Melody Maker build

[flatfive]

Originally Posted by guitarbuilder

Do you haveany build threads here or elsewhere showing some of these
steps?

Thanks for the tips on the tuner holes! I wasn't clear when I
asked about the "steps" -- I was referring to the ideas you
shared about the truss rod slot, fillet, and access hole.

[flatfive]

Originally Posted by crazydave911

Not to mention, IIRC, those tuners have the little pressed sheetmetal bushings on the top similar to the Gibson L-O (they even look like the same kind of tuners)

Thanks for reminding me of that! I do have the bushings, but
had only measured the tuner posts.

[guitarbuilder]

I made my filler strip out of maple and just used the pattern I used to make the router jig for routing the truss rod slot. I kept the end straight down by the heel of the neck and curved the rod upwards toward the nut. I usually make my necks .125 thinner at the nut than the neck at the 16th fret, so that .125 curved ramp up compensates for that which also means the adj rod nut cavity can be shallower as well. That is a weak spot on gibson necks. If you used an allen head type nut, you could make the adj cavity narrower too. One one neck with a hot rod and allen screw head, I literally just drilled a hole instead of that big cavity for access to it.

[Mojotron]

Originally Posted by kwerk

Holy mackerel, Glenn!!




I gotta sit with Nick on this.

Ever since I saw one of these:



I feel a lot easier about marking with a mechanical pencil off a combo of calipers and steel rules. If accurate fretting means a different fret position on each string, there's no amount of accuracy that can get me perfect position from straight frets.

That's interesting - I've really loved the guitar's that I've had where I used an Earvana nut - sort of tries to mitigate those differences and works with the bridge intonation. To my ear - the Earvana nut is more noticeable with single coil guitars - especially strat-like guitars - and not all that noticeable when using humbuckers.

[flatfive]

Another in a series of posts in which I avoid the tricky steps
of the build...

The jig (card eliminates any slight movement of sled) and the
saw, with strip glued on the side for depth control.





22 fret slots, plus top slot marking top of fretboard:

[Guitarnut]

Originally Posted by flatfive

Oh - earlier I mentioned a blunder. After hogging out material
with the forstner bit, I realized that I was working with a symmetrical
body and hadn't considered which was the better side to be the
top.

I flipped the body over and saw the two holes that I'd drilled to
hold the body routing template. They were placed so that
the pickup routs would remove them.

This is crummy -- the wood is really nice. I'm determined to do
a very good job of filling those holes.

I'm not sure what you're planning for finish but you could place a very thin mahogany veneer on the back and carry a burst finish over the edges...no one would ever know...except us.

Mark

[flatfive]

Thanks Mark, I hadn't thought of that.

I'm looking at this as an opportunity to get obsessive with the
problem of plugging a small hole.

If I really can't get a good result by plugging, I'll consider veneer.

The plan for finishing is to try to replicate the finish on my old
Melody Maker, which was a burst. On the back I plan to use
dark grain filler followed by clear, with maybe time lightly tinted
coats before the clear.

I don't know exactly how I'm going to do the yellow on the front,
as it's somewhat opaque. I guess I'll have to use dye plus a little
white pigment -- any thoughts?

Originally Posted by Guitarnut

I'm not sure what you're planning for finish but you could place a very thin mahogany veneer on the back and carry a burst finish over the edges...no one would ever know...except us.

Mark

[LC100]

Originally Posted by flatfive

I don't know exactly how I'm going to do the yellow on the front, as it's somewhat opaque. I guess I'll have to use dye plus a little
white pigment -- any thoughts?

Maybe borrow ideas from here?

[flatfive]

Originally Posted by LC100

Maybe borrow ideas from here?

Yes!! Thanks very much! The key step appears to be:

> after painting a light coat of transparent white on the
> Mahogany, light enough not to get into the pores, let it
> dry and grain filled with clear lawrence mcfadden filler,

The finish that Scatter Lee got is very close to what I'm going for.

I guess transparent white means clear mixed with a little white
pigment.

What I don't get is why this was done before grain filling.

Thanks again -- I've asked this question in various places and until
now hadn't found the answer.

[LC100]

Originally Posted by flatfive

What I don't get is why this was done before grain filling.

Best bet is to ask SL the whys of the way he did that. Just guessing that it probably allows the grain to show through the transparent coats later on. If filled first the white probably covers everything.

[flatfive]

Thanks; I've just asked Scatter about it. In the meantime I
found this interesting post in mylespaul.com.

http://www.mylespaul.com/forums/luth...ml#post2061086

Originally Posted by LC100

Best bet is to ask SL the whys of the way he did that. Just guessing that it probably allows the grain to show through the transparent coats later on. If filled first the white probably covers everything.

[flatfive]

I mentioned that the symmetry of the body dazzled me
and I ended up routing the control cavity on the back,
not the front. That means what used to be the back
is now the front, so the holes used to mount the body
template are now on the back, not the front.

Got that?

The gist of it is that I've got a couple of holes to fill
on this nice piece of mahogany.



The holes are about 3/32" so shouldn't be too hard to fill.



I wanted to make a plug with the grain going along the
width, not the length. You don't want the end grain on
the surface of the body -- it'll soak up more finish than
the surrounding wood and stick out.

I found a cut-out that was the perfect starting point:



Sand the edges to about the radius of a 3/32" bit:



Slice off a bit with the X-Acto saw:



A little hand sanding gets its round and the right size:



Then a dab of Titebond, jam it in the hole, and saw off. On the
first one I didn't align the grain very well.



First plug after sanding a little. You can spot it:



On the second one the grain's oriented properly, and the color
looks good.



Can you spot it?



The bits point to the two repairs. The one on the right is
the first one.



No problem.



But, like I said, filling holes this small is pretty easy. It took
20 minutes max to do the job.

[guitarbuilder]

Nice fix! I have some honduran body blanks here that have some naturally occuring worm holes in it. Maybe I should send them to you for plugging? :-)

[Guitarnut]

Nice!

[flatfive]

Originally Posted by guitarbuilder

Nice fix! I have some honduran body blanks here that have some naturally occuring worm holes in it. Maybe I should send them to you for plugging? :-)

Yes, please send me your honduran body blanks. I will send
them back to you.

[flatfive]

Earlier I was wondering what to do about the pickguard.

The modification that had been made to my MM to handle
two humbuckers was very funky (as in "funky smelling", not
"funky music" ).



However, after looking at lots of pictures I'm inclined to use
the same funky pickguard arrangement. Why?

1. it was a really common way to modify MM's
2. it's like my old MM
3. the method of putting the bridge humbucker mounting ring on top of the pickguard addresses the increased string height near the bridge (due to neck angle)

[crazydave911]

Considering the original MM was one single-coil at the bridge, I would think the "funky" horse has already left the barn (always wanted see one with a single P90) so you just carry right on there .
Don't even have my 24" scale finished and I glued up a neck blank for a possible Fender Musicmaster. See what you've instigated?

[flatfive]

Originally Posted by crazydave911

...I would think the "funky" horse has already left the barn...

Loltastic, Dave!

Originally Posted by crazydave911

Don't even have my 24" scale finished and I glued up a neck blank for a possible Fender Musicmaster. See what you've instigated?

Cool! I actually traded a Musicmaster (or maybe it was a Duosonic)
in mint condition to get the Melody Maker.

I'm thinking that next year I definitely want to build a Duosonic.

[flatfive]

A big part of learning a new guitar building trick seems to
be simply in realizing that it's not a big deal.

Today I got the angled neck heel sorted out. The Melody
Maker has a flat neck pocket, and a 2 degree angle on
the neck.

I needed about an extra quarter inch on the end of the
neck, so I cut a piece of scrap mahogany to about that
thickness with a hand saw.

Glued it on:



The scrap piece had been used for scarf joint practice. Here's
after routing excess off the sides:



I decided it would be easiest to make the 2 degree angle
using the ROSS plus careful hand sanding. I drew the
2 degree angle on the side of the neck. There are also
lines indicating the neck pocket area (neck's not cut to
length yet).



Got the angle roughly correct with the ROSS, then used
this sanding block, which is corian glued to a plywood block,
with 80 grit sandpaper glued on using adhesive spray.



I did quite a bit of hand sanding, checking often for squareness
and flatness.



All done.



In this view you can see a little problem on the upper left.
My hand sawing wasn't so great -- one area was a little low.
I could have kept sanding until the surface was completely
flat, but 1) I was tired of sanding, and 2) if I took material
off the bottom of the neck to gain gluing surface, then I'd
lose gluing surface on the side of the neck, which I've heard
is important for neck rigidity.



Also, about a third of that low area was removed when the
neck was cut to length.

[flatfive]

I figured that since this is a glue-on neck, the neck
pocket had better be a tight fit.

I started with a long piece of 1/2" MDF. I drew a straight
line along its center it and double-sided taped the neck
to the MDF, with neck's center aligned with the line on the
MDF.

Next poplar pieces with straight edges were double-sided
taped along the sides of the neck heel.



The neck was removed and the MDF routed, using the poplar
pieces as a template.



Then I cut the MDF, leaving about 12" from heel end of
the neck pocket to the end of the MDF piece. With a
long piece of MDF I can get good alignment with the body's
center line.

Anyway, then penciled the neck pocket and hogged material
out with a drill.





The first couple times I did neck pocket templates, I used a
piece of MDF routed to the shape of the guitar body. But I
think all you really need is a longish piece of MDF and a
center line.

Four pieces of Duck double-sided tape is enough to hold the
template firmly to the body.



Routed pocket (still needs a little clean up along the edges):



My big worry was that the neck might be loose in the pocket.
In reality it was a little too tight for the neck to fit. I sanded
the sides of the neck rather than the pocket, figuring it was
easier to keep the neck sides straight than the neck pocket
sides.

Once the neck fit into the pocket, I did some fine tuning to
get a good fit in the corners and at the heel.



There's a tiny bit of wiggle but it's about as good as I'd
hoped for on my first set neck. Next time I'll go a little more
slowly with the sanding along the side of the neck.

Wish I could glue the neck in right now! But I have to wait
until the neck is about finished.