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As long as it don't bounce!

Moving right along - yesterday I started the control knobs and drilled the holes for the elecronics and also had to rout a bit deeper in the control cavity - I still have to go a bit deeper for just the pickup selectors and mini toggles.... I decided to pimp out these knobs and run with the theme of the guitar....



For some reason - I really like hammering ebony splinters into padauk with a brass hammer - you should try it sometime - it also splatters heavy cs glue all over the place - fun stuff kids!



Viola - the next day:


Also, I kinda figured out a cooler way to make my knobs during the process ... see, the knobs have a brass sleeve and a set screw on the underside, so I found an old drill that fit into the brass sleeve, cut the drill so it only had the shaft part - tightened it in there with the set screw and plopped it into my drill press and used strips of sandpaper to get it to be perfectly rounded - worked great!





My next step was to bevel the entire back part of the body's edge, then went and did the body contours:



After deepening the elec. cavity, cutting out the neck pocket, beveling and contouring, the body weight is about as heavy as the dueling dragons now and I am totally happy with the weight - seems to be close to my PRS custom 22's weight - which is fine!

This Cocobolo has some nice grain in it - especially on the other side lol





And for my final act of the evening, I got to glue the neck up (That's French for "On the home stretch"!)

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

That neck looks pretty darn cool.

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http://www.tinyhouseandland.com

Thanks Mark - I still need to do some work on the heel and will be making a "Heel Plate" - have a cool Idea for that too - as long as I have enough wood, I should be able to do it!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

That's lookin' sweet, man. You're really moving right along now. I finally got my body blank glued up on my alder/walnut tele build. I've been working on the neck and have made pretty good progress on it, but I still have a loooong way to go.

That's awesome Roger! It will eventually consume ALL of your time until your brain falls out and you need to purchase Depends by the case.

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

TMI, dude

I think I smell more inlays coming!

Virgil, how does the paduak seem to be floating on the cocobolo? What did you do to the edges to make that happen? Looks cool around the tail the way it seems to be sort of floating. Please to 'splain to me.

Tony

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http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

Great stuff Virgil. I hate how much better you are than I am at building guitars. But then again, if that's the line I cross, then I hate a lot of people on here.

Hi Tony!
You are probably correct sir in regards to more inlays; I am still having to do the trussrod cover, which will have some inlay as well as a good chance on the heel plate(Not sure if I am using the correct wording there ) Actually, the Padauk is not even touching the Cocobolo on the body - it's separated by Zebrawood and I have it just thinned down to almost the point of it being flush with the Zebrawood - it's still not exactly where I want it - looking for a little more "evenness around the base" but I decided to work on that a bit more on the final sanding, which should be in a few more days - hopefully it goes off to the finsh guy next week for the polyester finish. Thanks for droppin by!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

Hey Jimmy! I actually shouldn't even qualify under the pluralism of "GuitarS" yet bro, I actually only have 1 completed so far.



If you look at what I do tho, you can clearly see that I take a Loooooooong time to do the things I do.... what that means, is that since I spend SO much time on inlays, building jigs, etc., it gives me AMPLE time to figure out each step along the way. RARELY do I just jump into something without some sort of practice and research that IMO, may be to the extreme, just to get things as perfect as possible. These 3 guitars that I have been working on concurrently have all been HUGE "learning more" steps as I have been adding to my arsenal. I tap into other's knowledge in and outside of these forums, which sometimes I have agreed with, sometimes not.

I knew very little about working with wood before I built the Dueling Dragons, but have spent my whole life as a graphic artist, becoming really proficient in Adobe Illustrator and 3D programs and being a guitar player/collector for over 35 years was probably all part of my "new destiny"

One thing I do think, is that if I had just tried to build a simple guitar for my first one, I probably would have screwed something major up and it probably would have stopped me in my tracks. Because of the time I had invested in the fretboard alone, it scared the crap out of me to screw anything up after that point.

So, if there is anything I can pass on to you (Even though I am still a rookie) is to not compare yourself with others - you are right where you are supposed to be... maybe, just maybe the journey you are on is teaching you things that Jimmy needs to learn to get where he needs to be. Tap into your imagination while working on your guitars and try to implement those ideas, even if it screws something up. And if it does screw something up, try to figure out a "Design Implementation" to not only FIX the problem, but make the guitar look cooler, play better etc.

I see cool designs out there all of the time and always think to myself, "If I could do something LIKE that, what would I do to make it look COOLER?" I don't care how much time anything takes for 2 simple reasons:

1. I'm probably learning something new that can be added to my arsenal
2. I love doing this stuff and enjoy the journey MUCH more than the destination.

Rock on brother and go buy some sandpaper.

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

Zebrawood, cocobolo, whats a different species among friends? At least you knew what I meant.
The way it looks in the pics, to me at least, it seems like its floating. I can't think of a better way to describe it. My limited vocabulary and composition skills preclude that.

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http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

"Preclude" ugggggh big word for Mongo (hehehe)
I see what you mean - we'll see what everything looks like after it gets the finish - maybe because of the lighter wood underneath it gives it the "floating" look. Thanks!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

Dude, you builds make me insane, really. They are incredible. LOVE the knobs. How did you actually machine them?

Edit: Nevermind. I missed it the first time I went through the new posts. Cool idea!

I've tried something similar before using a hole cut-out bit, and sandwiching layers together, but it always leaves the pilot hole through the center, which has to be covered by some other decoration (inlay, etc). I like the seamless look of these.

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-—-—-—-—-—-—-
Mike Hoenerhoff
Elderly Instruments

Thanks Mike!
At first, I was going to simply make them on my lathe, but because of the inlay, I took another route - I still could have done them on the lathe, and I did make myself a little "jig/holder" for knobs, where I used double-sided tape to hold the knob in place while I did the inlay (There's pics of that on my Dueling Dragons post) - I did luck out having the odd sized drill bit that I ended up cutting in half - I have a stack of old drills that I have made different things with - thanks for checking it out!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

What about a plug cutter? No pilot hole.

http://www.leevalley.com/en/wood/page.aspx?p=42292&cat=1,180,42288&ap=1

Hehehe - I've gone full circle now - before I even started working on the dueling dragons, I was contemplating using a plug cutter - but it always seemed to be a budget thing at the time... again, it would require a little jig to hold it in place for doing inlay... thanks!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

Today I worked on making a heel plate and decided to go with Zebrawood - still needs some more sanding, but I'm going to wait until the final sanding - I also ran into a little problem over the weekend, I discovered that the jack plate was too wide with my beveled body, so I ordered an endpin jack and drilled the holes for it today - also had to widen the pup wire hole from the bridge pup cavity to the elec. cavity, and did more sanding.

Right now the guitar weighs in at 10 lbs.







Tomorrow I will begin on the trussrod cover, Friday I'm going to a friends shop to drill the bridge holes (my guitars don't fit on my hand-me-down drill press - the throat makes it just a few millimeters shy of being able to drill the bridge stud holes )

Over the weekend I will be able to do some fret dressing, then it's off to the finish guy next week!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

Oh that's looking sexy, dude. Your attention to detail on your inlay is outta sight!

Thanks Roger - Happy to be nearing the end - this one has almost 3 months into it!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

3 months? You're practically doing it over night compared to the last one!

In certain aspects, this has been more difficult than the DD - being my first "carved top" and doing inlay on the contours has been a bit tricky, but since I had so much *practice* on the DD, I have been able to do things more quickly - I started it while the DD was at Moe's being finished, but ended up starting #3 & #4, as well as making some jigs, and other sidetrack items (Like the Fretboxes). I am planning on making a mix of simple builds and pimped out guitars.... here we go!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

This thread is long enough to knit a sweater LOL Thanks Filippo!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar

Sounds like a sitting down type of guitar . Really nice work, although the dragon guitar was nice, this one is much classier (IMHO of course)

Thanks Brian,
There are some aspects of this build that I like more than the last one too - I am really excited to see what this is going to look like with a finish on it... stay tuned - each guitar will be different!

_________________
"Talking about music is like dancing over architecture".
See the most insane first guitar build: http://www.virgilguitar.com
http://www.youtube.com/VirgilGuitar