Guitar Build #1 - 3/4/2015

WRAP-UP AND LESSONS LEARNED

Welcome to the final post of Guitar Build #1. What a journey this has been for me! In the beginning I was inspired by my father to build a kit guitar and was hoping to learn more about the inner workings of an electric guitar than I've ever been motivated to learn about in my nearly 30 years of playing...not to mention saving tons of money by NOT buying a Gibson. I would have been perfectly happy with a well playing, great sounding Frankenguitar. In the end I strongly feel that I came away with so much more...

Not bad! Although I think I want a new pickup ring in the bridge position...

This guitar, while intended to look like an antique or relic, is truly beautiful. I definitely achieved the relic look with the exception of the nut and bridge/tailpiece. Both of those components look very new, but the features and functionality that they brought were necessary. I will say that after much curing on the surface, the finish has matted down a little more than I wanted. The finish is still beautiful but could use just a little more gloss...I guess she has that "aged 50 years" look right outta the box, so to speak. Lesson learned #1: apply more varnish than you think you need! Honestly, if I were to build another relic, I'd use the exact same supplies and processes (except pre-wash the rags more to avoid lint...FUCKING LINT MAN!). However, if I were to build another guitar I'd probably opt for a more modern nitrocellulose spray lacquer finish over the top of dewaxed spray shellac (this would bring out the grain more than just clear lacquer alone).

Pretty glossy...but still has an aged look to it!

 Speaking of lessons learned that are indirectly related to the finish....Lesson learned #2: drill the hole for the bridge ground BEFORE finishing the top. This would have saved me some damage to the finish, which on this build is being explained off as "character" or "age" haha. More finish-related lessons learned...Lesson learned #3: do a better job taping the binding and other surfaces that aren't supposed to receive a particular finish. There are a couple spots on the binding that have the mahogany color from the back that I was not able to scrape off with an Xacto knife. Once again..."character". Lesson Learned #4: buy a kit with binding all the way around the guitar, neck, AND headstock. This would have made the headstock much more appealing in the end as this build has a pretty rough looking finish on the headstock. More on the headstock, especially related to the next possible build being spray lacquered, Lesson learned #5: don't purchase the maple veneer on the headstock. This will ensure uniformity between the back of the headstock and the face.

The Switchcraft toggle switch is REALLY nice to use! So are the knobs...

Lesson learned #6: pore fill the mahogany back! This build I wanted a more antique look so I didn't pore fill, but if I were to opt for a more modern look I would certainly need to pore fill in order to ensure a glass-like finish. Finally, and possible most importantly in regards to the finish, Lesson learned #7: SAND THAT MOFO DOWN to 400 or 600 grit BEFORE finishing to ensure a very smooth surface AND to knock off any residual glue from the factory. This glue remnant left a few spots on the face of the guitar where the finish didn't fully take...which, in the end, looks like light spots on the finish...no bueno!

See the light spots in the red by the binding?? Glue residue...

Moving onward...filing down a teflon coated guitar nut is really not friendly to the lungs. Lesson learned #8: wear a protective mask (this also applies to finishing as well since the fumes aren't very nice either). Additionally, protective gloves are a good thing (I wore them for a while, but after I ran out I didn't buy them or wear them anymore...)! Now on to electronics...

The Gotoh 510 bridge/tailpiece set is really amazing!

Lesson learned #9: if you want boutique pickups, order them in advance of the project. They often take 4-to-6 weeks or longer from order date to arrival date. Due to this, I actually opted for Seymour Duncan Antiquities (even though I was originally going to get the Whole Lotta Humbuckers) which are surprisingly a hand-wound set of pickups! I must say that the tone of this guitar is absolutely amazing! Ballsy, fat, expressive, and just has that bell-like chime when you really dig into the strings...I've not heard a tone like this from a guitar in person, EVER. I've heard it on old albums, but never in person, not even from a real Gibson. I don't say this out of pride of building this thing, I say this out of nearly 30 years of playing and hearing TONS of guitars! You could say I'm happier than a pig wallowing in its own shit in regard to the tone of this guitar!

Looks like something straight outta 1959!

Lesson learned #10: my hands are not well suited to wiring, or maybe I just need practice. HIRE someone to wire the guitar. Had I listened to myself this time, I could have saved myself $65 (the original quote was $60 to wire, but was upped to $125 as all my wiring had to be ripped out and re-done) and one electrocution. 

And last but not least...Lesson learned #11: measure twice, work once. I measured for aligning the tuners as well as the input jack...all of which ended up crooked. But, alas there's that "character" thing I keep speaking of.

Not a performance demo, just seeing how my newly built axe sounds! Lots of buzz though...perhaps new tubes are in order...

Thanks for tuning in! I've had a lot of fun and do believe that I will do this again! I really, REALLY like the electronics and tone in this one, but I'm not sure the direction I'll take the next one. For sure it'll have the upgraded AAAA tiger maple cap (MORE GRAAAAIIIINNNSSS), and also have binding around the body, neck, AND headstock. Tune in!

Cheers,
Dean

Guitar Build #1 - 2/26/2015

This is a post both on what not to do, and what I've had to do as a result...

The Internet is a great place for information. In fact, without the Internet this entire project would have never happened. However, the majority of my fowl-ups are also due to the Internet (my look of despair/shame below...).

Case in point, electrical grounding. Going into this project I read numerous articles about how, in addition to the ground circuit between all the electronics, the bridge needs to also be grounded. I read numerous articles on how active pickups need not be grounded to the bridge, but passive do. I read numerous articles on how covered pickups are shielded and therefore do not need grounding to the bridge. What the hell does all this grounding do anyways?

Well, grounding the electronics is always required, and I won't go into that. However, grounding the bridge, which is really grounding the strings that touch the bridge, is done to prevent the annoying buzzing that occurs when you lift your hands off of the strings. The Internet was both right and wrong on this one. Active pickups do not need grounding, check! Passive pickups need grounding, check! Covered pickups do not need grounding, WRONG! In this style of a guitar, unless you are installing active (battery powered) pickups, you must ALWAYS ground the bridge. This is done by drilling a hole (if one doesn't already exist) between the bridge stud hole and the control cavity. Then, you shove a wire into the hole and pound in your bridge stud creating a friction fit. The other end of the wire is soldered into the ground circuit and BANG, no more buzz.

So, here's what not to do...DON'T BUILD THE WHOLE GUITAR ONLY TO THEN REALIZE YOU HAVE TO GROUND THE BRIDGE!!

Here's what TO do...DRILL THE HOLE FOR THE BRIDGE GROUND LOOOOONG BEFORE YOU POUND IN THE BRIDGE STUDS!!

OK, so what did this mean for my project? Well, today I had to REMOVE a bridge stud...not for the faint of heart. Essentially I could try to use channel locks and some leverage to pull out the stud or I could create a lever of sorts. I found the exact thread for the inside of the bridge stud and bought a bolt that matches. I also bought a large washer and a short section of PVC tube. By putting it all together like the picture below, I was able to simply screw the bolt in thereby pulling the stud out like a lever...sort of...

In the end I did a little damage to the finish around the stud...I guess we can consider that part of the "character" of this intentionally antique-like guitar. Here's a pic after the stud was removed...

You can faintly see the little rings I created in the process (the large rings are light reflections)...ugh. Next up was to drill the hole to the control cavity. This would be the same whether done early in the project or now, so here's a pic. This takes a LONG drill bit...

Drilling at that angle is crazy-making. In the end, I BARELY made it into the bottom of the control cavity...WHEW!! So, I guess some of you might be wondering where the pickups went and such...well, I wired the guitar up over the weekend. Once I plugged it in to my amp, bad things happened haha. I'm pretty sure I had some current running through me, or something. So, I took the guitar into my local shop where I know the owner is a whiz at wiring Gibson (and other styles) style guitars. He re-wired the whole thing, then called me to request that I drill this stupid hole for the bridge ground. So, today I picked up the guitar, performed the aforementioned tasks, and finally returned it to the shop for final wiring (and as you may notice in that last pic, I finally picked up a case for the guitar!).

I should have this guitar back in my hands, and completely done no later than Monday. I'm hoping earlier. I will definitely be posting a video to demonstrate the sound of this beast and I will certainly be writing the final wrap-up and lessons learned.

Until then, cheers!
Dean

Guitar Build #1 - 2/19/2015

Wow, it's been a big couple of days around here...and not necessarily good ones.

Yesterday I was fortunate enough to have my good friend from work lend me his socket set (no commentary on why I don't currently have a socket set) so I could finish installing the tuners. This process involved sliding the tuners into the holes, then drilling holes for screws from the back of the headstock, screwing the screws in, and finally ratcheting the hex nut on the front side down. The screws were so f*%^ing tiny and a PITA to screw in I ended up trying to drill a little further in for each hole to make it easier. Suffice to say, my fingers got really sore and so my judgement was a little off...soooooo, a little hole accidentally got drilled through the face of the guitar from the back. Needless to say, I was angry to my core. On top of that, even after measuring twice, the tuners ended up a little crooked. Double anger.

After settling down (not by much), I did some research and even Gibson has some QC issues and often lets Les Pauls off the line with crooked tuners...just not holes drilled through the headstock :\
However, I felt a little better...even more so that the task was completed and I was moving on.

Today the remainder of my parts arrived, except I only ordered one volume/tone knob instead of four...which makes me kind of an idiot, but whatever. Since yesterdays issues were fresh in my mind I decided to tackle the next step which could result in the most damage to the guitar, the bridge and tailpiece. These pieces require hammering little posts into the guitar face. Obviously this could lead to hammering directly into the face of the guitar thereby making me want to set fire to the damn thing a la Jimi Hendrix. However, this did not happen.

I carefully hammered in the posts and installed the two pieces. I must admit, they are stunning. I am really glad a spent the extra $15 (<10% difference from stock Tune-O-Matic) on the Gotoh 510 set. Here's a pic!

This pic is a little unflattering of the finish, but that's OK. The lighting sucked...Also, the switch and switch plate were not actually installed. I was attempting to do that, but realized that I need to drill a relief into the wood to make it fit properly. Hopefully that will not be traumatic...so, we'll see you tomorrow for that! I'm hoping that I have this sucker done THIS WEEKEND! We shall see...

Cheers,
Dean

Guitar Build #1 - 2/12/2015

Well, here she is! She looks like a complete (or somewhat complete) guitar! The glue has dried, so I removed the clamp and, after sweating whether or not this was going to be a bust, I picked her up. To my complete elation the joint was rock solid. *WINNING*

Next up, I broke out my measuring tape to make sure that the scale was on. This would certainly determine if the guitar would tune and retain good intonation. So, after measuring from the nut to the 12th fret, and then again from the bridge (of course pretending the nut and bridge were installed), I determined that the measurements were exactly equal and have thus deemed this a success! *MORE WINNING*

Here's a pic with the neck and body as one (it actually looks like a guitar now!)

Once again, the blue tinted photo lights make the grains and colors dance around, which from this angle makes is look like there is no red in the sunburst. Strange, but I like it!

I think I'll take the rest of the day off. Tomorrow I might install the tuners, but after that it's a brief Vegas trip and then waiting for more parts to arrive before I can move forward. You know what that means?!?!?

This.

Wifey made us some margaritas, so...

Cheers!
Dean

Guitar Build #1 - 2/11/2015

Well, today was the day (or, one of THE days...)! Today was extremely short, but will define the success of this project. Sure, having an ugly finish would affect the overall outcome, but the guitar would still be playable and sound good. However, today was all about gluing in the neck...which, if not properly done could result in an absolutely unplayable guitar. Whether it becomes a really expensive paperweight, due to REALLY bad gluing, or a somewhat playable guitar that continually sounds like crap because the neck is *slightly* off resulting in horrible intonation, etc is completely up to the events of today. Unfortunately, even though I've already glued the neck in, I don't have data to report until I can remove the clamp and start taking measurements...ugh.

Here's the latest pic I took of the top (don't mind the awful blue lighting-it makes the colors on the guitar look WAY off, but still cool) followed by a rather unremarkable pic of the guitar with the clamp on the neck/body joint (don't mind the pads of paper, I felt they would be easier on the finish than the steel clamp).

Time to go and worry for 24-48 hours...maybe a libation (or so) will help...

Cheers,
Dean

Guitar Build #1 - 2/9/2015

Just wanted to check in with a new pic for y'all today. The back and sides have been curing now for a few days (I think a few...), and I've still been applying more finish to the face of the headstock, but I wanted to get an idea of how this baby would look all put together. So, over the weekend I removed all the remaining painter's tape and slid the neck into the body...of course, since my hands were now full (and I was excited), I called my wife over with her phone to take a quick snap! So, here it is!

Sometime this week I'll actually glue in the neck and next week, after a brief weekender I'll be ordering and installing the hardware and electronics...ALMOST THERE!!

Cheers,
Dean

Guitar Build #1 - 2/7/2015

Well, I think the finish is complete! I didn't apply nearly as many coats to the back and neck as I did to the top, but I also wanted a somewhat more natural look and feel to it. This means that the pores on the mahogany still feel like pores and are not perfectly smooth like glass. Here, take a look!

In both pics, especially the first, you can see the pores in the shimmer of the light. Personally, I think it looks awesome! I know that the finish will knock down a little bit as it cures, so it may not have quite as much sheen to it (that's OK in my book!). I will, however, be applying several more coats to the face of the headstock to get it more shine, but I can do that while the rest cures.

Probably around Wednesday or Thursday it'll be cured and I'll be gluing in the neck! At that point it will look like a guitar! So, I'll see y'all in a few days!

Cheers,
Dean