"Starcaster" Build

[Nickosaurus]

WR pups sound amazing.

[gavinturner]

The kit looks amazing. I'm very jealous!! Saving my pennies for a starcaster of my very own. In the meantime I'll be keeping a watchful eye on your build!

cheers,
Gav.

[ihasmario]

WR pups sound amazing.

Yah, I haven't really decided if I want to go for the vintage type WR or go full modern with it...

[keloooe]

Saving my pennies for a starcaster of my very own.

Who isn't?

[ihasmario]

Who isn't?

Me...

Here's the back. Come to think of it there will be quite a bit of blank space on the guitar, so I might end up doing something a little fancier with it....

maybe.

[stan]

certainly looks like it has a centre block.

Great looking kit, this will look good in blue

[ihasmario]

All sanded back. The obvious white machine marks are gone. I couldn't fix the scratch - it's now level, but it looks a bit lighter. It should go with the stain on, I think. If not I'll work some things out.

First stain will likely go on saturday night/morning - most likely black to start and then I'll sand it off. Tell me now before it's too late if you can't really do that for grain popping on these veneers! If I can get half or more of it off, that would be good.

Can someone link me to the thread that tells me how to set neck angle (Z axis)? Pic related. I think it's way off and I don't know how to fix it - a shim? How do I measure it? Do I have to put the bridge on first?

Cheers.

[keloooe]

For popping the grain you just need to make sure you dont go through the ultra thin cap, be very careful about how much sanding you do and the grits you use!

[ihasmario]

For popping the grain you just need to make sure you dont go through the ultra thin cap, be very careful about how much sanding you do and the grits you use!

Is there enough to use black and then get most of it off again? I've never popped grain and definitely never on a cap before. I don't want a black guitar and would much rather have less grain than get rid of the grain by sanding it off!

I rounded off the headstock a bit. Gave my best shot at the old bevel in the real starcaster one. Can't do it without a router, but I gave it a good crack. Little bit of tear out/scratching because my wood rasp is coarse and blunt, so it was difficult to sand all the scratches out. Going to give it some more sanding later tonight after I head to the shop and get some glue and maybe some timbermate.

Here's a pic. You won't see this bad boy again until it is stained.

I'll post some pics of the update on the gaps when I fill them just so I can see how well I did looking back

[gavinturner]

When dying the cap black, you might try doing a first pass with clean water first, then the black. The theory is that the figure soaks up more liquid because the figure grains are longer. The more dye-less liquid you can fill the other (non-figure) grains up with before applying the black, the more contrast you'll get without the need to sand quite as much. Just a suggestion. I have used this technique successfully in the past when popping figure without even the need for a sand back. Just be careful not to saturate the cap as this causes its own issues.

cheers,
Gav.