DIY Guitar Messing About (5 Viewers)

[magicbastarder]

Yep, that's the plan now - I had just expected to measure to a fixed position on the bridge, rather than a movable one like a saddle. I guess I just expected something like a notch on the bridge showing the mid point of the saddle movement, where to measure scale length from. Every day is a school day.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

Yep, that's the plan now - I had just expected to measure to a fixed position on the bridge, rather than a movable one like a saddle. I guess I just expected something like a notch on the bridge showing the mid point of the saddle movement, where to measure scale length from. Every day is a school day.

You just have to guestimate it a little in terms of how far to push saddle long its travel as your measuring point. I normally go about 2/3-2/4 on the high e string.

should you be interested, stewmac has an online fret position calculator that will give you the exact distance from the nut of each saddle for a given scale length/intsrument type.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

yeah, just spitballing. as mentioned, i only copped it last night and assume it was intentional. or had they thought about the aesthetics to that extent when the early ones were designed?

I think they probably did - fender is renowned for basically finding ways to cut costs in the early guitars and amps, but applying some basic design to the bodies would have been relatively cost neutral. Also flowing curves as a design element would've been somewhat in vogue in the early 50s.

 

[ann post]

It'd relate to cutting a load of them out of a big plank no doubt

 

[JohnnyRaz]

It'd relate to cutting a load of them out of a big plank no doubt

the ultimate lean solution to reducing cutting waste was invented by Bo

 

[ann post]

the ultimate lean solution to reducing cutting waste was invented by Bo

I saw him live years ago, and he was sitting down playing the show. Mid show he started talking about the guitar saying he spoke to the maker about what he wanted, and they gave him a tree, hence the sitting down.

He was using a bit of midi to cover his age which at the time gave me congnitive dissonance but in retrospect i'm cool with.

 

[magicbastarder]

It'd relate to cutting a load of them out of a big plank no doubt

i don't see much scope for efficiency really - they probably wouldn't have been cutting them out of board much wider than a guitar body, i think? i.e. doubling the width of a board would usually more than double the price of the stock.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

Related unrelated
I ultimately bought the remaining wood I need of these guys in spain

Maderas para guitarras e instrumentos musicales | MADERAS BARBER

Maderas para guitarras y otros instrumentos musicales. Encuentra más de 85 especies de madera diferentes. Envío de tonewood a luthiers de todo el mundo.

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and was surprised to be 'offered a tree' with these punters as a result;

https://tree-nation.com/about-us

Greenwashing no doubt, but a no-brainer to link buying timber(admittedly very small quantities in the grand scheme of things) to planting trees...

 

[JohnnyRaz]

Sides glued and neck dry fitted.

The curves aren’t 100% even so there’s a slight misalignment over the run of the neck to heel. I can probably fix this as it’s all fairly flexible at the moment, an will be until the back goes on. Worst case I can make sure the center line of the top is aligned with the neck.


However the joinery is probably my best to date,

 

[magicbastarder]

i need to get me one of those calipers. my lidl digital one is gone glitchy.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

i need to get me one of those calipers. my lidl digital one is gone glitchy.

I got these off my wife (former archeologist), there probably 15years old + and still going strong

 

[magicbastarder]

re the heel and neck being out; if what's holding that in line is the bent sides, you'd expect a lot of play!

does she have any cool archaeology stories?

 

[JohnnyRaz]

re the heel and neck being out; if what's holding that in line is the bent sides, you'd expect a lot of play!

does she have any cool archaeology stories?

Yeah, it should be easy to fix when I put the back on. It’s only a few mm over the length I think.

Not that many really, a lot of Irish archeology seems to involve discerning between different colours of clay. Found a few small cool things over the years I think. Also once shared an office with boxes of skeletons

 

[pete]

Also once shared an office with boxes of skeletons

Same.

 

[pete]

It’s called “the civil service”

 

[magicbastarder]

flirting with disaster this evening; the template i had made moved when i was routing out the control cavity. another mm or 2 and i'd have been a lot worse off.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

flirting with disaster this evening; the template i had made moved when i was routing out the control cavity. another mm or 2 and i'd have been a lot worse off.

View attachment 17556

You’re almost there!

 

[magicbastarder]

you don't happen to have an extra long 5mm or 6mm bit, do you? i need to drill the holes connecting the cavities, and i just have standard length bits.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

flirting with disaster this evening; the template i had made moved when i was routing out the control cavity. another mm or 2 and i'd have been a lot worse off.

When I was playing round will how to pull body back into alignment I realised the side was actually twisted, and not square to the neck block.

This would mean the whole top/fretboard would be wonky. I'm ok with one of my scratch build chancer experiments looking slightly off, not ok with them not being a playable instrument .

So a bit of carful breaking of a well glued joint with a very sharp chisel later and I think we're back in business, and I've a scheme for how to reshape one side when gluing the back on.

If that doesn't work, I'll remake the troublesome side, but hopefully I'll wing it

 

[magicbastarder]

was the twist caused by a slightly askew glue joint, or is it twisted anyway?