I have also read that lacquer over poly can have issues as well from the lacquer solvents affecting the poly. To be safe, this is why I am going to do my entire neck in clear lacquer to avoid the complications of trying to blend the satin poly neck with clear lacquer headstock. My new disclaimer applies (see my sig).
Mantra: No more pedals, must finish BlueyCaster...
Disclaimer: I haven't done woodwork since high school, and wasn't really paying attention at the time ...
Wow, how did I miss that thread???May not be what you are wanting to do, but here is a goldtop conversion I just finished off. I used gold metallic vinyl wrap.
Interesting BD, how is it applied/adhered? Heat?
Making the world a better place; one guitar at a time...
Yeah the vinyl adhesive kind of gets activated with heat. And if you don't like it, just peel it off.Originally Posted by McCreed
Yes, not really what I’m after but it looks great nonetheless!May not be what you are wanting to do, but here is a goldtop conversion I just finished off. I used gold metallic vinyl wrap.
Wiring goodies arrived yesterday. I’m feeling a long way off wiring, but I did want to check how much thread I have on those pots to see how feasible it would be to put some reinforcement in the bottom of the cavity. It looks pretty tight though.
Those short shaft pots are really meant for fitting direct to pickguards. You probably should have ordered the long shaft ones (though beware the very long shaft ones - I've got a couple of pots that are ridiculously long)
Hi Simon, I think I’ve only seen the two sizes? It’s definitely not a 'long shaft' (ie 3/4" worth of thread) body. These pots are long enough for the cavity as is, but there’s not a lot of thread left over (on the thickest one at least), so adding an extra 1mm of timber inside the cavity may be pushing it.
They look like they have a locating pin that I didn’t see when I test fit though, I may get away with it. I’ll have another squiz tomorrow.
You'd normally break the locating pin off with pliers. It snaps off easily and makes fitting the pots easier. You'll sometimes find a hole drilled for the pin in a scratchplate on Strats and the like (it ends up underneath the knob so isn't normally seen). It helps in quick mass production and does stop the pot rotating if the nut becomes a bit loose, but it's generally easier not to bother with it.
So I haven’t done an update for (checks notes) uh, 16 months. In my defense I’ve had a lot of other projects which unfortunately ranked higher in the Spousal Satisfaction Index, but I have made some minor progress.
One of the distractions I hit, was restoring this bad boy that a relative was throwing out:
It’s an old jarrah workbench complete with...
a 7" Dawn quick-release vise that doesn’t seem to have had a lot of use.
The workbench appears to date back to the mid-60s (based on some writing found underneath) and has been remanufactured at least once already - it looks to originally have had angled legs. This means the angled steel side cabinets look a little odd when mounted vertically, but I 'plumbed them up' with some pegboard. The original colour looks to have been close to the Rust-oleum 'Pastel Peppermint' I resprayed them with.
I replaced the old-school timber bench stop with a flush mount job from Carbatec.
I also replaced all the old brass flathead screws with modern galvanised jobs, which also gave me a bad case of tennis elbow. The bench was missing several of the top pieces and it’s pretty difficult to source 60mm jarrah nowadays. I do have tonnes of 50mm though so managed to lift some up with 10mm floorboard. It’s not super flat but honestly it’s much better than balancing stuff on cheap saw stools.
At any rate, I’m crossing my fingers that the 4" x 4" jarrah frame will be sturdy enough to hold up a guitar
Anyhoo, the Goldtop. Main issue I wanted to resolve was fixing the bridge post holes, the positioning for the angled wraparound seems to be inordinately difficult. I ended up synthesizing some measurements from:
1. Random internet dude on the My Les Paul forum who claims to have been taught a specific method by an authorised Gibson repairer
2. StewMac fret position calculator
3. Clamping strings over the bridge & tuning/intonating
The resulting measurements were... all pretty close, actually, well within adjustment range. Photo also shows how far out I drilled the last holes. The main risk again is really the vertical positioning; I think I’m trying to centre the back of the bridge where the strings exit, but I won’t know for sure until everything’s together.
I didn’t have a lot of luck with the FW sanding sealer - it went on very thick, and certainly clogged up the sandpaper like crazy, but after several coats didn’t seem to have done much grain filling. So I ended up doing my tried and true "just spray lots of coats of poly". I’ve probably done about 6 or 7 coats now - I don’t have a recent photo, this was one of the earlier coats:
Perhaps most importantly, I’ve stamped a serial number. This is meant to be an incentive for me to get the thing done within the next few months.
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