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Google routing box sled
(formerly customkits)
(formerly customkits)
5mm is approximately the thickness of the top of some guitars, with rear access control cavities, in the area where the shafts of the pots emerge. Removing that much material from the front of such guitars risks rendering the control cavity "open plan".
If you remove 5mm from the top of a Stratocaster, the recessed jack socket cavity would no longer be deep enough to accommodate the Switchcraft socket.
Buy slab of wood
make slab of wood thinner via the slab method mentioned
glue on a nice maple top
make it guitar shaped
route out all cavities needed
It in my head is the logical order of things but there might be a better way, what i am going to do is buy some scrap wood and practice thinning it to the thickness first
A side jack hole won't be central any more. May not matter though doesn't look pretty.
If the guitar already has pickup/neck cavities routed you'd likely need to deepen them, def the neck pocket.
If you're planning on adding a fancy top then there's another job in re-chopping the cavities out. That's perfectly doable with the right cutter but clearance for the bearing+screw head can be tight, just needs a bit of planning re cavity depths though.
If you make a router sled, make the sled rigid or it'll sag in the middle with the router's weight. Bowl cutters are good for surface planing, they have radiussed corners so you don't get the plough marks (if sled is meaty enough).
also I'm thinking of making a sled out of metal maybe to make sure it is solid enough
(formerly customkits)
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It worked, but there's definitely some things I'd do differently next time. The biggest problem was caused by using offcuts I had to hand rather than properly measured stuff. So the MDF is only just wide enough - I hadn't factored in that the router bit being in the middle of the router. Sounds obvious in hindsight, but it meant I had to place the rails further apart. I had a minor accident where the sled slipped sideways and fell off the rail, causing the router to dig in a bit. Also my support pieces ended up a bit short, but I didn't notice any sag. My rails were from an old cot bed, so they were factory cut for consistent size and straightness.
I used a 20mm bottom trim bit from Wealdens - a compromise fitting my router (1/4") and budget (small). Wasn't too bad, just more passes needed. In general I found that I didn't get too bad lines, but it did help to finish with a very light pass moving up less than the width of the bit, as it would mean you go over the line left by the previous pass. Depends how much time you want to spend.
I used this on both the body and the neck fairly successfully.
@idiot wind, that's really helpful information, I'm in no rush for this project to be completed so if it takes a month or 2 years im not too fussed. how much material was you removing each pass?
If I was doing this again, my main change would be to make the sled wider enough to overhang the rails, with some extra pieces going down to make sure the sled couldn't move side to side.