I am calling this done !
I ditched the Musiclily bridge as I couldn’t get the action low enough and it was vibrating like no tomorrow and the Kaisch locking posts didn’t fit hence it tilted forward.
Installed the Gotoh bridge which arrived surprisingly fast. It sat a lot further forward and has less intonation adjustment than the bridges I set the neck with. Luckily I had just enough adjustment available to get the intonation set. Next step was to reverse a saddle but don’t think I need to. (And I have no idea how to remove a saddle)
Electric trickery is working beautifully with no buzz and Tonerider AC2 pickups sound sweet.
I am happy
I learned a lot on this build and pulled out my fair share of hair. Thanks for all the help and encouragement along way. Big call out to [mention]Simon Barden [/mention] @[mention]McCreed [/mention] and [mention]Bakersdozen [/mention] for the in depth get me out of trouble advice.
Key learnings
1) glue soaked through veneer is a major pain. But I now have a burst effect.
2) tru oil is awesome. But truoil plus wet sanding is dangerous. (Lots of rework here) 30 coats applied with a aeropress coffee filters and mesh pad rub down every 5 coats is my magic formula. Last 2 coats diluted with mineral turps and allied with a synthetic chamois gave me my final gloss coat and polished with meuguires car polish after letting dry for around 3-4 weeks. Back gloss finish achieved with slurry method applying the oil with about 1500 grit wet and dry paper and then layering lots of gloss coats.
3) shimming the neck. I wish I had been more aggressive here to get a lower action however I manage to solve for this by recessing my bridge posts and using a slim bridge.
4) The dingo tone stain gave me the flame effect I wanted but didn’t cover the glue stains and did not work on the sides or back. Ended up using feast Wason Japan brown which was a happy fix as it forced me to learn how to burst on the front and the contrast on the back and neck works.
5) water slide decals are worth the effort.
6) kit electrics are worth replacing. Electrics include 0.22 orange drop cap, treble bleed circuit, cts mini taper pots and shielded wiring. Pickup switch is a musiclily switch craft style switch that just fits. Cable jack is a pure tone 3 point connection which is awesome. My cable is never coming out with this. Dpdt on on on mini switches are a custom mod and give me split, series and parallel options per pickup. Pickup polls cancel hum out in split and parallel modes.
7) fret leveling is my nemesis. Need to buy a wider crowning file but managed to fix issues and have no fret buzz
8) buy the best p2 vapor spray mark you can.
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