I built my first guitar from a mahogany back and maple cap but with a bolt on maple neck in a LP clone.

I do really like the way it sounds and it will be interesting to see how this one compares. there's not much on the net about aspen but Ed Roman is a big fan of walnut in his guitars.

the aspen on the walnut actually does have a nice resonance to it when I tap on it.

Are you looking for flashy looks or a guitar that has tone?


If tone is what you seek, metal pickguards work against you.


I'm firmly set on my belief that the best performing solidbody electric guitars share certain specific characteristics:

1: They are made of highly resonant woods with high natural tap tones. The higher the better.

2: Their bodies are symmetrical down the lengthwise axis, or nearly so. I base this on the theory of constructive
and destructive interference of waves, as visualized in a wave tank, which is an experiment you may have performed
or seen performed in a high school science class. Odd, highly asymmetrically shaped bodies will cause undesirable
inteference patterns, creating nodes and nulls that move around the body as the frequency of the played note changes,
resulting in uneven note to note and string to string response. The effect is lessened if the neck itself is made of
a wood that is resonant at a high pitch. I specifically choose my neck blanks by the tap tone. It has caused me
to reject a lot of beautiful mahogany because the tap tone is too low even though it's very clear and long lasting.
To use that mahogany will result in a neck that has dead spots (wolf tones) in it.

For this reason, the Flying V is my favorite design from a performance perspective. It's totally symmetrical and the
way it behaves when looked at as a wave tank of v shape is commendable. The nodal and modal points stay pretty
much the same at any frequency. Those nodes and modes don't move around much at all. The result is that most
any note will sustain as long as any other that's close to it. An SG is also really good due to its nearly symmetrical
body. A single cutaway like a Les Paul is good, but a DC Standard is better.

And, truth be told, the Explorer shape leaves much to be desired. Looks cool, peforms badly.



3: Use the dryest, most seasoned woods you can get. If the wood is cool to the touch on a warm day, it's got
too much moisture in it and needs to go into a hotter, lower humidity environment until its moisture content gets
low enough, around 6 percent or less. Eventually any guitar maker will buy a moisture meter.

Tinkering is good! Les Paul was a tinkerer. Llloyd Loar was a tinkerer. Paul Reed Smith is a tinkerer. They have all done great things to advance the
state of the art of the guitar, in their own times.

I always encourage people to try something new and different, but think it out before you commit it to wood.

Once I had an idea that didn't pan out very well. I "retired" that guitar with a bandsaw as there was no point in keeping it alive. It did not represent
the quality of workmanship, design, and execution that I demand of myself.

CJ

I've been busy on my own new build over the last few days. I put seven hours into milling out the cavities on it over the weekend.
But this isn't my thread to take over. If I start a new thread on that build, I'll just link to it.

CJ

That looks sweet as hell. A fixed bridge PRS without the wraparound junk?

Win

I'll have to set up an account there...

got some new hardware today.. yay brown truck! I'll be able to play it to sound like an acoustic :)

I made an attachment for my dremel!

I need to tweek it a bit as the threaded hole is a bit out of straight but otherwise I think it will work well. I'll have to make a lot of shallow passes at it. The nice thing is that if I don't have it at the right angle, it just makes a more shallow cut so that I can fix it with another pass at the right angle.

http://www.offsetguitars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=32912

If you need inspiration, check out this link describing a Jazzmaster the guy built from scratch. Amazing project.

Stay safe

I made the body from scratch on my first guitar, I'm doing a bit more from scratch on this one but not all of the wood. I'll buy a fretboard from stewmac but the rest of the neck is to be made from scratch.

I'll use a router stand that I made which holds the router vertically with the cutter facing down to do the rough carving on both the body and some of the neck. I'm essentially building a bunch of my jigs for this guitar build

Thanks for the tips CM!

I'm planning to do some lighter colors on the dye other then the burst. I'm thinking dark brown wash coat then sand down, then amber stain, and then a mix of the amber and brown for the burst, maybe in a couple of stages.

Necks are easy, too. It starts with a good quality stick. But really it's no magic to make a neck. You just need
patience and you must pay attention to the details.

I'm always more concerned about getting the neck mortise in the body just right. To me, THAT is the single most
critical part and if you don't have a plan, it will be the most difficult part as well.

CJ

Add a 4" class angle grinder, a few sanding/grinding discs, and a random orbital sander and you have all you need to carve
out tops, belly cuts, etc. quickly and efficiently. Even without the chainsaw disc that I use as stage 1 of the carving, these
tools will work fast.

CJ

Some people like that approach, some people don't.

I personally don't like it, having tried it.

I just start by scribing the line at the rim of the top where I want the carving to stop. I then round over to near that edge
using my first carving tool, and then once I get close to that line, I start migrating inward toward the middle of the top,
and down into the top toward my target thickness. The closer I get, the finer the sanding grit I use.

I spend a LOT of time just running my hands over the surfaces and feeling for things that aren't as I want them.

I also make extensive use of shadow lighting to reveal subtleties in the contours. This works best when you have a
single small but bright overhead light bulb. Turn off all other lights in the room. Use shadows cast across the top
as a way to see the high and low spots. It works extremely well.

PRS uses this method. All their top sanders have spotlights on their benches so they can use shadows to gauge the quality
of the top carve.


CJ