DIY Guitar Messing About (2 Viewers)

[JohnnyRaz]

Dry fitted neck top and fretboard after routing the top.
Nice grain on it

 

[magicbastarder]

On the way home from town after spending over 100 quid on saws and saw blades. I'd forgotten my mental note to self last time when I realised my Japanese saw blade was too narrow to cut fret slots (0.3mm) so now I have a saw with a 0.4mm blade and one with a 0.5mm blade.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

On the way home from town after spending over 100 quid on saws and saw blades. I'd forgotten my mental note to self last time when I realised my Japanese saw blade was too narrow to cut fret slots (0.3mm) so now I have a saw with a 0.4mm blade and one with a 0.5mm blade.

I have a crown dovetail saw that I use for EVERYTHING including frets. think it's about .5-.6.

 

[magicbastarder]

yeah, i bought the 0.5mm one in goughs (with replacement blades for it and the 0.3mm one) and was thinking that the teeth seemed quite splayed on it, so got a 0.4mm one in mcquillans just to be safe,

 

[magicbastarder]

Yep, the .5mm saw cuts a .8mm kerf. Way to big for me. I guess I'll find a use for it anyway.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

Routed the binding slots. Almost got it 100%

 

[magicbastarder]

how did you do that? a template? or is there such a thing as an offset flush cut router bit?

 

[magicbastarder]

i was fretting while doing this.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

how did you do that? a template? or is there such a thing as an offset flush cut router bit?

I have a trim/palm router that has an attachment that allows you to set an offset

 

[magicbastarder]

what's the wood on the top?

 

[JohnnyRaz]

what's the wood on the top?

sapelle. normally it isn't as figured, but I bought this from madinter (i think), who sell guitar bits.
can't see it, but there's a bit of 'flaming' in the pieces as well
unusally for me a lot of the wood in this is new. I bought some extra panels a couple of years back, only getting round to using them now.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

I finally have caught up in that I have a body!

 

[magicbastarder]

another coat of danish oil on the body today. may have already mentioned, but this is a slow process; the body is probably iroko and the danish oil is pulling the natural oils out of the wood, and really slowing the curing. usually danish oil would be touch dry within 8 hours. this is taking 48 hours between coats to get to that stage.

i would be working on the fretting but i've had a couple of beers and avoid trying precision work when i've done so.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

another coat of danish oil on the body today. may have already mentioned, but this is a slow process; the body is probably iroko and the danish oil is pulling the natural oils out of the wood, and really slowing the curing. usually danish oil would be touch dry within 8 hours. this is taking 48 hours between coats to get to that stage.

i would be working on the fretting but i've had a couple of beers and avoid trying precision work when i've done so.

View attachment 20330

I find beyond a quick coat or two danish oil is very fustrating to work with. (I may be unique in that). That and the smell gives me headaches.

Main reason I moved onto using shellac.

 

[magicbastarder]

i think i put 8 coats on the london plane body, with no issues. it's just the way it's reacting with the iroko.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

i think i put 8 coats on the london plane body, with no issues. it's just the way it's reacting with the iroko.

so it was plane sailing with the other one?

 

[JohnnyRaz]

Neck set day.

This is overwhelmingly the most complicated build so far. Not only is my neck joint sufficiently tight I don’t need to clamp it, I’m only about 1.5 mm out from nut to heel, which can be compensated to a large extend when I place the fretboard.

Still strong possibility of implosion when I string it up though

 

[magicbastarder]

you mean 1.5mm off the centre line, rather than 1.5mm too close or too far from the nut?

 

[JohnnyRaz]

you mean 1.5mm off the centre line, rather than 1.5mm too close or too far from the nut?

Off centre line.
Considering the multiple jointing/gluing steps involved that’s not too bad I think. Certainly better than I’ve managed before

 

[magicbastarder]

centre lines are a moving target!
why i cut the neck pocket first, before routing out the control cavities...