The Frankencaster

[Eponymous]

My plan was to use a drill guide and follow the steps like this guy:

https://youtu.be/pLCYA8FijhA

But I might take a half way house approach and make a jig with the drill guide. I can then check everything is straight and true in the guide before I let it loose on the body.

I like the way this guy has done it. It is kind of what I am shooting for but using my own home made drill jig.

It was a good and instructive video though. If I can get it as straight as he did, it will be a huge win.

[Groovyman32]

Well, my drill guide arrived today - so I had a few practice goes with it on some scrap. I sort of followed the method in the video and it worked out pretty well I think. The holes have all joined up and seem evenly spaced on both sides.

I'll write up my method with some pics in my build diary.

[Eponymous]

Mine didn’t go so well. Not horrendously bad, just not the exact straight, evenly space row I was hoping for.

I made the jig out of my square aluminium tubing and tried to get a decent vertical jig using my drill press. Seemed to go smoothly.

That done and checked, I screwed my template bridge onto the body. I only used 2 screws as it has to come off for final sanding and painting.



All the holes lined up perfectly.

Following that you tube video, I then did really shallow holes through the template, so I had the drill holes centralised and started enough to use the jig to do a vertical drill. It’s hard to see but in the photo above, I have drilled through the template, into the body by about 3 or 4mm...

I then drilled each hole as far as the jig would let me. 20mm deep jig, 40 mm body, so halfway or more.

I took the template off and (lining up with the already halfway drilled holes at either end) drilled the two outer holes through.



That looked like this from the back



The idea being that I then place the template over some pins to make sure I was aligned, drill small stater holes (a few mm), then drill through from the back with the jig.



That is when the problems started.

When I drilled using the jig, some of the holes didn’t seem to quite join and they didn’t quite seem to line up either.

Looking at the bottoms hole of my jig, it seems to have deformed from the straight round hole.



I didn’t notice this in time.

So, I tried to get them to meet up, which they now do and then cover the problem with the bigger holes for the ferrules.

I lined them up as best I could and they are straightish, now but not perfect...continued in next post.

[Eponymous]

I now have finished drilling the ferrule holes and sort of bought things back into line. I’m just not thrilled with the result. It’s ok but, being my own harshest critic, I will always notice it. Damn.



Maybe aluminium wasn’t the best choice..maybe I should have clamped everything down?

The drill was a Brad point and brand new for the job. The drill is only a few months old and perfect. Not that I was ever going to blame the tools. My technique somewhere let me down. Maybe I should have rechecked that jig after each hole?

Anyway. It’s done now and I can’t really fix it better than what I have.

Time for sanding back and grain fill for the body and oil topcoat for the neck, now that then neck has been curing for a week.

[Groovyman32]

What kind of ferrules do you have? If they are flanged type are the flanges going to interfere with each other on the holes that are closer together?

I’m wondering if you can use dowels to fill the string holes and filler for the ferrule holes? If you’re using the flanged ferrules it will all be largely covered up. I’m sure one of the seasoned professionals here can offer some advice.

I guess the problem might be that the jig is hollow. Did that allow the exit hole to be redrilled a number of times when used for each hole?

I’ve still not been brave enough to actually drill on the body yet - I’ve been doing a lot of testing with scrap pieces.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Eponymous]

They are the flanged type. I might be able to rejig them a bit. Will have a think about that

[Eponymous]

Well, after spending a lot of time thinking about how to fix it, I resolved to do the following.

1. Get a new body and do it all again;
2. Get a proper drill guide and test it on some scrap wood;
3. Remeasure everything;
4. Use the old body (when experiments have finished) by filling the holes, painting it and using a top loader bridge ( which is the fender bridge I use as a drilling template.

This has the absolute beauty of 2 competing ideas. They being, I get to do a redo on my string through bridge, with a proper drill guide and practising on scrap to make sure I have this right. The second idea is that, when I get another neck and some pickups, I will have 2 telecasters and I can compare top loader with string through.

I think you will all agree that my plan is exceptionally sensible.

[Groovyman32]

Excellent plan! I’d be very interested to hear the difference between a ST and TL bridge.

I felt compelled to do ST on mine as it doesn’t look like a tele otherwise. But PRS and Gibson have top loaded guitars and I love those equally!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Eponymous]

This is the drill guide I got. It seems to have good reviews and I have been practicing on scrap wood.



There have been mostly good reviews but the less good reviews say it is pretty good and quite sturdy but they didn’t think it was the sort of tool that would last long enough to hand on to a grandchild.... It seems solid to me and I have no grandchildren yet, so still time to rethink my strategy.

I have seen some people mount it on a wooden base. That might be overkill. It does seem solid when clamped down to the wood.

I have drilled some test holes in some scrap pine, which has turned out ok.



The holes are not straight, I know. The first 2 were with an ordinary twist drill. The 3rd hole (ie, on the left as you look down) was with a Brad point, which gives a more accurate hole, particularly when centre punched.

Next step is to mark holes on the guitar body I messed up (and which will be filled with wood filler and top loader bridge installed), mark exactly where the holes for string through should go, centre punch centre of the holes, drill through with Brad points (I can drill straight through...can anyone tell me why that might be a bad idea?????) or go the halfway the flip over method.

[Eponymous]

Got it. Unless I leave a whole lot of drill exposed, it won’t go that deep. More shank exposed means Less stability. Ok. That has solved that mystery.