My first scratch build

[Gregted]

Hi all,

About a week ago I decided to start my own scratch build of a strat.

So I have seen lots of videos and read lots of blogs and decided to price some ply and pine to practice on. Worked out reasonable but on a whim, I decided to ring the local mill to see how much a slab of local hardwood might compare.

They told me they could cut some spotted gum to 500mm long by 400mm wide and run it through the thickneser to 45mm for me for $40. Pick it up in a couple of hours.

Sweet I said. I'll be there. I arrived to this country mill and they showed me what they had done for me.

Propped up against the post was a slab of very nice spotted gum.

I like how the receipt says Approximately 400mm x 500mm x 45mm. It turned out to be 500 wide by 45 thick all right but nearly 1 meter long.

I will get 2 good bodies and maybe another 1 it I can work out how to stabilize the crack running through the middle of the last piece.

So while I was there I thought I would push my luck even further and ask for some cheap hardwood at 25mm thick and at least 100mm wide for a practice piece for a neck. The lovely lady showed me a pile I couldn't step over of 150mm wide x 25mm thick and 2000mm long and said I could have a piece for $5.

But my luck hadn't run out yet. I got this great find home and decided I would drop into the local hardware store for some mdf to make my templates from. I was just about to pay for my half sheet of cheap ply when I thought I would ask if they had any off cuts or rubbish sheets of ply that would do the job.

In the corner was a pile of 3mm mdf cover sheets and she said I could have one for nothing. Sweet. So I returned some of my good luck and bought a set of scroll blades for my jigsaw from them for $12.

So to recap my day. I now have enough spotted gum hardwood for 3 bodies. a plank of hardwood for 2 necks and a 2 meter sheet of mdf for templates.

I have cut out my templates and sanded them to fit nicely together. I followed the specs from the original vintage 62 fender blueprint I found somewhere on line. I was really happy with my first day.

Current update. I decided to use some free ply as my first guitar body and work out any problems before attacking my good spotted gum.
I will get 3 necks out of my neck slab so will go with spotted gum for the first neck. I have cut out and glued 3sheets of ply ( 17mm+17mm free + 12mm from Bunnings ) together and routed all cavities and the edges and given it a trial prime to show up all my mistakes. Yikes...

The free ply used for the front chipped out while using the jigsaw but the back top quality stuff looks great. No more free ply...

So far so good.

[Gregted]

Here are my latest pics..

Have shaped the back and front and primed. You can really see the chips out of the free ply now. Oh well. Some spakfilla will hide that.

Routered the front of the neck and drilled and trial fitted the tuners. Will have a go at blending in the head to neck later today.

Also giving the whole body a coating of spakfilla to fill grain and holes and chips so should look a lot smoother tomorrow.

Actually starting to look like a guitar.

[pablopepper]

Awesome. Look forward to following this.

[BenWA]

wow what a score on the materials

[Jeff Sheridan]

Looks really cool. Just wondering did you use a few different jigs for the routing? it looks real tight!

[stan]

great score on the timber, and nice work on the tryouts!

[Fretworn]

The lesson here is - "it never hurts to ask"

[SIMpleONe89]

And you used a jigsaw on all that? Won't the blades break?

[Gregted]

Hey Pablopepper. If it turns out anywhere near as good as some in this site, I will be rapt.

Yeah Ben. Really happy with the materials and that little country mill. Unfortunately they are limited in what is available locally in hardwood but hoping this spotted gum turns out nicely when sanded and polished.

Jeff Sheridan. I made some templates from pdfs online and followed these. It made the build so much easier. I have included a pic of some of the templates made so far.

You can see the main template for the router. I add the small block to the left to cut out the back 2 sheets of ply so I have the neck pocket complete. I add the small funny shaped insert laying on top to the bridge pickup hole to allow me to route the control cavity deeper. I have a center line on the black one and line this up on the back for the tremolo route. The insert on it is to route the tromolo cavity to the full 38mm after routing the 16mm cavity for the springs.

Fretworn. Exactly how I got this far. Asking lots of questions and watching lots of builds. You really get to the point where you can't watch any more and you just have to put tool to wood and have a go. Thanks to all who have helped so far. I hope mine turns out 1/10th as good as your masterpieces.

Simpleone89. I cut out the 3 layers from the template before I glued them together that way the thickest I have to cut with the jigsaw is only 17mm. I leave a few mm outside the template line and route to that off the template. If you glue and join them properly, they just need a light sand and they look like a 45mm slab.

[keloooe]

Beautiful slab of wood! Looks great when shaped, always nice to get multiple bodies out of a single blank!