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Base theme by DesignModo & ported to Powered by Vanilla by Chris Ireland, modified by the "theFB" team.
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Fret markers arrived today, so got the straight in. Sanded the board to 600g, felt lovely and smooth. Then got it fretted. Defo last time I'm using pre-cut frets. They didn't feel tooooooooooo bad, but the close-up shows otherwise. They are a bit springy at the edges. Superglue should resolve it, but I'm not impressed by the under radiussed pre-cut frets. I did run some superglue under most of the frets. I'm definitely not great at fretting!
Ran out of time, but I will soon file the fret ends flush and get on with binding it.
All I wanna do is work on the guitar.
do you have a fret press/drill press caul ? You can superglue and re-press the frets to remove any of the gaps. I had the same problem on a few frets in my first build and the fret press / glue trick worked well. Otherwise lots of fret levelling to do !
I had to reglue several of the ends on the V I built. This one isn't as bad - where it's lifting is mostly due to the flatter frets so it wants to lift. I tried the first few without bending the frets more and they defo popped up at the edges. I tried bending them after that, which helped, but I only did a bit of a rush job of pre-bending (further up the thread I was going to make a more robust jig but didn't bother in the end!). I've ordered a fret press insert and will make a press... the price of some of these presses are ridiculous.
But for sure will be getting a fretwire bender for the the future.
Each time i think about and explorer - that's the guitar i think of.
http://imgur.com/a/teNWRj4
But instead of gold hardware, nickel hardware
giving it a warm vibe,without the niggles of gold plating
Cant wait to see it.
Have got the neck carve well underway. Think I'll leave the heel until the neck is glued down so I can shape it all together.
Have now got the headstock veneer gluing up ready to trim this tomorrow (maybe!) and thickness the head and then will likely glue the neck on I reckon.
Some pics....
I think I'll carve the heel a bit more post-gluing.
Some woodwork machine porn for everyone, because why not and I love these machines. This is my spindle moulder shown with a sanding drum on (fences were removed while I was shaping the neck). It has a digi drive for rise / fall / tilt, which is really useful.
My planer thicknesser, also with the digi up / down on the thicknesser.
Planing a headstock veneer, taping it to some MDF to act as a sled to pass it through as it was just below 2mm thick.
Fun!
The way I made the neck by planing the blank to 18mm and adding on another lump for the tenon has left a nice natural stinger, of sorts. The whitish blob by the 15th fret is where I had an earlier wobble with the router (didn't stick the template down properly!), but I needed to fill it smooth in order to route the binding channel. I used a white filler as I was hoping to lose the filler with the neck carve. I didn't. And yes, I should have just mixed sapele dust and joint filler. Whoops!
Handy you already had the skills before this & that V haha
Looking forward to seeing completed! That neck joint is smooooth
Humbucker cavities mostly routed, just need to drill / route the legs a little more, though I must just route the whole lot deeper. The neck cavity looks like it has a slight wobble, there's a whisker of neck tenon remaining on the bridge side of it, but that won't harm anyone and it's all concealed.
I think that the next post will be painting, which is my favourite part of the build.
ABR-1 post lolz
This is the biggest shame. Some tearout when I was being impatient with the router. The mix & fill with sapele dust didn't quite work. I have some Mohawk graining pens so I will make an attempt to conceal it. Will be tricky though so I'm not holding my breath.
The mega switch & cable channel route just makes me laugh. Ridiculously big. At least it's all concealed though!
Yeah it's most definitely a blessing having the machines and workshop. If we were closer you'd be welcome to come in and use them. I've just taken delivery of a new one, an edgebander, but that's no use for guitar building sadly!
The plan was to make a non-reverse firebird next, but I've dreamt up a guitar that I'd like to try - it might change of course! A bit like a Fano RB6 and a bit like a Supro Black Holiday. It'd have a maple cap like what you're doing, a German carve, weight relieved body maybe, black top, bound (curious to try binding + german carve), P90s and wraparound bridge. That's how it sits in my mind right now anyway!
This is the first oxblood colour coat.