Desk Top Tele

Greetings all, My son is going into his last year at elementry school so I thought I would make something that I could donate to the school to be raffled off. When my daughter was in school I usually made a jelly cupboard or a cabinet of some kind to sell tickets on. Since the majority of my woodworking hobby is building guitars I decided that would be a good project for a good cause. At first I had a swamp ash /maple neck tele in mind until I had a brainstorm and thought what would be really cool was a guitar with an old school desk for a top. My wife put the word out on face book and within 24 hours I had a donor. The desk is 30 to 40 year old maple ( I think it's dry) with all the proper graffitti on it. I have so far bonded it to a 3 piece ash body and made a maple/maple neck. The desk in the pictures is actually a second desk that was given to me. I had pics of the actual donor desk but somehow erased them from my camera. Always wondered how I can build a guitar but can't operate a camera, go figure....

The neck is locally harvested maple air dryed for 3 years. I matched the headstock to the desk's patina as best I could using golden oak stain. I stained the fret board and then sanded it with 220 to give it an aged look.

Here it is hanging in my rec room waiting for parts. I hope the parts come in this week. I will post more pics as i procede. I also have hanging a birch top/ash body tele. the grain in the birch is crazy.

Very cool idea. I love using unusual materials for builds. I know of a builder in australia who used old hardwood from the floor of a basketball court to make a top for a guitar...

Cool idea!! Loved them old desktops.

That's great - just need more graffiti.:lol: Reminds of the Alice Cooper School's Out album cover - maybe you could put an inkwell in there...

Nice patina on that desk too. That basketball court top that andrewdoeshair mentioned (Harvester guitars) is another great example of using timber from unlikely sources to fantastic effect. Nice gesture too on your part for the school - I should do something similar. Cheers

Love it, subscribing

Very nice........That desk brings back memories.

As the son of a career educator and a current employee in a public school, that gtr. rocks. Nice work

The hardware arrived today and now I have to start making some decisions. The priority is to show as much of the top as possible ,so I probably will not use a pick guard.

My vote goes for string through with shortened 3 barrel bridge and 2 P90s (and no pickguard). But yes, you decide . . .

Gorgeous . . . .

This is the coolest guitar ever. My vote is one black P90, but maybe a dogear, and the wrap-around bridge.

You definitely need to post instructions for how to enter the raffle. I have a feeling the school might do very well with this prize.

Very cool idea!

What if you made the pickguard out of an old piece of black chalkboard slate?

Thanks for the input guys. The idea of an old slate pickguard is great. Thanks Whoa, I will look into the possibilities.

Hope to have the routing done and all hardware test fitted this week end. I will post pictures as I go.

If you want to keep the PG small you could always go La Cab style or TC90.

Thanks for the input guys. The idea of an old slate pickguard is great. Thanks Whoa, I will look into the possibilities.

Hope to have the routing done and all hardware test fitted this week end. I will post pictures as I go.

I'm just glad somebody other than myself know what a slate chalkboard is. If you used slate you could write a different message for every gig.:razz:

Rust-Oleum Chalkboard Spray (http://www.rustoleum.com/CBGProduct.asp?pid=110)

You could spray a regular pickguard, or (even cooler) spray the chalkboard pickguard right onto the guitar body itself!

Rust-Oleum Chalkboard Spray (http://www.rustoleum.com/CBGProduct.asp?pid=110)

You could spray a regular pickguard, or (even cooler) spray the chalkboard pickguard right onto the guitar body itself!

That's super cool. La Cabronita PG sprayed with this.

Rust-Oleum Chalkboard Spray (http://www.rustoleum.com/CBGProduct.asp?pid=110)

You could spray a regular pickguard, or (even cooler) spray the chalkboard pickguard right onto the guitar body itself!

wonderful idea!

and wonderful desk top tele as well :)

You could write your current set list on the blackboard pickguard and erase it after each set so you could put the next sets songs on it. And I think I would carve my initials in the body somewhere for further identification purposes. I absolutely love it.

Greetings, finally got a little time to continue on the DeskTop Tele build. I ran into a few glitches along the way. While I was routing the pickup cavities I set the guide bearing a little to high and it came above the template.The result was a cavity that no way resembled a P-90 pickup shape. I thought about using humbuckers instead but in the end I made some trim rings out of curly maple I had on hand. When i was screwing down the bridge I twisted off one of the screws. OOOPs... I ended up putting the other 4 screws in the bridge and drilling out the broken one. Anyways I'm on Vacation for the next two weeks so I probably wouln't get a whole lot done.I will have to turn it up a notch when I get back in order to have it ready to donate to the school in Sept.

That is starting to look very nice, I like the theme.

Fantastic.

Greetings, finally getting around to posting some pics of the finished Desk Top Tele. My son brought it into his school in Sept and it will be displayed until Dec when they will draw for it. Come to find out the pricipals husband is a guitar guy and has been playing it for the kids,awesome, I heard it has also been displayed at a local club on open mike night. This has been a very satisfying project for myself and my son. I let him drill the fret marker holes and do a lot of the sanding so he did get to be involved in the project. I will post again in Dec to let you know how much money it raised.

Thanks,

Great job Ken! :grin:

Whereabouts in NS are you? I'd interested in buying a raffle ticket. Great work by the way!

My elementary school had those desks. The color of the aged desktop has been my guide for every tint job I've ever done - odd that I never thought of going straight to the source and just using an old desktop, as you did! Stunning job.

That's very nice :)

It's a bit too late to suggest but I thought a built in pencil sharpener along the edge somewhere would be a cool feature.

That's fantastic! I love that kind of stuff. Is it me, or did you change the binding scheme. It looks like you cream binding in the earlier picks, but now it looks black.

love!

Great Job

The school selling the tickets is Cumberland North Academy in Cumberland county NS. Their website is www.cna.ccrsb.ca . Thanks for the interest.

Great theme, great job, this is big!

Very cool idea. I love using unusual materials for builds. I know of a builder in australia who used old hardwood from the floor of a basketball court to make a top for a guitar...

The floors in my house are an old basketball court. Great wood and cheap if you can find one getting torn out.

Great job, love the look of it.

The school selling the tickets is Cumberland North Academy in Cumberland county NS. Their website is www.cna.ccrsb.ca . Thanks for the interest.

Hey Ken, amazing job! Do you know if they are selling tickets to outsiders? Or are they keeping it in house? I'm right up here in Southern N.B. A short 2 hr drive. I have family in Glenholme/Debert and Truro areas.:)

What a great idea and a beautiful guitar! Nice to see fellow bluenosers on the board doing some awesome building.

How many boogers were stuck under that desk? :razz:

I don't know if there were any boogers, but I scraped a pile of gum off the bottom of the desk. Took me back to grade nine when things were a lot simpler.