this was achieved by applying Stew Mac Cherry Red Coloured Shellac directly to the bare body of the Strat. The result is that you retain that wooded texture as the pores of the wood are not filled with Filler. This is a process I have used before but with Tung oil over a brown water wash. In that instance the Water wash raised the fibres of the timber and each wash the surface was sanded down. I did this process about 5 or 6 times, before applying tung oil. The tung oil was applied with a rag the same way as you apply Wudtone. This aplication is totally different to how you apply Shellac. To apply Shellac you need to make up a rubbing pad. You use two 170-180 mm square squabs of 100% pure cotton. you fold up one of the sections of cotton into a flat squareish pad. you then place this at the centre of the other piece of cotton and fold up the sides. I use a piece of copper wire to bind around the squab to hold it to gether, or you could use a plastic tie. When applying the Shellac you apply it with the grain in a sort of swooping motion, just caressing the work with each pass. If the work gets to sticky you will need to squirt some metho on the squab.
It is important to note that the use of cotton is to stop threads pulling out of the squab. I've used a host of different types of material and they pretty much have all ended up blowing a hole in the squab and getting fibres all over the work. If this happenes with Shellac all is not lost as you can wipe all teh shellac off with metho and a clean rag. As to what type of shellac to use. I found White Shellac produces a harder and glossier surface, but if you want that aged yellow look then standard shellac is the go. you can buy Shellac flakes or premixed shellac from Bunnings or any big hardware store.
The application of the shellac should be three coats about half an hour appart, then leave for 24 hours then repeats coating step. When you are happy with the amount of coats you should leave the work for about a week before finishing off.
When finishing off the Shellac I use 0000 steel wool as it gives a nice smoothe surface. AJ recommends MacGuires polish to bring up the shine. I am yet to give this a try.
Cheers PK
That's a cool guide to using shellac, Paul. Detailed enough that I reckon I could even do it.
It's a pity the Strat's going back because it looks great.
Hi Lawry thanks for that. Yeah that Strat does look good. But that's the way things go sometimes.
Tung oiled Guitar. It looks and feels a bit like leather.
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The front of Tung Oiled guitar is clean oil, no colour added.
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This one is made from African Mahogany(as best as I could figure) it has of course the Bigsby, two Kent Armstrong Vintage P90's, the scale is standard Gibson 24.75. Tuners are Kluson deluxe, the Bridge Gotoh(I think). strings are Ultra Light D'Adario. Wiring is standard Gibson. Set up and fret leveling done by Jimmy Oastler at Underground Music in Weribee.
Cheers PK