2 builds for the price of one

PhilR · November 29, 2020

Hahah not quite, I wish it were true as I'm not exactly falling over my money at the moment.... I am doing 2 builds though. My last build, a Carl Thompson tribute, worked out so well I decided to do a couple more and see if anyone would be interested in buying. This time I'm building both a bass version and also a short scale 6 string piccolo bass. AKA a "guitar".

Starting as always with wood selection. I'm using up some stock I've had lying around as much as possible. So the body wings are sapele. The bass is getting a centre core made from a sandwich of figured sapele and fumed ash (this was leftover from another project). The guitar body is getting a centre core of Iroko, which I've not used until now.

For the necks I'm going with a maple & wenge lamination on the bass. And a 3-piece maple lamination on the guitar. Both will have scarf joint headstocks and wenge fretboards,

Here you can see my scarf joint jig. I built this so the guide rails can be pressed against the baseplate on my belt sander

Gluing up the bass headstock with a wenge sandwich to create a fun detail.

So here we've got all the bodies glued up, ready for planing down to final thickness. And the necks all cut & shaped.

And getting my fretboards all done. I print out the layouts from Ekips on self adhesive vinyl. Using real MOP marker dots here, and boy those side dots sure are a pain to install.

Here's those bodies. All planed down and carved.

Once the necks are complete I make the pockets by using straightedges to form a routing template conforming to the neck.

Et voila! Both builds all necked up. Also, the headstocks have a wenge veneer now.

Getting to work on neck carving here. I go about his in the few ways. On the all maple neck I actually used my bandsaw to slice away a lot of material like a wooden kebab. Then I do the rest with a shinto rasp and drill mounted drum sanders. In the background is all the work I should be doing instead of wasting my time on this luthiery nonsense.

Tapping in some frets with the finest of tools.

Pickup cavities routed, and this one is just about ready for finishing.

And, much applications of shellac later, this is where we are on this build. Just awaiting pickups & sundry hardware which should hopefully arrive next week.