The Buttercaster Project

[Ronkirn]

you can get pretty close this way….

Do you kids have any ideas?

Been there… dun dat…….

Here’s what I did. . . go to any well stocked hobby shop…. They will have a supply of K&S brass . . . tubing, sheet metal, rod… etc…. the larger brass tubing is a precision fit going from one to the next….take your router bit, find the one that fits snugly over the bearing….cut a short section to make a sleeve. . Ummm after buying it..... use the next larger to make another sleeve. A dab of CA will hold everything in place…

you can get pretty close this way….

Ron Kirn

 

[Tedecaster]

Ronkirn's method looks like the ticket, to me. Great solution.

 

[Buckocaster51]

...I noe yew ain't payin me noe nevermind on iss but fi waz yew I'd place the vinyl tape in a strip jes unner the slot yew are routing and allow the bearing tew ride on it roun the body. It mite take a few layers tew make it thick enuff!!

DING DING DING DING

I think we have a winner!

This is such a great place. Within a couple of hours of posting a problem that has had me baffled for a couple of years now, I have a couple of good ideas to work on.

Nothing like "thinking outside of the box."

Fuzzy...I'm Dutch and never pay any attention to anybody...until I get between a rock and a hard place...then I'm all ears.

Thanks again guys.

 

[Tom S]

Another possibility is to head to your local Home Depot or other similar store and try to find some washers that are slightly larger than your smaller bearing that also fit the alllen screw (bring your calipers). It might be a longshot, but it's worth a look. If you can find them, just attach a few instead of the bearing.

Good luck with it! (I wondered why they gave you binding with that black bottom...it seemed a little thick.) If you want to eliminate it, you can clamp the binding between two boards with straight edges and sand it off (too bad you don't have a jointer, but they're more than $99.). Another option is to use the smaller bearing, glue in the binding, and sand off the excess. Of course, you will eliminate 0.22" of the width of the checkerboard.

 

[Buckocaster51]

Another possibility is to head to your local Home Depot or other similar store and try to find some washers that are slightly larger than your smaller bearing that also fit the alllen screw (bring your calipers). It might be a longshot, but it's worth a look. If you can find them, just attach a few instead of the bearing.

Good luck with it! (I wondered why they gave you binding with that black bottom...it seemed a little thick.)

Another good idea.

re the black substrate (at least that's what I call it) on the checkerboard...that will become the inner line on the "binding" package. Custom Inlay actually made it up special for me. The stuff they normally make for banjo people has a white substrate.

It will look like this, except the flake will be bigger. We hope.

 

[reddogbass]

Lots of good suggestions here-

I'm fortunate enough to have a local hardware store that has a selection of router bearings in .010" increments to vary the depth of the rabbet. That's plenty close for most woodworking projects, but are only available for 1" bits.

If I were to improvise, I'd do something similar to Ron Kirn's solution. Find some bushing stock (or have your machinist make some) that fit the o.d. of the smallest bearing that fit your bit. Then have him grind the o.d. for the required depth of the rabbet. How many dollars you put into tooling depends on how much use it will get in the future.

I like the guide-in-the-base too, but since a guitar body is not a straight line, turning corners with one of these, and keeping the depth consistant, ain't all that easy. Stew-Mac offers a sytem for rabbeting for bindings... but it's only in a Dremel size tool/collet I believe. And we are supposed to what, with that?!

 

[Ronkirn]

Fuzzy's tape around the body presents a problem often unforeseen. As the bearing travels around the body, it will often freeze; this can be for a moment or for longer. If that happens and it’s riding on tape, the heat generated virtually instantly will melt the tape's adhesive, with unpleasant results.

Those little bearings can surprise ya sometimes even those on the rather expensive Freud, CMT, Amana, et al brands. This is why it’s a good idea to NEVER use plastic Templates... they melt instantly.. I routinely clean and lubricate 'em every time I use them.


Ron Kirn

 

[0le FUZZY]

it will often freeze;

...Throw the duck plucker out the window !!!

...Tools are good till they go bad. Fit don't go roun like it should onna shaft break out yer sling shot and shoot a mockin bird with it.

...I haff had my old B&D fer years and ain't hadda bearing lock up yet.

...But then again, yew kin alwayz postpone yer project fer weeks er months lookin fer the rite copper tubin er a nutter "rite" bearing iffin yew wanna.

...(Fer the tape I uze black lectrcians tape. It don't stick real bad and has a slick surface sew that iffin the duck-pluckin bearing catches a liddo it will still move along.)


0le FUZZY

 

[Tom S]

Stew-Mac offers a sytem for rabbeting for bindings... but it's only in a Dremel size tool/collet I believe. And we are supposed to what, with that?!

I had the same reaction to that thing! It may work great, but I can never get comfortable with a dremel anyway, and the whole thing just doesn't look all that stable. But it does allow for any lateral depth of cut.

Fuzzy's tape around the body presents a problem often unforeseen. As the bearing travels around the body, it will often freeze; this can be for a moment or for longer. If that happens and it’s riding on tape, the heat generated virtually instantly will melt the tape's adhesive, with unpleasant results.

The other thing that would worry me about the tape is that it will be prone to indentation even if it doesn't melt or tear. Slightly more pressure here or there could result in a wavy channel. If you're going to add something to the outside of the body to decrease the depth of the cut, it should be at least as hard as the wood.

Buckocaster, if you can find some very thin sheet metal, you could cut a strip and attach it with carpet tape to make up the 0.022" difference, assuming you can find it in the right thickness, or very close. However you ultimately approach this, you might want to consider using the larger bearing first to get a good, clean cut, leaving you with very little wood to remove when you go deeper.

 

[Buckocaster51]

No actual work on the Buttercaster(s) today. Life got in the way...and I am pondering how to cut that binding channel. So many good ideas!

But the project(s) progressed never-the-less...

A box of Glendale Wide Intone Twang compensated saddles arrived. I'll tell you one thing, these have put the joy of guitar (okay, I borrowed that from Esteban ) back into playing the Telecaster. Once set up, they just play in tune as far up the neck as I every want to play. Compensated saddles - they're a good thing! (Okay, I borrowed that one too.)

 

[mojocasterman]

Bucko, thanks for the continued info... and the fun sense of humor

 

[sprucetop]

Hey Buck

Thanks for the tutorial....you are a real hands on man
Looking forward to more pix and your completion

 

[Buckocaster51]

Been there… dun dat…….

Here’s what I did. . . go to any well stocked hobby shop…. They will have a supply of K&S brass . . . tubing, sheet metal, rod… etc…. the larger brass tubing is a precision fit going from one to the next….take your router bit, find the one that fits snugly over the bearing….cut a short section to make a sleeve. . Ummm after buying it.....

Oh! that seemed like a good idea.

Yesterday life took me to the "city" on business. While there I went to "the hobby shop." I guess it isn't "well stocked."

So on to "Plan B."

This is the basic problem. I need to make a rabbet, or channel, the width of the binding and purfling. With my cutters, the closest bearing is way too small.

A few years ago I had pretty much the same problem (you might have thought that I would have found the right size bearing/cutter in the mean time...but that's not the "Buckocaster Style) and made the bearing bigger with layers of vinyl tape. It sort of worked. But the tape did melt once and sort of made a mess of things.

Ummm...

In the "guitar room" I found a roll of aluminum tape that I sometimes use to shield control cavities. (You know, aluminum conducts ALMOST as well as copper and is much cheaper.) I think it started out life as duct sealing tape and is REALLY sticky. So maybe...

With my tape, bearings, razor knives, calipers, binding samples, and a straightedge...

I cut a piece the width of the bearing and about the length of the circumference of the bearing. The tape sticks really well. The tape will be burnished on the bearing surface and edges with the handle of my trusty X-Acto knife.

 

[Buckocaster51]

About 10 layers of tape and bingo...

The too small bearing is just the right size.

If the tape is sticky enough and I take short passes through the wood and watch the heat build up, I think I will be okay.

Here is the sample I made.

It looks good. I am happy. This is A Good Thing.

If things go good, we'll do the top of the Martycaster tomorrow night.

Thanks again for all of the help, advice, and encouragement.

By the way...that little "sample" used up $0.30 worth of the checkerboard.

 

[mojocasterman]

woaw, 30 cents for that little bit? I can see why you keep to $99 and less tools to be able to afford that stuff

Thanks for the update! Always a thrill to read...

 

[Jack Wells]

Buck .............I've been away from the forum for a few days and missed some of the discussion about the wrong bearing size. Stew-Mac sells a binding bit and a bearing that will cut a 0.150 in. channel which seems close to what you need. However I don't know if the same bearing is interchangable with your bit or would give the same cut when used with your bit.

They sell the individual bearings but don't tell you the size of the bearings. They list the bearings showing the size channel they will cut when used with their bit. I have this bit and a couple of bearings. I could measure my bit for comparison with yours to determine if any of their bearings will give you the channel depth you need.

If your tape-laminated bearing doesn't work, let me know.

 

[Buckocaster51]

Here's today's big news.

I've taken my "modified" cutter and bearing to the body for the Martycaster. The 10 layers of the really sticky aluminum tape that I covered the bearing with - and heavily burnished the surface and edges - made the bearing just the size needed to cut the proper rabbet.

Because this whole thing is held together with stickum, I decided to keep the amount of wood cut at any time to a minumum and to let the cutter and bearing cool between cuts.

So far...so good.

With everything going good, I cleaned up the rest of the "big" rabbet. This is the rabbet that has to hold the side binding and the purfling made up of the black/white checks and the solid black inner line.

It worked!

The plastic fits great. You can even see the "router hump." (This, the body for the Martycaster, is a USACG body that I have had laying around. Sorry if this is confusing. The Buttercaster Project, has grown into the Buttercaster, Orangecaster, and Martycaster. The bodies for the Buttercaster and Orangecaster I made.) Looks like this USACG body weighs 3.9. But I don't know what units that is.

The last cut, for the big outside piece of plastic, uses the same cutter that I used last week on the Buttercaster and Orangecaster. This is an easy cut that doesn't need any special modifications to the cutter or bearings.

This is will be the last shot of the World's Worst Router (which must be a bad name because it has worked pretty good on this little project) and the Grizzly piloted cutters I have been using.

Next stope will be gluing on the binding and purfling.

Maybe I can get some sanding sealer on these bodies this weekend.

Thanks again for hanging with me on this little adventure.

 

[mojocasterman]

great work, man. This is great stuff! I had never seen the step by time of how a tele gets bound. Very instructional

 

[Buckocaster51]

Thanks, but I'm pretty sure this isn't how "real" Teles get bound.

Like Rob D said way back in this thread, this is genuine, honest-to-goodness guerilla guitar building.

Channel's cut, binding/purfling material is in hand...

Time to start glueing. No use for wimpy masking tape here. We're using the real deal - strapping tape - and going slowly.

I'll be busy for the next few hours...

 

[G Man]

Thanks again for hanging with me on this little adventure.

No thanks are required. I check this thread everyday anxiously awaiting more on this project! Thanks go out to you sir!

G Man