volowv's 2012 Challenge Build Thread -- COMPLETED

[volowv]

Originally Posted by gitlvr

Looks really cool! Good job so far.
I have used the Duplicolor lacquer before, in my 100 year old Pine P bass build. It turned out great. Just be careful if you go that route. Duplicolor makes lacquers and enamels. Most of the auto parts stores put them on the same shelf with one another. Make certain you get lacquer.

i checked the dupli-color website looking for a color chart but i didn't see one. anyone know where i can find one?

[axedaddy]

Is that OOB?? One of my FAVs

[volowv]

Originally Posted by axedaddy

Is that OOB?? One of my FAVs

it's just south, about 5 miles.... Fortunes Rocks.

[guitarbuilder]

Cool shell work... I've been thinking about clear cast lately too.

[ugly_guitar_guy]

Dig the shell work. That's gonna look great!

[RogerC]

Very cool idea. Can't wait to see the implementation

[volowv]

thanks guys.

@guitarbuilder, casting resin is alot of fun. i probably should have used epoxy resin for this because it's clearer i think. but the budget...


laid out some lines with a stew-mac fret calculator print out, razor knife and square. came in 5mm off each line on the 3, 5, 7, 10, 12; 4mm or so on the higher frets.


here we have a temporary jig. the router slides on the white plywood. the fretboard is sitting in between two other pieces of flooring. slide it up and down, clamp, rout. 1/4" bit on the lower frets, 1/8" for higher.



sawed up the shell resin, sanded it to size on the ROSS or by hand on a piece of sandpaper.

this is before i glued them down with CA. black or white binding? either one looks pretty sharp i think.

[RogerC]

sweetnes! I'm not sure about the binding...

[crazydave911]

Originally Posted by gitlvr

And, aprdon my ignorance, but what is the difference between a tenor guitar and a uke or mandolin? Construction? Tuning? Scale?

This should help LINK

[crazydave911]

Originally Posted by volowv

crazydave, yeah, ACDG. thats the standard right? 10 on top and a 52 on the bottom? i'm not sure about the between gauges, i'll have to check a tension calculator when i get a chance

Standard tenor tuning is CGDA, like the tenor banjo they evolved from. Another very popular tuning is DGbe, or "Chicago tuning" as it's called (like a baritone uke). Mine has a 23" scale and I tune it CGDA. The string gages follow the tunings. For standard I use 36,26,17, and 10 (you can vary each side of this somewhat. For Chicago tuning you can just use the top 4 from a set like d'adarrio XL110 or XL115. Standard tuning is in fifths, like a fiddle, Chicago is like the top four of a guitar, easier to learn, but not a true tenor tone and the tab and chords for each are quite different. Since this your tenor, do it however your comfortable. With a shorter scale like you have, you could do STD, but half to a full step higher, putting it a fourth lower than an octave mando. With the shorter scale, you could could up to G. The possibilities are endless . Read here LINK

Originally Posted by volowv

black or white binding? either one looks pretty sharp i think.

Like the black myself

Dave

[Muzikp]

I like the black binding better FWIW, great looking build and very unique. Love the weight, that's my kinda guitar. What is that giant face plate on your router made out of? I must have one.

[volowv]

thanks crazydave, i totally missed that question... my mind is stuck on paint right now. thanks for the gauge info too. i think i'm going to go with heavier strings and keep the tuning CDGA even though the scale is shorter.

muzikp- on the weight, granted it's not a full size body and it doesn't have a back yet, but i was pretty excited to reduce it by almost two thirds, 4.25lbs to 1.5lbs. the faceplate is just plexiglass. it was originally some kind of packing material for a large roll.

on the binding, i like the black binding too. i'm going to have to double bind the body since i'm using a plywood back. given what i have sitting on the shelf here are some possible combinations that i'm considering:

black body, ivory or white binding, tort guard, black PU.
duplicolor light colored body, black binding, black guard, black PU.
duplicolor light colored body, white or ivory binding, tort guard, shell flake(?) PU.

i also have a single ply white guard blank, but its not calling me at the moment.

i'd like to find some kind of light green or blue. at moment gold or silver seem oddly interesting though. there are so many silver cars these days... fender did have inca silver and shoreline gold on the chart.

it's seems there is no duplicolor color chart. i checked some huge auto paint databases online but i don't really know what's available off the shelf locally. i'm going to have to go to the autoparts store and write down everything that looks promising and check on google.

meanwhile... some of the less exciting action.


the end looked ugly so i made a plug.

moved bandsaw table to 5 degrees, set the neck face down and marked with a level.



i leveled the face of the headstock on the ROSS before the fretboard went on. i use a couple sewing pins for alignment. just tap the ends in with a little hammer until they bend and clip everything but a few mm's off the top. pop the fretboard on with a few taps from the hammer and it sticks in place.

[Mojotron]

Originally Posted by volowv

beach weather is finally here.

76 the other day... in march? something is very wrong but i'm tired of the heating bills so spring is a welcome site....

You're killing me... It's snowed here just about every day since the beginning of the challenge... Someday my spring will come...

[volowv]

it's been in the 80s for the past few days mojotron. it's unreal. i'm sure we are going to have to pay for this later. usually this time of year we are hoping we aren't going to get a snow storm on april 1st.

well, i'm just plugging away at the guitar.

cutting the neck taper. one side and then move the board to the other.

i cut the binding channel here also. i forgot to mention that i cut the fret slots awhile ago, before i glued the board to the neck. i use a razor blade to score the lines, then .11 razor saw to open the slots, and finally a stew-mac fret saw. freehand, no jig. it doesn't look very interesting in pictures so i forgot to even take a picture of it.


don't fight the ross. it knows whats best.

i went with a very simple headstock. everything i drew out looked like something else and i just got bored with it. i cut this headstock to thickness by dragging it backward on one side of the bandsaw blade. the teeth remove a 32nd-64th on each drag. this is why there is an unusual amount of sawdust on the table. once i got close i leveled it out with the ross.

only a few worm holes left.

[crazydave911]

I like it!

[emoney]

I appreciate the "shell into inlay" idea. Living in Florida, I can walk out to the backyard
and find shells and I've always wonder how to get them turned into inlays. Good work.

[anyone]

Hey, I think I have a mortar and pestle somewhere...
Very cool!

I dig the headstock too. It's like a few well-placed notes...

[ModerneGuy]

Well, Sydney's full of beaches isn't it? I'll be out there with a small plastic bucket next time we visit the mother-in-law in Manly ... actually it's only 20 minutes away, no need to visit the mother-in-law is there ?

Volowv, nice build and thanks for the inspiration. Love last year's build too by the way...

[volowv]

thanks guys.

a tip on shell collection, look for stuff is flakey or damaged. the easiest stuff to work with is almost falling apart when you find it at the beach. look for small thin walled shells too. anything that is thick is going to require so much grinding that nothing will really be left of it by the time you get it to a useable size.

on the headstock, i was a little concerned about weight too. the body is so light... it seems to be balancing nicely.

on the paint front, i went to the autoparts store and wrote down anything that seemed promising and check google. i didn't find any of the many silver tones acceptable. "storm grey metallic", which is a GM color, is growing on me. earlier in the day i had seen a dark grey metallic Edsel at the gas station. didn't look too bad.

back at the shop... cutting some rudimentary faucets. the neck is so small that it didn't really take much. its 3/4" at the nut, 7/8" up at the 15th fret.


i smoothed over some of it with the ROSS.

then shoeshined with 80.

ground down the heel with a block and 80 grit. a little ROSSing was involved also.

radiused the fretboard. polished the inlays up to 400.

had to be a little more careful than usual. i didn't think the inlays would pop out, but resin is fairly brittle and a stray hammer blow would not be good.

ground down the fret ends inside the binding channel, ala gibson. i hate doing fret ends, so the frets go in first.

[flatfive]

Wow, volowv, you've got a lot of cool tricks up your sleeve.
Super educational. I want to see how you approach the binding
on the neck. Do you prefer a certain thickness binding on the
neck? In particular I'm wondering 0.060" vs. 0.040".

BTW, Get Happy may be my favorite album of
all time. I wore out a couple of vinyl copies of it, and learned
the bass part to every tune. Great bass playing!