Hi all,
First I'll set a little scene for this build diary. I got back into playing my cheap Chinese P-bass knockoff recently, and that reignited my interest in 6-string guitars (after having had lessons for a year or so in primary school), and thus I began searching for an electric guitar for cheap-ish while avoiding the Chinese off-brand stuff. This left me with a problem, seeing as guitars from brands I've heard of started at around $500 which was far more than I wanted to spend on an instrument to mess around with. Then I stumbled across the idea of making a guitar from a kit. This was a great option for me as it allowed me to gain understanding of how a 6-string works in better detail, while suiting my unemployed high school student budget, and it let me test the quality of PBG before (hopefully soon) buying an EX-5 kit to replace the aforementioned P-bass. And please excuse the mediocre pictures throughout this diary, as my S4 isn't the greatest image-wise.
And into the build, which will be in one post as it is finished at the time of typing.
So, upon opening the box, all was in order other than one of the bridge pickup mounts was ruined. So a quick e-mail was sent to Adam about it, and within the day he arranged to send out another whole pickguard & pickup set as a replacement, and told me to keep the broken one as spare parts.
Once the replacement pickguard arrived, I did a mock build. Everything fit like a glove, neck was straight, frets (bar one) were level and the body had some grain to work with. I decided to go for a dye and danish oil finish, after seeing that danish oil absorbed better into basswood than stain. A trip to bunnings later and I was ready to begin the build.
I did a dry build first, to ensure that it all bolted together correctly and wouldn't fall apart. This went well, other than me messing up two of the neck holes (requiring a re-drilling) and taking a small chunk out of the back cavity wall with the drill (covered by the screw in cover). Beyond me being inept with power tools, everything fit well with screws in.
Preparing the headstock took by far the longest and was the most painful process sanding wise. I chose to go for Fender's modern strat headstock profile. This was jigsawed out of the wood, and then sanded with 100, 180 and 240 grit sandpaper before reaching an acceptable stage.
The body and neck were sanded with 100, 180 and 240 grit sandpaper. I used an electric sander for the 100 and 180 grit passes of the body as I had spent about 3 hours sanding the neck and headstock that day.
The first coat of dye was applied the following day. I used two coats Briwax's brown mahogany spirit based dye for the neck and body, sanding with 240 grit between coats. Here is the front of the body after the first coat.
I felt that having the entire body dyed dark was going to be a little uninteresting, and I added an accent line of bare wood to the back (you'll see it in the finished pics)
Left them both to dry overnight, hung up from a washing line in the garage.
The following day, two coats of danish oil were applied, and left overnight to dry.
The next morning, both body and neck were sanded with 240 and 600 grit sandpaper to make them smooth and remove any sticky spots. This also gave the distressed effect that's visible in the final pics.
After the buzzing horror that is my P-bass-ish (I got radio through it once, not my preferred station though), I wanted to ensure that my new guitar would not have the same issue, so I bought DingoBass' shielding kit and went to work creating a Faraday cage. Unfortunately I ran out of copper tape, and couldn't be bothered to wait for the extra tape promised if it was not enough, so aluminium foil and a glue stick finished the cavity shielding. Picture is of the mostly finished shielding. I also added a layer of aluminium foil to the back of the pickguard that makes contact with the overlapping edges of the cavities (I'm not sure if this is necessary but I'd rather over-do it than under-do it).
From here it was easy sailing, putting screws in the right places, stabbing myself with a screwdriver while trying to get the trem springs in place before realizing I could loosen the screws and using a soldering iron that refused to heat the tip, and only did the sides.
Now that it's all together, I think it looks great!
Plays like butter, other than the one fret that's high, but it is only an issue across the first three strings (E, A and D) and the last three play fine, any ideas as to why that is are appreciated.
Thanks for reading! :)
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