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A little late in starting this thread.
Back at Christmas time I had started my first scratch bodied guitar.
I wanted to do an offset style tele guitar.
I started with some standard tele plans and used a photoshop store program to skew the wings.
Ordered a PBG neck to put on it. Not quite ready to build my own neck.
Also some Tonerider hot classics pickups for tone.
Photos to come.
sounds good Forthoseofus. Look forward to the the pics. What timber is the body made out of ?
I can't believe you joined the forum December 2012 (same month as me) and this is your third post ? haha
Some photos of the plan.
Yeah Wokka. Been around a while. Have done 2 of the kit builds one of the early strats, which turned out awesome and was still using live but need to check the wiring has developed an intermittent fault that seems to go away with a tap of the volume knob.Quote:
Originally Posted by wokkaboy
And a LP kit that wasn't quite as good. Need to do a fret job on it.
But I've always been more of a lurker. Did think I had posted a bit more than that back in the early days, might have disappeared in the changes to the new forum.
That's actually a pretty cool design, offset tele looks really good
shape looks cool Fortho, more of a jaguar/jazzmaster shape. Will it be semi hollow with a F hole ?
Nice you got a 22 fret PBG neck, is the heel square or rounded ? Tele heel should be square
Built the body out of a bit of knotty Bunya pine. I've only just got stung to filing those knots. Thought I'd do all of the initial shaping first.
I made a pattern out of MDF with the jigsaw and plenty of time on the spindle sander.
My jigsaw barely went through the pine to get the rough shape done. Then some routing with a pattern following bit. One bearing exploding on me making me happy I actually wore eye protection that day.
I'm a bit of a novice woodworker, let the router away once or twice, so a bit of time on the spindle sander to fix that up.
Square heel to make the pocket a little easier to cut.Quote:
Originally Posted by wokkaboy
This one's not going to be semi-hollow that's another thought for a later build.
Ken.
well done Fortho looks great. How many pieces of pine is that ? hard to see any joins
Looks like a single piece, nice
As I said earlier this was started back at Christmas time, so there is a bit of progress to show.
Next came the part I was dreading most. The neck pocket.
Watched some YouTube clips for some inspiration and went to work. Made a template in MDF by clamping some straight boards right either side of the neck, and another inbetween them at the end of the neck and using that as the initial template.
Routed that out of the MDF, and that have a pretty good fit.
Access the template into the body (screws into the soon to be pickup cavities) and routed away with the pattern bit.
Couldn't get the full depth with the template on, so had to take it off and use the initial rout as the template.
Not quite as tight a joint as I'd like, but not bad for my first effort.
Yep single piece.Quote:
Originally Posted by wokkaboy
nice job on the neck pocket Ken. I agree its the most nervous part of a scratch body. That's common practice to route a cavity to the depth with the template then use the cavity edge to route it deeper.
Nice work Fortho! If thou are really worried about the pocket fit, sand the sides level and insert a thin shim to whichever side needs adjustment then sand that back to get a good fit for your neck. Make sure you've got a good clear centre line and reference marks on it to get you neck alignment right and you should be sweet.
Love the body shape BTW.
Next up was the pickup routs.
Again, made some templates out of MDF with the jigsaw / spindle sander. Traced them onto the body and hogged out some wood with forstner bits.
Neck rout is a little wonky, but will be covered with a chrome pickup ring.
The bridge rout was almost perfect. Couldn't be happier with it.
After that the control cavity. Had to rout it to various depths as the 4 way switch I'm using needed to be far shallower than the pots. Infact bottomed out my routers depth adjustment, and was almost perfect.
Cut the slot for the selector switch wit a dremel with a small carving bit, running it along a straight edge and going maybe half a mm depth each run. Then sandpaper doubled over to round the edges.
Looks a little like a judging face at the bottom of the guitar when it is un-populated.
Next was some drilling with some extra long drill bits. One straight from the neck-pocket through the neck pickup rout and into the bridge pickup rout.
And another from bridge rout to control cavity.
Then a spade bit to drill the hole for the electrosocket jack.
nice work Fortho, I presume these stages have happened over the last few months ? Good to see you are wearing the standard aussie safety boots. You should look at building a workbench so you don't have to pick up tools from the floor !
Next was the string through holes.
Made sure everything was lined up, and marked the spots where I was going to drill the holes.
Drilled the outside two holes all the way through from the top of the body, and the four middle holes about half way.
Used the dremel drill press on top of the body and drilled through the bottom plate of it.
Flipped the body over, marked the four middle holes in a straight line between the two outer holes drilled through, and this time gave them a bit of a dent with a nail/punch to start them in the correct position (something I didn't do on the top) and ended up not only almost perfect, but also met the holes in the top perfectly.
Next was to enlarge the holes in the back to fit the string ferrules, for this I used my hand drill in a drill guide. Did the job remarkably well.
Top of the body is not quite straight, but will be covered by the bridge plate. Back of the body is as near perfect as I'm going to get without a drill press. (Would love a drill press and a band saw for Christmas this year, but just don't have the space)
Then shaping the headstock.
Reasonably straight forward. Trace on my design, jigsaw and neaten on the spindle sander. I'm quite happy with my new design, went fairly traditional with my strat kit.
Unfortunately haven't taken any pictures showing the string through holes yet. But here's some with the hardware test fitted.
All of that progress was just over a couple of weeks in the Christmas holidays. It has sat pretty much untouched until last week when I've finally put a bit more progress into it.
I would love a workbench, but don't really have room in the shed for one.
Well hell yes! I'm trying to work that angle for a birthday present, not going so good.Quote:
Originally Posted by forthoseofus
Mate there's nothing wrong with having to keep it simple and minimal. If you refer to any of robin's builds, he does pretty much the same, and all with manual hand tools. A lot of these builds are done on kitchen tables, study desks or apartment balconies and there are some wonderful results.Quote:
Originally Posted by forthoseofus
You seem to be doing great despite the lack of space😁👏
Last week, I did some filling of the knots with sanding dust and superglue, as well as give the back of the neck pocket a bit of shape for better upper fret access (not that i get up there very often).
As a side note for the back of the neck pocket. I was going to use a neck plate similar to the pro-strat neck plates (see image), but stupid me, forgot to stop the round-over of the back and it doesn't fit anymore.
Luckily I have some ferrules to put in it's place.
The A string hole on the back is not quite as well lined up as I remembered, but I can live with it. Also check out the mistake string through hole, (luckily only on top. Not sure I should bother filling it as it's covered by the bridge plate.
looks good Ken. Plans sound good. As you say bridge plate will hide the 7th string though hole
Great job mate, looks awesome
As usual - some A hole always lets you down...
bahahahahahahahahahahahaha!Quote:
Originally Posted by stan
haha comments from Stan could go toward a COTY award hahah
Hopefully that A hole will be covered up soon.
Well I've done a little more work on the project today.
Finally got a round to drilling the neck mounting holes and recesses for the ferrules.
Not sure what I was worried about for these, went extremely well, even with just the hand drill in the drill guide.
Might use the drill presses at work to drill the neck though. And need to visit the big green shed to get some new screws to attach the neck the ones I have are about 3mm too long. Wont poke through the finger board, but will definitely go into it, a little shorter is on the cards.
Should I drip a little CA glue in the body holes to harden the wood a little? This is a Bunya pine body. Feels slightly stronger than the basswood bodies I have, but I'm never quite sure about pine.
After I finished that, I whipped up a cross cut sled for my circular saw.
(By whipped up, I mean spent a few hours getting it right. ;-) )
Not quite as accurate as I wanted, but still far far more accurate than using it without the sled. I really should by a proper square one of these days.
We'll other than filing a chip on the fretboard, it's just sanding and finishing left.
Progress this weekend. Lined up and drilled the holes to attach the neck. Going to need a bit of shining laterally to get a tight fit, but have the strings lined up neatly with plenty of room on either side of the neck.
Then time to attack the control cover and shelf.
All in all, spent probably 2 hours making the template and testing, an all of 2 min routing the shelf in the body. Thought it turned out well.
The cover it's self took a bit of time cut the rough shape with the coping saw, ten lots of sanding with 80grit to get the right shape, and a few moments going up to 400grit to smooth out the edges.
First time cutting pickguard material. That dust goes everywhere and seems to get some static cling too. What a pain.
Happy with the results so far.
Does anyone have any suggestions for sanding the the edges around the tight curves of the horns?
Or the edges in general. I find it hard to get a nice smooth finish on the end grain.
Yes, the dreaded static cling. Hate it.
I usually have a selection of different sized dowels, broom handle pieces, and hard foam & rubber cylinders for the tighter curves. Some sticky sandpaper or double-sided tape to attach. Work with the grain, whatever crazy direction it follows, then move to in line with the edge/side once it is smooth enough and any marks have gone.