Well, now that the guitar is done, I've learned quite a bit. Having never built a project like this, I should be happy the guitar is even playable! I must admit, there were a few moments where I was wondering if I'd spent 3 1/2 months creating a giant paperweight. Being the perfectionist that I am, all of its little warts jump out at me. I guess that's why we woodworkers continue to do what we do; the relentless drive for perfection.
I thought on this page it would be nice to summarize the things that turned out well on the guitar, the things that didn't turn out well that I need to address on the next guitar, and various other things I discovered along the journey. All of these lists are in no particular order of importance, although obviously some items are more important than others!
What Turned Out Well:
Obviously, because the guitar turned out to be a usable instrument rather than an unsual piece of modern art, this is a positive thing! For a completely home-made guitar (vs. buying parts and bolting it all together) it gives me a great sense of accomplishment. The first notes played on a self-built guitar are quite an experience; maybe not the rush that some have described to me, but then again I may have had my expectations built up! Certainly satisfying, though. I do notice, the more I play it, the more I like it.
It sounds pretty good. Granted, there's probably bias in my ears. I compared it with my Les Paul and my Hamer (excellent sounding LP Junior clone with P-90s) and found the tone to be somewhere in-between. The sound isn't as dark as the Les Paul, but not quite as agressive as the Hamer. I really love the neck pickup sound; it's not as "woofy" as a lot of neck pickups. The two series/parallel switches give me lots of tone options as well.
The weight is excellent. Very light; probably the lightest guitar I own. I could play it all day without worry of shoulder fatigue. I haven't put it on a scale, but just by comparing it to my Les Paul I'd say it's nearly half the weight.
It balances very well, which is something I was concerned with given the long neck and relatively heavy Sperzel tuners. One up-side to the long top horn.
The laminated neck is very ridgid. Before I strung it up, I gave the truss rodd about a 1/2 turn of tightening thinking this would put me in the ballpark. After I strung it up and started adjusting, I wound up backing the truss rod completely off.
The controls are in a very comfortable place. I like the 3-way switch on the top horn; it's about the easiest place to reach it, but it's far enough forward that I don't accidentally bump it. The volume knob is out of the way when strumming, yet close enough I can tweak it with my pinky. The controls being in the right spot was probably half careful planning and half dumb luck.
Speaking of dumb luck, the intonation was nearly dead-on from the get-go. Three strings were perfect without adjustment, and the other three needed the saddle moved about 1/32". I've never purchased a guitar that needed this little amount of intonation adjustment, let alone made one!
The action over most of the neck is extremely low, in fact it's lower than any of my other guitars. I say "most" of the neck because around the 15th fret it starts to get a little higher, but not enough to notice unless you are really looking for it. I'm guessing I didn't have the neck face as flat as I thought I did. Also, the first five frets of the two "E" strings buzz just a tad, but nothing you can hear through the amp. All the others don't buzz at all. Again, it might be the neck face flatness thing.
Apparently I have a little too much neck angle, because I had to raise the bridge way higher than normal to get the strings high enough off the fretboard. In order to get the pickups adjusted high enough, I ended up having to cut the mounting springs in half. Considering how low the action is, this means I probably could have gone with a 1 degree neck angle and been about right. Not sure why this happened; when I drew out the side elevation on the plans it measure 2 degrees. I'll have to investigate that one prior to building the next guitar. This issue is probably my biggest wart, but after playing the guitar for a few minutes you don't notice it anymore, so the issue is primarily asthetic.
The electronics are just a spot noisy. I'm guessing because I got lazy (no other way around that one) and didn't shield the cavity. It's not bad enough to make me undo the wiring and shield everything, but I can tell.
The body shape looks way different in real life than it did on paper. If I ever use this shape again, I'm probably going to increase the width of the lower body by 1/4" on each side and slightly thicken the horns. At it's widest point, it's only 1/2" narrower than a strat, but several people who have seen it comment that it appears to be very small. I think the length of the top horn makes the body seem narrower than it actually is.
Upper fret access isn't as unrestricted as what I hoped. Frets are reachable, but not as easy as I'd planned. If I use this body shape again, I'm going to deepen the lower cutaway a smidge. I rarely play above the 17th fret anyway, so I'm not sure why it bothers me, but it does.
Finish gloss on the top is adequate, but not great. When rubbing out the top, I got thin in a couple spots and ran into some cracking/peeling problems where I had to secure the peeling finish with some CA (hense the visible cracks around the tone knob and string ferrels. Because of this, I stopped buffing before the top was as shiny as I'd liked. Didn't run into any of that on the back side or neck, so that side turned out well.
After using it on this and other woodworking projects, I have decided that I just don't like the look of water-based finishes. They tout themselves as being "non-yellowing" but I guess I really like the slight amber tint and depth that oil-based finishes give to the wood. The figured grains don't "pop" much with the water based stuff either. You can hardly tell that there's figured wood on the headstock, and the mahogany looks a little "sterile" to me, not the warm dark color it normally has. Water based finishes aren't as stinky, though, so I guess that's what they've got going for them.
The headstock turned out about an inch too long between the fretboard end and where it flares out. I think shortening that up would make the headstock look better.
It's a lot easier (for me anyway) to make the body than it is to make the neck.
Jigs are your friend. Just make sure to provide ample room on them to hold the router base steady.
Cutting 2 degree neck angle tenons is a pain. Make your cuts conservative and creep up to final fit. Consider making the tenon first, so if you screw it up you can just start with a new neck blank and don't have a lot of other time invested in the neck.
Carpet tape has great lateral holding strength, but much less vertical holding strength. Especially when relying on the vertical strength to guide the edge of the router.
Guitar making is addicting! Stewart Mac catalogs may become porn-like.
Don't build a guitar as an attempt to save money over purchasing one. You're competing with giant companies who sell a guitar for a profit for less money than you can just purchase the components. And that doesn't include tools!
Always remove the safety switch on the table saw when Tundra Boy is in the shop. That or keep loads of clean underwear handy when you hear the saw unexpectedly fire up.
The traditional order of neck building is: cut and glue the scarf joint, truss rod slot, neck tenon, thickness profile, tapered (width) profile then headstock shaping. With the first neck I tried it in the following order: cut the scarf joint, shape the headstock, thickness profile, glue the scarf joint, truss rod slot, tapered (width) profile then the neck tenon. There's a reason the other order is the traditional one, and it's related to the reason I had to build a second neck!
Make sure you have the right bandsaw blade when trying to resaw 8" stock.
Careful with that chisel when doing final cleanup of your headstock!
When getting maple sawdust out of the shop vac to mix with glue for a little filler, make sure you don't forget that you just sucked up a bunch of MDF dust as well.
Figured wood is difficult to plane, especially when it's only 1/8" thick.
If you're hauling a 8' long piece of mahogany home on a motorcycle, watch out for pedestrians.
You won't regret whatever time you spent planning during the design stage, and will probably wish you'd spent a little more.
Belt sanders remove skin really fast!
25" is not quite long enough for a neck blank. 30" would be better.
Tuning machines are somewhat finicky when it comes to headstock thickness.
Shapes on paper look a lot different when you cut them out of wood.
Scraping plastic binding makes a huge mess and a faint smell of burning plastic.
Hugging your workpiece and drill press isn't a good substitute for the right tool and proper clamping.
At 1:00 AM, David looks a little too excited to be in the shop. Must've been the cold medicine.
Unlike other woodworking, a bandsaw is much more useful than your tablesaw. And your router may be more useful than the band saw.
Having your neck join a little tight is better than a little loose.
Unless you're a gambler or just hate trees, don't use expensive wood for your first guitar. Staring at a beautifully flamed maple neck in the garbage can is painful.
Mahogany shapes and sands a lot easier than maple.
Pattern cutting router bits are about the most useful bits for guitar making.
When carving neck profiles, keep a finished guitar handy to compare. Your opinion of a neck profile that currently feels great may change after playing another guitar for a few minutes.
Careful when carving the neck to body join, as it's easy to cut into the neck tenon!
Don't freak out about carving necks and other guitar parts. It's a lot easier than one would think.
Keep your mind open about your headstock shape. It may have to change after a chisel slip!
You can never have too many clamps (actually, I already knew that one, but I was constantly reminded of it during the guitar construction.) The Black & Decker Workmate may be the best tool B&D makes.
I said this before, but it's worth mentioning again: it is un-nerving how fast a belt sander will remove skin.
Don't think that making a guitar is impossible!
Click here to return to the main guitar page.
Return To The Main Music Gallery
This page last updated on 06/28/2018