Gigged it

Well in the end I couldn't not play this guitar live and I had a spare Tonerider AC2 humbuckers handy so...

I bought another one, slung them in and here's how it looks

They didn't have any black neck AC2's so I got a zebra one which I think looks rather cool!

At its first gig...

And another. Looks, sounds and plays great!

Finished!!!

Well there have been lots of fuckups, learning curves and work arounds.  It's taken nearly a year but I stuck to it and didn't resort to any power tools and at long last it is completely finished!



Front



Back



Taken for a trip across country to meet its older brother who resides with my older brother.



And a gratuitous shot of me too...



This was recorded through my Marshall 100W valve amp set on a very weedy measly 1 and it still sings clearly with a bright jangly sound.  It is very under powered without the pre-amp so I may well rewire to be on permanently when the plugged in.

I have done a band rehearsal with the guitar and it performed really well.  It doesn't really have the low end balls that I need for the sound of this band so it's unlikely to get used live.

The pickups really need to be wax potted too as they are incredibly microphonic.  If you talk in to them your voice come out through the amp...

I might even make some more p'ups, humbuckers this time as I have plenty of the matching wood left!

Thanks for reading :-)

Finishing touches

Well, it's pretty much all done, just the last little finishing off job



Got the frets leveled, dressed and polished



The bone nut cut and shaped.



Bit of disaster and I might have cried a little bit!  As I was about to fit the neck p'up I dropped it and the surround shattered.



Thankfully all the breaks were clean so it glued up nice and cleanly.  I really didn't need this heart attack this close to the end of build!!!



The strings fitted with the bridge propped up on some walnut off cut sat on some cloth so it can be easily slid around and positioned for the best intonation and then the post holes drilled.



Making the headstock decal.  I used water slip paper.  The decal was printed off in a hollow block font in reverse and then filled in liquid gold leaf paint.

Decal in place...

...after the I covered it over with oil to hide the decal lines.  

It can still be seen if you catch the light right but otherwise it looks mostly seamless so I'm happy.

Wiring

So whilst the finish is left to cure and harden I finished a few little jobs on the pickups and got the parts for making the pre-amp.



Drilled and tapped the pole piece height adjustment holes and re-assembled the pickups.  The magnets were stuck in place on the base plate with superglue.



This is the wiring diagram, it's based on the popular Tillman discreet JFet circuit.  I've modified the original design to include my p'ups and controls.



Using a cardboard template to wire the standard guitar wiring circuit...



...wiring the pre-amp...



...putting the two parts together.  I clipped the p'ups to the switch and the output to a guitar lead and tested the whole thing in the same manner as the original p'up test.  Works perfectly!



Aluminium adhesive tape stuck down to shield the cavity, cover and p'up cavities.



All fitted nice and snug!

Time to get shiny

Phew, well that's all of the big construction jobs done so it's time to grain fill the meranti and apply the polymerised linseed oil (Tru Oil) finish.



Did some last minute sanding down to 400 grit.

Because meranti is open grained it needs to have a grain filler applied otherwise it will just drink up all the oil and leave it with an uneven finish.  One thing I didn't think to do was give the whole guitar a wipe down with naptha prior to finishing.  This would have shown up and faint tool / sanding marks that were previously invisible to the eye.

So a load more sanding later and a reapplication the guitar was hung up to allow the cellulose grain filler to dry.

Looks rather nice just with the grain filler...

...and the back

After sanding back ready for the oil application.

Hung up to dry, the oil really brings out the colour of the wood!

After lots of careful rubbing down with wire wool to smooth out the finish and remove any excess oil build up, followed by 10 re-applications of oil the finish is now complete.  It just needs to be left for a week to harden now.

I opted for smooth silky matt look rather than shiny gloss both of which can be achieved with Tru Oil depending on the level of polishing.

The same process was done to the pickups and control cavity cover.

Fittings

As I was working out the layout and test fitting all the parts I suddenly realised that I hadn't drilled the hole for the jack socket.  Another interesting challenge to give myself now that the neck is firmly attached making it difficult to position the body at a good angle to drill by hand with a 20mm bit.

The biggest problem with large bore drill bits is trying to maintain the pressure to cut through wood whilst turning the handle on the brace and bit drill.  There is also the problem of the bit grabbing as it breaks through to the cavity.  It's often recognised that it's easier to drill the big hole before hollowing out the cavity. So in order to make it easier I drilled a pilot hole big enough to allow the wire to pass through and then bored out the 20mm hole just nicely deep enough for the jack socket to fit.

I then drilled the post holes for the string anchor and also drilled a small hole from the control cavity to the lower post hole for the string earth (ground) wire to pass through.

After that I made a small rebate in the post holes to allow the flange of post bushings to sit flush with the body.  It's not necessary but I think it looks neater.

How the guitar looks with the p'ups and bridge hardware.  The final bridge position won't be drilled until it's strung up and I can work out the exact placement for correct intonation.

It was good and reassuring to see that the neck angle worked out perfectly for bridge height adjustment unlike on my last build...

Coming together

Okay, so far I'm quite happy with the neck profile and the body so I guess it's time to marry the two together!

Before gluing I did a final measure (thankfully) and found the neck is 2mm out of line!  The centre lines at the heel and tenon were spot on with the body centre lines however they weren't at the nut meaning either the strings would drop off one end of the finger board or the bridge would have to be offset and the p'ups wouldn't line up properly so this needed fixing!



I enlarged the hole and then carefully fitted strips of sycamore veneer until I had a snug fit that line up correctly.



It took about three hours of fitting and tweaking, all made more complicated due to the fingerboard being in place and covering the joint making it difficult to see where the gaps are.



Eventually though I got it to where I was happy.  It will need a little filler in a few places but it all lines up correctly now.



Due to possible hidden gaps that may cause weakness in the joint I opted to use JB Weld Wood epoxy resin as it will fill any gaps and make a strong joint on all mating faces.



Well I can tell you, there was a big sigh of relief after the glue had set and everything was nicely lined up!



I had to make a little bit of oak saw dust filler to close the slight gap between the heel and the body.  I used meranti saw dust filler on the sides.



Nice easy upper fret access.  This should be a dream to play!