Next Project ... opinions? ... & updates!

TTony · March 2015

MrsTT just had a good idea.

At least, I think it's a good idea.

Fill in the cavity with the bit of off cut as planned, but then use some veneers or marquetry in the area from the end of the fretboard out to beyond the bridge to both hide the mismatched piece of wood, and add some visual interest to a fairly plain piece of maple.

That way, I can still finish the guitar as originally planned, rather than getting into spray-canning.

Or maybe some sort of transfer (which would be easier)?? I've seen people decorate guitars with transfer-type things before, but don't remember where they came from ...

Jalapeno said:

WezV said:

Glue a new bit on the inside of the cavity

And possibly some french polish skills to join the grain line up.

I'd not looked closely enough at that feck-up before to notice the grain line going right through the middle. It shouldn't be as obviously visible once I've put the finish on.

I hope.

Andyjr1515 · March 2015

Hi @TTony I think the scratch plate or marquetry ideas are good. It would be a shame to lose that lovely bit of maple under a spray job... Andy

TTony · March 2015

Andyjr1515;560165" said:
I think the scratch plate or marquetry ideas are good.

It's evolved slightly.

Partly to make the fix easier ... but I'm going to claim mainly because I preferred the evolved solution.

All I'm saying atm is ...

WezV · March 2015

Makes sense

guitargeek62 · March 2015

Given that it was the inspiration for the original plans, it definitely makes sense! I'll see if I can dig out my blueprints the next time I'm home, that mahogany was bought for an eerily close design to how this has ended up

TTony · March 2015

@WezV - how did you do the neck inlays? White tube infilled with black CA??

I'm half thinking of extending the inlay design onto the body ...

WezV · March 2015

Aluminium tube from B&Q - it will either have been black dyed epoxy of ebony dust and CA. if they are shinier than the surrounding wood its the CA rather than epoxy

TTony · March 2016

A bit of a back-from-the-dead update post, and - co-incidentally - almost exactly a year since my last post.

The last post was the "I've ballsed this up" update, when I failed to do basic maths correctly, and started routing a pickup cavity 1" away from where it should have been.

This was the pic update;

This was a guitar (that was originally @guitargeek62's, with a major contribution from @WezV) that I'd done some work on to rescue. That work included adding the birdseye maple top that you can see, on top of the original mahogany body. All was going well until I routed out the pickup cavity in the new maple top, and found that it didn't align with the original cavity in the mahogany, because I was a completely numpty and failed some basic maths.

After that event, I put the guitar to one side because it upset me to look at it. Then life got busier and I didn't have the time (etc), so it's been in a gig bag in the (heated) summerhouse for a year.

Until today.

The solution ...

I'd decided to cut out a larger area of the top/body around the misplaced cavity, and then "plug" with a piece of matching wood. I'd put aside the largest pieces of offcut from the timber from which I'd made the top, so the size of that determined the size of the plug.

Step1, true up the edges of the plug and make a matching router-guide template.

Step2, router, router, router

Comparing those ^^ two pics, you can see how I'd mis-measured & mis-cut the original new pickup cavity.

Step3, routing done

I needed to make sure that the base of the new hole was properly flat, to give the plug the maximum possible surface area for the glue joint. The top of the guitar is carved, so the underside of the template had to be packed with thin pieces of hardboard to keep it from rocking front-to-back as it supported the router.

The bottom is flat.

Step4, plugging the gap. Naturally, this wasn't quite as straightforward as hoped because the piece of offcut was 18mm thick, whereas the hole was 25mm deep. So, let's find another piece of offcut, thickness that down to c9mm and make another - identical - plug.

This took a bit of careful sanding to get it to be a really - REALLY - tight fit. I marked "T" & "B" so that I always re-fitted it the same way around after each bit of sanding. To actually get it in place, I needed a mallet and block of wood on top of the plug.

Step5, with glue on the base and around the sides, plug clamped in place to dry.

TTony · March 2016

In the last post ^^ you can just see (top right corner of the cavity) the remains of the channel into the control cavity.

The guitar (body) is routed for 2 x HBs, and there's a channel between the two p'up cavities for the wiring, although I might leave it as a single (bridge) p'up guitar. But to leave my options open, I thought I should re-connect the wiring channel from the neck cavity with the channel into the control cavity *before* I glued the top plug in place.

See, I don't always make daft mistakes ...

All that's left to do is to fit the top part of the plug. Again, sanded so that it's a really tight fit in the hole, with the grain pattern and direction matched as well as I can to the original top.

And this is the current state of the repair (except that I've clamped it after taking the quick pic)

It was another strong-hit-with-the-rubber-mallet to get it into position, with glue at the base and around the inner edges of the hole, so I'm hoping that's going to dry off to a decently strong repair.

It stands slightly proud of the top (1.5mm at the bridge edge, about 2.5mm at the neck edge), so I'll be doing some sanding later.

Jalapeno · March 2016

Good stuff ! More ! More !!!!!!!!

TTony · March 2016

And I had company for most of the morning while I was working ...

paulnb57 · March 2016

Nice to see this project back on the rails Tony.....

TTony · March 2016

Jalapeno said:

Good stuff ! More ! More !!!!!!!!

Patience, patience. The reason I'm in this mess is that I rushed it last time around and wanted to start getting a finish on it.

This time, I'll take it a bit more carefully. If the dentist doesn't kill me tomorrow, I might get it all marked out again ready for posts & cavities to be drilled/routed over the weekend.

paulnb57 said:

Nice to see this project back on the rails Tony.....

Thanks. It's a year-and-2-days since I put it aside. Looking at the photos from last year, it was nice & sunny then too!

WezV · March 2016

That neck must be 6 or 7 years old now.

A little longer wont hurt

TTony · March 2016

WezV said:

That neck must be 6 or 7 years old now.

A little longer wont hurt

It's surviving very well. I thought this afternoon that the frets were still looking quite polished!

TTony · March 2016

Got the plug sanded flat this afternoon. That took a while.

Then I measured and marked where the bridge should go. Then I double checked my measurements (which were correct).

And then I walked away and left it.

I'll *triple* check my measurements tomorrow before, possibly, actually drilling some holes.

I'm going single p'up with a simple wrapover bridge. Ash made this p'up for me a while back (intended for another guitar), and I think it should be quite effective in this guitar ...

Andyjr1515 · March 2016

That looks meaty, @TTony

TTony · March 2016

Feeling brave today (not really, but I couldn't wimp out again), so I re-checked my measurements and the bridge/p'up placement and got on with it.

The bridge posts are drilled in yet, just in case I change my mind about the bridge.

I've got a black metal p'up ring, and probably black knobs too.

That's a saddle-free pigtail bridge atm. The original saddles were notched in the middle of each saddle. When the bridge is placed "properly" (ie not at right angles to the centre line), the notches are in the wrong places, in that the strings have to break at an angle horizontally as well as vertically. Should have some new replacement, un-notched saddles coming over from Pigtail US next week.

Also got rid of that extra "ventilation" hole into the control cavity ...

The plug blends in reasonably well. The joint line to the bottom end of the body is hidden by the bridge. The sides match the grain pattern reasonably well. The only problem area is the neck/treble corner of the plug where you can see the joint line quite plainly.

Thinking about finishes ...

I'd had originally planned a fairly light colour to leave the grain pattern & birdseyes all visible. I had some Wudtone white that I thought might do the job, but I think the maple is too dense to really accept that finish.

This is a piece of offcut of the same wood. The right-hand end has been stained with Wudtone white. The bit on the left is just oiled.

I know which option I prefer ...

TTony · March 2016

Had my assistant with me today as well ...

WezV · March 2016

That plug is bloody neat.

I assumed you would be going solid finish on top.

I do think you need to be careful now. Oil clearly looks best on the top, but that also means it will show the plug more. If you do oil and the plug looks obvious it will be harder to refin with a solid colour. Personally i would go with natural lacquer on top as it doesn't limit future solid colour options the way an oil finish would.

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