Official Luthiers Forum!

This morning I got the body sanded level and transferred the outline:



Then I called around to find a millwork shop that would cut it out for me. Found one. Here's the body fresh out of the bandsaw, ready to sand:



And here's after the first go with the spindle sander:

Lookin' good, Mark.
I like the horns and stinger,
plus maple is my favorite wood.

Thanks Alan. As this is my first build, I don't have the most informed opinion, but I like this maple a lot too. It maches very nicely and sands smoothly.

The side dot and position marker "inlay" material arrived today:



It is aluminum rod. The smaller rod is 1/16" and will be used for side dots and fingerboard position markers for the 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 20th, 21st, 22nd, and 23rd position with a single dot for each position (hopefully centered under the G string). The larger rod is 1/8" and will be used for the double dot markers at the 12th and the 24th positions. I received 10ft of 1/8" rod and 6ft of 1/16" rod. I'm probably not going to use more than an inch of 1/8" and 3 or 4 inches of 1/16" on this project, but there it is. At least I'll have plenty left over for future builds.

Tonight, I routed the truss rod channel:



Then I glued and clamped the fingerboard:

I worked on the fingerboard dot design a little more last night, and decided that the 2 dots at the 12th and 24th positions were definitely getting too close to the edge of the board, which I fear would invite splitting and chipping. I looked at moving the dots toward the D string a little bit, with the rightmost dot centered below the G string, but I didn't really like the look of it. So I eliminated the second dot and lined the 12th and 24th position dots up with the rest of them:



I am happy with that.

Also, early this afternoon I unclamped and trimmed the fingerboard flush with the end of the neck:



Hmm. Looks like my center line is a bit off. I better adjust that before I rough cut the neck out.

Went out to the shop and worked on the neck today...

Tapered the neck and shaped the headstock:


Headstock closeup:


Veneer sandwich detail:


Very happy with today's progress.

Tomorrow is neck profiling day. I am excite.

Couldn't go to bed without profiling the neck.

First I drew my taper lines with a chalk pencil:


Then I started hitting it with a 14" farrier's rasp. First one side:


Then the other:


After the chalk taper lines were consumed by the rasp, I smoothed out the facets with a spokeshave. I forgot to take pictures of this process. After the original facets were taken out with the spokeshave, I attacked the flat spots with a sandpaper belt. I started with 80 grit and moved up to 120 grit after a few minutes.






More to do tomorrow, but I am satisfied with this for tonight.

Today I installed the 12th and 24th position markers on the fingerboard face.

First, I taped the neck down level and flat to a pine 1x4 to have better clamping area for the drill press. I marked the positions and got my materials ready. I taped the 1/8" drill bit so that I would know where to stop, as I only wanted the hole about 1/4" deep.



Then I lined the marks up with the drill bit brad point and drilled the holes.



I put some super glue gel into the hole and pressed the rod into place. On the first one, I accidentally used too much glue. No worries, as it will be ground away anyway, and then sanded smooth when I radius the fingerboard.



Then I used a flush-cut hacksaw to remove the excess aluminum rod and ground the dots flush with the fingerboard with a dremel.




(When the fingerboard is radiused, the marred and overglued surface will be eliminated, so it should look pretty seamless.)



Total time to do this: ~30 minutes. Pretty happy with it.

After that, I went ahead and installed the rest of the markers:



Not perfectly straight, but good enough for a 1st. There was some wobblyness with the drill press, which made precise drilling somewhat difficult.

I went ahead and sanded it down with the radiusing block. I'll finish radiusing after I cut the nut slot.

Had a few minutes this evening, so I installed the neck bolts.



It sits a with a bit of uncertainty on this kind of stand, so I think I will get a different type for it. Probably an Ultimate.

I also cleaned up the neck pocket:



Now I just need to make the filler strip...That will be happening on Friday.

Looking great so far mate!

Made a riser for the cavity cover template:



And a pickup cavity routing template:

Nut slot:



Did it on the table saw. It took about 15 minutes to adjust the mitre gauge to 0.85 degrees, but after that it was done in 3 quick passes.

I know it looks like a big slot, but the nut is 3/16" wide and it is a bit too snug to get it seated properly. I am going to have to sand the side the nut down a teensy bit to make it fit.

This is really coming along great! I have to admit, I had some serious doubts about an all wenge neck and fretboard. Having had my share of wenge splinters, the idea of sliding your hand back and forth on an all wenge surface freaked me out. But it looks dang sleek! And once the neck is finished, splinters shouldn't be an issue. Will you put some kind of finish on the fretboard? I'd recommend it.

Also on the subject of finishing, do you have a plan for preventing the wenge from bleeding into the maple? I made a neck-through with a birds eye maple, wenge, and walnut neck (9 pieces! Yikes!) and it was really tough to isolate the colors. Although I personally liked how the wenge got into the maple a bit. It's like a very light stain, as if I had stained the maple and then sanded it back down.

Anyway, I'm enjoying seeing these progress pics! Really nice work!

Thanks Gabby. There will be no finish on the ebony or the wenge. The maple headstock and body will have several coats of tru-oil. I hadn't thought about color bleeding between wenge and maple, but I'm not worried about it. If it happens...ok...if not...ok. I'm really not that fussed about it.

Today I routed the pickup cavities and the electronics cavity. Radiusing continues at a painful pace.

So I had the whole thing assembled and playable for a few hours the other day, and....

...I'm not loving the neck. I've put the thing on hold for a bit while I figure out what I want to do about it.

Specifically, I have shaved the neck a little to thin at the first few positions, and it is still a bit thick in the upper register. It's a little wider than I originally wanted it to be. I'm also not really in love with the profile itself. The wenge, while it felt nice when I first profiled it, is not really what I was hoping it would be. Every instrument I have ever played had a maple neck, and so I think I am just too used to that. The wenge feels "ok", but not stellar.

I can obviously machine it a little narrower, thin the neck some more in its fatter bits, and reshape the profile to some extent, but I can't make the first positions fatter, and I can't predictably change the texture of the wenge.

So I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the neck right now. There were numerous errors that were made in its fabrication, which I can overlook, but the tactile issues are harder to suss. So for now, I'm going to work on the body and worry about the neck later. Worst case scenario: I build a new neck. That is not something I am completely against, which is why I chose a relatively inexpensive neck material to begin with.