New Build - Ash Tele

[Guitarnut]

After my last few builds, I wanted to do something classic. So, I've decided to build an ash Tele.

Specs:
Quarter sawn 2 piece ash body
Black pickguard
Standard Tele pups and hardware
Flame maple neck & fretboard

And so it begins.

The body will be made from a rather nice slab of quarter sawn white ash. It's dried to 5% but is still a bit heavy. I know going in that this will be a heavy guitar but I'm comfortable in the 7 to 8 lbs range...strong back and shoulders.

The slab has a machined edge and one natural edge. This will present a few challenges and require a little different approach.





Because the natuarl edge is twisted...it's narrow to the right on this end but to the left on the other end. I need to find the widest portions of the board before I decide how to cut it.



I ran a tape measure down the board on each side using the machined edge as my quide. One side showed 6.75" and the other 6.5" to be the widest points. I makrked those on the other side and checked the width to see how the opposite edge would yield. The max I can get out of this board, with a perpendicular edge is a shade over 6.5"...which I can get for about 90% of the length of the board.

So, I laid out my cuts...deciding at just over 2.75" in thickness, it was too much for a table saw...mine anyway. Plus I knew I had to maximize the width, and I could do that better in smaller pieces vs ripping the entire length to one width.

The 3 sets of marks are for the cut lengths and guide for my circular saw.



This shot is for illustration only. Both hands are needed to do this safely. One hand holds the combination square in place, squared to the edge, while the saw rides against it. I made shallow cuts until I was half way thru, then flipped it and cut from the other side. I set my lengths at 17" so I didn't have to be super accurate in lining up front and back.

[Guitarnut]

After making my 3 cuts, I set the pieces on the bench and tried them in various combinations until I found one that gave me the widest area without crossing the natural edge.



In this shot, you can see that I'm still just a bit shy of the 12.75" I need for my Tele body. But, I'll be resawing the planks down to roughly 2" thick. You can see that the deeper I go into the board, the wider the natural edges are from eachother.



I decided to cut the boards into manageble sized pieces not only to make it safer to cut, but to allow me to use the jointer to clean up the natural edge. Here you can see this in progress. With my jointer set at a .0625" cut, it took awhile but I just shaved away at it.



Stopping to check my setup as well as how far I need to take the edge to get the width I need.



I could continue until all the natural edge is gone, but it would make the boards too narrow for a 2 piece blank. The portion above 2 " will be cut away during resaw.

[Guitarnut]

Here's a test piece...the third plank...that I ran first to test out my jointer setup and theory. It's a nice before and after.



During resaw, I removed about .75" leaving the planks at 2" thick. Plenty of room for planing later.



After both planks were resawn, you can see that I just do have the width I need for my template...I love it when things work out.



Nice grain match and flat joint, ready for glue up.

[Guitarnut]

That slab yielded a very nice body blank, Three .75" boards for use on another project and a third, and a 3rd resawn plank that I'll feed into the planer butted up to the tail end of the blank each pass to prevent snipe.



Peace,
Mark

[Super Locrian]

I really enjoy these "guitar embryonic diaries", thanks for taking the trouble to document your work! Looks like you have a really nice piece of wood there!

[Guitarnut]

Originally Posted by Super Locrian

I really enjoy these "guitar embryonic diaries", thanks for taking the trouble to document your work! Looks like you have a really nice piece of wood there!

Thanks! I enjoy taking and posting pics almost as much as building. It really helps me remember the details of a build too.

Stay tuned...

Peace,
Mark

[bubba105]

That's some pretty wood you've got there. I like your process for making use of the plank. Here's something that might come in handy when using pipe clamps.

I've gotten into the habit of using wax paper, the stuff from the supermarket or the bride's kitchen if I'm out, to put in between the pipe of the clamp & the glue line on the boards, especially the bottom where the board lay directly on the pipes & I get the most squeeze out. I've had wood get stained by the reaction of the glue & pipe while it's drying. Don't remember exactly why it happens but the stain can go pretty deep into the wood. You've got extra thickness here but if it's 1 3/4" there's no room for error. Read about it in a woodworking magazine a long while ago & now it's part of the process for me.

[Guitarnut]

Here's the blank out of the clamps and down to thickness with the planer. I used the other plank from the slab and passed it thru behind the blank each time and I had zero snipe. Nice.



Rough cut on the band saw...broke a blade. Should have wrapped it up then...nope, pushed on.



Profiled the body with the route and template. What's that gouge you see there? Well, I told you I should have stopped eariler. The router bit I was using is not one I normally use. It's a very shallow cut and has a pressed on bearing. I was using it because of a thin template so I didn't have to take off a huge cut first pass. Well, after about 3 inches, the bearing slid up the shaft and the cutter ducked under the template. I could have been worse...it could have cut the template.






So, now my simple, classic Tele is going to have a black .090" binding on the front. I must be living right because the .090" bit leveled out the gouge. I haven't sanded the sides of the body yet and after I do, I'll re-route the channel just to make sure I got it all.



I'm gonna have a few beers and relax. I've earned it today.

Peace,
Mark

[Shepherd]

Man, that's a really nice piece of ash. I'll bet it's alot easier to grain fill as well. Looking at the pics I was thinking how cool it would look if you could somehow leave the bark around the edge .

[Mark-00255]

Nice recovery! That's some super straight grain ash! My ash builds have been flat-sawn - because that's what I could get at the time. It would be interesting to hear the tonal difference with q-sawn ash.

[SixShooter]

Originally Posted by Shepherd

Man, that's a really nice piece of ash. I'll bet it's alot easier to grain fill as well. Looking at the pics I was thinking how cool it would look if you could somehow leave the bark around the edge .

I was thinking the same thing!

[Guitarnut]

In addition to working on my walnut build, I had a chance to work a bit on the ash build.

As I noted earlier, a bearing mishap created the "opportunity" for the addition of a front binding. No big deal, the binding channel will easily cover the damage. To make sure, I trued up the edges of the body on the spindle sander and then recut the channel to make sure it was clean and that I removed all the damage.

A note here. I could have just cut the channel to the same depth as before, but I wanted to make sure I had a nice, square channel so I cut this pass a few thousandths deeper than finished depth. This recut not only the thickness of the channel, but the depth as well.

I then passed the body thru the planer with the knives just breathing on the top to cut the channel height back to spec...I always leave the bindings a bit taller than the channel and scrape them down to meet the top. This gives me a flat, square edge on the tops of the bindings...they have a tiny bit of roll on their edges as they're delivered.

Here it is with an extra flame maple neck I ran during my alder/mape build.



More tomorrow...

Peace,
Mark

[BritishBluesBoy]

That looks gorgeous!

[mgdesigns]

Mark - You are turning into a guitar building machine. Green with envy.

[timmer114]

Very cool, what your doing takes alot of talent and I envy your skills. Sorry for the router ding, but everyone knows a Tele with binding is perfectly sexy for any occasion.

[maumari]

I like natural teles with black binding, just completed one.

Cool thread!

Ciao
Mauro

[Guitarnut]

Well, this build continues to evolve. My last 2 builds were planned out very carefully and I knew, step by step, what I wanted the guitar to be. This one seems to have a life of it's own. Instead of forcing the issue and building what I want, I'm rolling with it to see where it goes.

The latest development is the body weight...as is, 7.3 lbs. Routing would remove perhaps .75 lbs but, adding hardware and neck that's likely a 9 pounder...at Mickey D's, that's 36 Quarter Pounders. Ha!

So, remember the cutoffs from resawing? They may be destined for a top on a chambered Ash Thinline.

In preparing for this option I decide to plane and glue up the cutoffs to see what I would end up with. I had 3 and only need 2 for the top, so the third will be used as a "prop" to get the top pieces thru the planer safely. I lay them on the bed and feed them one right behind the other. The prop is the last to go in since I only have snipe issues on outfeed.



I sue a sled in my planer to keep from bottoming out the height adjustment. It effectively raises the planer bed toward the knives. Beacuse of the pressure from the feed rollers, the sled can sometimes push thru with the stock, so I use a stop clamped to the end of the planer bed.



The top planed out nicely...just over .375" thick. I left enough that I can run it thru again after glue up.



Looks nice. Like it was meant to be.

[Guitarnut]

To make this work, I needed a new routing template for the chambers. I posted this in my Maple Thinline thread but since I was taling pics anyway...

Starting with a standard template, I drew a center line, measured out 2" either side and, then drew out the curved lines for the chambers. I used a couple of spacers...one to ride along the edge of the template and one to space the pencil out to the distance I wanted. Then I just traced the template like you would with a router.



I added to lines that are at the center point of my Forstner bit making it easier to stick and go while drilling.



This kind of drilling makes a huge mess so I hung my dust collector hose overhead so I could grab it and keep things cleared off.



All drilled out and ready for filing.



I figured out that I was putting too much pressure on the fragile template while filing with it on it's edge, so I layed it flat and hung a small portion over the edge of the bench and clamped in place, letting the bench support most of the template as I filed.

[Guitarnut]

Here it is after some time with a rasp...



And then after some blocking with 80 grit.



I still haven't decide if this is going to be a Thinline or not...might sleep on it.

Peace,
Mark

[Guitarnut]

The top came out of the clamps looking pretty good, so I decided to go ahead and chamber the body. I started by removing the .25" that made up the binding channel. 15 to 20 gentle passes thru the planer took care of it...always using the extra piece to prop up the feed roller as the body passed thru.



Here you can see the last bit of the channel...a couple more passes and it's done.



I traced out the body profile and rough cut the top. I cut it very close to the line to prepare it for the next step.



And that is, attaching it to the back of the body and running it thru the planer to smooth out the glue joint. I cut it as close as I could so that it would be fully supported by the body. I placed 6 pieces of double stick tape around the edges and attached the two. I placed the tape at the edges so I could reach it with a thin putty knife to break the bond. This keeps me from having to pull on the thin top to separate it from the body.



To make this work, I also attached 2 pieces of scrap from the top to keep my prop the same thickness as the body and top taped together.