Key interesting stuff:
Ash strat body, swimming pool route
copper leaf finish
3x Firebird pickups
5-way blade superswitch
Neck is being pinched from my Jazzblaster, at least for now.
I’m going for essentially Tele wiring hit with Strat 2&4 parallel positions. Master vol. & tone, no splits or taps unless I really see a good reason too.
The swimming pool route also means I can mess about with different pickups if the 3x FB layout doesn’t click for me.
I’ve never gilded anything before, let alone finished over the top of that….
Body arrived yesterday. Wish me luck!!!
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… and a bit of inspiration from Robbie Robertson’s bronze-dipped Strat
First up was a little bit of sand and grain fill just to minimise sinkage. I'll actually be quite happy with a little bit of grain texture but this bit of ash is quite meaty so I'm hoping it will be just a little rather than intentional heavily-sunken finish.
I stared with the back because I had no clue how easy this would be or how well I would do at it. Turns out it's actually not that hard as long as you don't want a pristine flat finish (which I don't, thank god!). You just apply the size (gilding glue), wait about 15 mins till it squeaks when you run your knuckle across it, then carefully apply the leaf. I used tweezers and a brush for the most part, tearing each piece to minimise straight lines along the edges as that seems to be one thing that a lot of first-timers mention when talking about things they'd have done differently. This also makes handling the copper much easier as you're not worrying about keeping it pristine.
Of course I had also gilded myself in the process...
And the current status as of 11pm tonight. is below. Front & back are both done. Both will need a little bit of tidy-up work where I either hadn't applied the size consistently enough, or had let it dry too much before I got the copper on. So tomorrow once it's all fully dry I'll give it a little burnishing to smooth everything out and remove any more loose bits, then do any touchups needed. Again as I'm not going for a pristine finish I don't actually mind the odd bit of relicing, so I'll see how much I want to try and get it perfect, but for right now I'm very happy with it.
FWIW I'm using Barnabas Metal Leaf Gilding Adhesive which didn't cost much, and this has taken 25x 14x14cm sheets of copper which between them total about £25 in materials, plus potentially a couple of cheap brushes that I guess I might not want to use for paint after this!
Top coat will be a few layers of shellac and a lot of elbow grease, which the internet tells me should work just fine....
Obviously I don't have the black undercoat, but that's no issue. If in doubt a few dents and some dirt should do it
A light finish is best if you are happy with it wearing through. I did some in rustins plastic coating, but it eventually cracked leaving razor sharp edges
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Long term if I like it as much as I'm hoping then a two-tone Tele-over-Strat outline headstock could be super cool. But I'm guessing that might cost quite a chunk to commission as a one-off..!
Let's wait and see if I even like the pickups. If not I'm gonna try a PFA in the bridge as the next stop
I've never particularly liked Strat knobs on anything so they were never an option here. If the Gison ones don't feel right I'll go chunky Tele ones
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Then I may be buggered - we'll see. I have plenty of spare copper for another layer if needed. Will see what it looks like once I'm potentially ready to finish it