News And Updates

Some progress was made over the weekend on getting the three EGS builds to completion. Below, I have routed the cavities in all three. Tremolo cavity in the Strat model remains.

I have added a social networking plug-in that should start posting to Facebook, and now also to MySpace.

I was traveling last week and happened to be in the neighborhood of Rick Toone - and I got a first look at the Simplicity tuning system, neck core and his on-going builds for the first time… Awesome stuff.

Not sure what happened to the camera, but check out Rick’s site and elutherie.org for up-coming announcements.

I am in the process of building five EGS guitars, here are some details:

Guitar #1 - Alder Stratberger

This will be made out of light-weight alder and be as close to a Strat as possible. Regular 25.5″ scale and tremolo - probably not with the pictured neck, but I might start off with this or a cut-off Jackson neck that I have just to save time. It will be quite a departure from what I normally do in that it will be painted (I’m thinking mint green or light blue) and have a pickguard. Electronics will be 3 Lace Alumitone single coils and a 5-position selector.

Here, I have marked up the cavities before routing.

Trying out the pickguard. It’s an actual Strat pickguard that I have modified.

Guitar #2 - Mahogany/Maple

The next one will be identical to the first EGS prototype but with a Honduras mahogany back. This means a maple top and the same cavities cut out inside. The neck will be carbon fiber reinforced maple with ebony fretboard, fanned frets, scale 25.5″ - 24.75″ like the EGS prototype. 2 x Lace Alumitone black humbuckers.

The blank marked up for routing.

Guitar #3 - Swamp Ash/Wenge

The third will again be identical to the EGS prototype, but this time with a wenge top (i.e. swamp ash back). I will use the Moses Graphite neck for this initially, again fanned frets 25.5″ - 24.75″ scale. 2 x Lace Alumitone black humbuckers.

Blank marked up for routing.

Guitar #4 - 7-String Neck Through

This will be a different beast. Neck-through body construction, carbon fiber reinforced maple. Honduras mahogany sides, ebony fretboard. Fanned frets 25.75″ - 24.75″ scale. Lace Aluma 90 pickups. I intend to try and hollow out the body sides from “within” before gluing them to the neck - quite an experiment.

Guitar #5 - 8-String Neck Through

The idea for this came from discovering that I could actually cut an extra neck blank from the one for the 7-string. The only wood I had left laying around was some old zebrano, so that is what will be used. Again, it will have an ebony fretboard, that I had to order to get wide enough for 8 string. On other EGS guitars, the scale has the nut perpendicular to the length of the neck. On this, I will extend the scale on the bass side to allow the range to be extended somewhat. I have not yet decided quite what the scale will be, but I think 27″ - 25.5″. Pickups have not yet been decided. I will experiment with the Aluma 90s to see if they can accommodate the required string width. If not, I am thinking of Lace Tonebar (for pedal steel or bass). Again, I will try to hollow out the sides from within to make the construction lighter.

Considering how well the first carbon fiber reinforcement experiment turned out, I immediately moved on to doing the same for my planned neck-through construction.

In terms of appearance, the CF strips look identical to wooden veneer strips. They came out about 0.5 mm in width. Considering how stiff the residual pieces coming out on the ends were, they should really make a difference.

Here are the materials for the neck-through construction. Again, strips of flatsawn maple that will be stacked. Here, I am including mahogany veneer strips as well, both for appearance (one of the builds will have mahogany sides) and to build width of the neck.

This time, I am including four strips of CF, one on each side of the mahogany. This blank will become two necks: one for a 7-string and one for an 8-string, so they need all the stability they can get.

Here, the pieces are being pressed together to harden. Again, they bake in 60 degrees centigrade for 24 hours. The CF, by the way, is called Tenax STS 24K UD, 296 g/m2.

The end result. The blank is long enough that I can cut it in a “Z” shape to give two neck blanks. More about the builds later…

As you know, I am building several EGS guitars in parallel in order to explore material choices and what impact they have on sound and playability. I have opted to make my design bolt-on and using a standard Fender Strat neck pocket. This allowed me to get only a slightly custom neck made by Moses Graphite, knowing that it would fit. This will also allow me to make several necks to swap around on the different builds.
As hinted previously, I am doing an experiment with carbon fiber. The idea is to be able to make a neck that is stiff enough to allow it to be hollowed out to some extent, to make it lighter.

In the image above, you can see the type of carbon fiber that I guess most people associate it with, which is a bi-directional weave, in the lower left. In the top right, you have a uni-directional weave. I am after stability in only one direction, so this is what I chose.

The neck blank consists of a flatsawn piece of maple that I cut in three pieces that will be stacked.

I cover the pieces in lots of epoxi (a resin made especially for lamination with carbon fiber, that hardens into a glass-like consistency), place the carbon fiber mat, whet it with epoxi, cover the next piece of wood with epoxi and then stack it on top.

I press the pieces together only slightly, but the threads that hold the weave of the carbon fiber together ensure that some distance is kept and that not all epoxi is squeezed out.

This then bakes at 60 degrees centigrade for 24 hours in a very rudimentary oven.
The results are very encouraging and will be the topic of a follow-up article in the near future.

The new builds are now well under way. Here are all the materials planed, squared and ready.

From left to right:

1. (top) mahogany veneer 1,5 mm thick to laminate neck with
2. some wenge veneer that I may or may not use
3. ebony fretboard blanks (made during last build)
4. wenge top
5. maple top (identical to last build)
6. flatsawn maple to be cut, stacked and laminated into neck blanks
7. honduras mahogany
8. swamp ash (from same batch as last build)

When I started measuring, I realized that the neck blank for the neck-through 7-string will let me cut a matching second blank from underneath. This gave me the idea that I will build an 8-string while I’m at it… I at least have the neck materials and I do have some old zebrano laying around that I could use for the body.
Regarding the neck blank, I am in the middle of an experiment that is baking out in the shop. I will say for now that it involves carbon fiber, epoxi and wood. More later!

I rigged the neck and routed a channel for the string locks last weekend already, but didn’t have time to post the pictures. I used an old pickup router template.

I created a drilling template since I did not have access to the milling machine that I usually do and hence had to cut the holes manually.

The larger holes are for the guiding pins and the smaller to hold the screws.

Ideally, you would keep the neck square in section where the string locks sit, to give room for the full length of the screws. In this case, the neck is round and I have to cut the outer screws quite short.

It’s long overdue as some customers have unfortunately found out, but I finally got my new tremolo spring blocks today.

I’m very pleased. It’s kind of sad how hardware can be this rewarding…

After the incredibly successful first EGS build (pictured below), I have now started the next few builds.

I want to explore different material options to see how they influence the final product, so I will build two more identical hollow bodies: one with a wenge top and swamp ash back and one with a maple top and mahogany back. These will have a neck pocket for a bolt on neck that will allow me to swap necks between them: the wenge neck I have already, the Moses Graphite neck written about before and a new maple neck with traditional shape. Lastly, I plan to build a 7-string maple neck-through guitar with mahogany sides and (maybe, haven’t decided yet) a maple top. I will keep the electronics similar as well, sticking with Lace Alumitones. I will use the P-90 type pickup for the 7-string since it is a bit wider than a regular pickup.

When they are complete and I have gathered the information I need, I plan to sell all but one in whatever combinations work out the best.

I have slotted and fretted the Moses Graphite neck over the weekend.

Slotting the fingerboard was a pleasant experience. The material is easy to cut and there is no worry for chipping out, which is very nice.

The frets still require dressing and polishing, but it was easy enough to do the fretting - no different from a regular neck. What was different, however, was that when filing off fret ends, planing them (which I do with a whetstone) and crowning them, there is no concern over dust or metal entering the wood. Again, very nice.

My one concern is that I had to remove one fret and re-mount it. This turned out to be somewhat tricky because the tangs had already shaped the slot. I had to re-cut the replacement fret once to make it shift slightly sideways in position and move the tangs to a “fresh” place. I would hate to have this be a future re-fret problem. Having said that, I do believe that there are documented ways of doing it the right way to avoid these problems. If nothing else, Moses offer a re-fretting service.

Next step is to cut the fingerboard to make room for the string locks and to dress and polish the frets. Then it’s ready for mounting.