This is my plan:
7-string Les Paul junior style guitar, loosely based on
a Huber Krautster.
Pine 4-piece body (pine bought from my local Wickes!), bound in cream plastic (binding left over from a previous
build), stained brown with a brown burst on the front. Sprayed with amber nitro
– thin coat because I only have a tiny bit left!
Set neck, also 4-piece
pine, I think stained brown and oiled with the headstock front lacquered.
Mahogany fretboard, which I fabricated from an old leftover piece a while back.
25.5” scale, 22-fret, jumbo fretwire. Mahogany veneer on front of headstock
(from a free sample pack of veneers that I've had for years). Dot inlays rescued
from an old fingerboard I replaced. Brass nut which I'm going to make from a
piece of brass bar I had left over from some previous project.
I'm going
to attempt to make a wraparound bridge from a tailpiece that I've had left over
in a box for years (from an old build when I bought a bridge and tailpiece combo
but just used the bridge with string-through-body ferrules, leaving the
tailpiece left over). I want to insert some brass in the top of the tailpiece
for the strings to go over, and I'm going to insert an ash offcut into the
body for the bridge posts to locate into as I think the pine might be a bit
soft.
Black Ibanez tuners that I removed from a second-hand RG7321 neck
when I replaced them with gold ones. They're 7-in-line whereas the head is going
to be 4+3 so I might have to angle them or the headstock a bit to get it to look
ok. We'll see.
Single bridge P-90 pickup, which is a pickup I built about
ten years ago. This was back when 7-string parts where more difficult to find,
so I built this P-90 from plastic, and a brass baseplate from a knackered
Schaller Hot Stuff. I then sent it to Tim Mills (Bareknuckle boss!) who wound
and potted it for me. It sounds great (although I've only had it in the neck
position before), but looks a bit rough, but it fits under a dog-ear six string
P-90 cover, so I'm going to use a cream one over it.
Volume and tone
controls using old pots/knobs I have sat in my parts box, and a scratchplate and
cavity cover made from some old cream plastic. Jack plug on plate on the edge of
the guitar.
So far allowing for all the second hand parts, etc (the wood
is the only thing I needed to buy!), total cost comes to £70.
Comments
I've drawn out the plan for it
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/Plans_zpsss1mfli1.jpg
This is the pickup that I made a while ago - as I said, it sounds great but looks a bit ropey, so I'm gonna put it under the cream cover (I might make some fake pole-pieces in the cover to make it look better too).
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2308_zpsqvi85rtf.jpg
The piece of mahogany I rescued that I'm using for the fingerboard. The usual advice is that mahogany is too soft to hold frets properly, but I'm hoping that with some superglue they'll stay in ok.
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2307_zpsb8dzgkk0.jpg
And the tail-piece with some of my planning on the top for where the brass will be inserted to make it a wraparound:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2311_zpshkngg9ay.jpg
Looks great even at this stage !
Weekend update number one!
First, the pile of pine:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2315_zpsdwwgjnnn.jpg
Body wood cut to lengths and dowelled ready for joining:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2317_1_zpsj7zbbqfu.jpg
Body blank after glueing:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2337_1_zpsu1tpwgrh.jpg
Neck woods clamped:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2345_zpscwe7ylsl.jpg
And after glueing:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2351_1_zpsl7fww2ei.jpg
Slots cut into the top of the tailpiece ready to take the brass inserts (to make it a wraparound bridge):
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2321_1_zps4fsfbvq6.jpg
And after I'd glued the brass in, re-sprayed it and filed the tops of the brass saddles. I realise I might have to angle the tops of the saddles differently to this to get the intonation right, but there should be enough meat left in the brass to allow me to do that later:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2339_1_zpsvjofbca2.jpg
I also made some fake pole-pieces in the pickup cover. The pickup itself has the pole pieces glued in as the pickup was coming apart when it was potted, but I didn't really like the look of the no-hole cover, so I drilled 7 holes in the cover and filled them with black epoxy just to give the look of pole-pieces:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2347_1_zpszofalsux.jpg
More to come next week!
Weekend update number two:
Routed the truss rod channel (forgot to take pics of that), and cut the headstock to rough thickness:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2368_zpsjarm5mi4.jpg
Glueing the wings for the headstock width:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2373_zpspdkinrqy.jpg
Slotting the fretboard:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2377_1_zpsvg7kqjtw.jpg
Slotted:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2379_zps7t25v9sf.jpg
Stuck the mahogany veneer onto the headstock (the marks are just some glue):
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2381_zpsknetfqst.jpg
Cut the headstock roughly to shape:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2391_zpsszalcm5s.jpg
Sticking the fingerboard on:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2394_zps0ta5cdol.jpg
Some progress on the neck. Got it roughly cut down to size (although it's still a bit over size), the side dots in, nut shelf cut and the board radius'd.
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2403_1_zps4hugcwbr.jpg
Holes for the tuners drilled and tested for fitting
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2409_1_zpsqth8ipba.jpg
Fretted!
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2413_1_zpskdqqwya5.jpg
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2426_1_zpstkhtxft1.jpg
Lovely rounded fret ends!
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2435_1_zps7tdramhn.jpg
I'm also building this for Sevenstring.org's Home depot build challenge, and for that you're not supposed to use any wood from luthiers suppliers, only what you can get at your local DIY shop! So I could only get pine, although I did look around quite a bit to find some that was straight and not too knotty, etc.
I also have a few new templates that I wanted to try before I used them on nice bits of expensive wood, so I thought this build would solve that issue too!
Basic neck shaping done:
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2440_1_zpsphxhfmp3.jpg
And you can really see now how I laid out the four parts of wood - makes some nice grain patterns!
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2443_1_zps206abcrd.jpg
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2445_1_zpsdubakesd.jpg
Might do a bit more shaping later, but I'm going to start on the body next.
Just a little bit more progress - made the nut. Made from an offcut of brass, it's in two parts. The bottom plate will be screwed down and the nut itself bolts onto it. This means that I can adjust the overall height of the nut by putting shims in between the plate and the nut, like you can with a locking nut. I wanted to try this because I often find that I cut the odd slot a touch too deep and therefore have to raise and re-cut the nut. So with this design it's easy to do. You could also have a ready made shim to put in there if you wanted to raise the action for slide guitar use
Obviously it will need a bit more work but I'll leave that until it's ready to string-up.
http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m622/Serratus1/IMAG2458_1_zps45igxu8e.jpg