#5 and #6 are being finished at this time. They have received a few coats of oil and a round of wet-sanding with oil and are now drying before fretwork and final assembly. #5 had an accident (or two actually) with heads of screws that broke inside the wood! Only explanation is that it was a bad batch of screws. The now enlarged holes have been plugged with mahogany plugs. #5 will have Lundgren M7 pickups and #6 will have Lace Aluma 90 pickups (which are in fact wide enough for a 7-string). Weights are 1890 grams for #5 and 2130 grams for #6 without hardware. I expect them to weigh pretty much the same after the pickups are mounted, since the conventional pickups are so much...
Learn More#5 has received the first pass of sanding and described earlier, it is time to string it up while there is still opportunity to alter its wooden properties. A secondary purpose is to verify that the neck set angle is correct, before routing the individual recesses for the bridges. Note that these recesses are not required, but I find it a nice touch. Here, I have fastened the bridges flat onto the top. Detail of body The string locks are mounted in line with the strings, but staggered. Note that there will be a graphite nut fitted, to guide the strings and set an accurate string spacing. On previous guitars that have had a straight nut, I have used just the zero-fret and string locks mounted close to it. Back side Heel/back detail It plays beautifully! Next is routing the bridge recesses and pickup and control...
Learn MoreI am continuing to work on #5 and #6 with the intent of having them both completed before the Uppsala International Guitar Festival, which is headlined by Paco De Lucia this year. Unfortunately, I will be travelling so I can only attend the last two days of the festival, but will be exhibiting for the full four days. If all goes well, #5 will be on its way to Chris Letchford and not at the festival, though. Below, you can see the neck set of both builds. #5 has an extra 5 mm as it will have a wenge top glued on. I am removing weight from the body of #6 in a new way. About 250 grams was saved by routing these channels into the body sides. Here, you can see the neck shapes. #5 conventional thin C-shape, #6 Trapezoidal Neck Profile (contact Rick Toone for more information about this neck profile). #5 fretboard radiused, inlaid, and fretted: I’ve been waiting for this moment for a long time: gluing the sides on to make the instruments complete. I am doing things in the following order: glue laminates of neck band-saw away and shape section on underside of neck portion insert truss-rod (while sides are straight and can be used...
Learn MoreHere is a progress report on builds #5 (Chris Letchford) and #6. First of all, here is an experimental truss-rod arrangement. On #3, there is a 15 mm diameter carbon fiber tube with a custom single truss-rod. This works like a dream and reduced weight from the neck. #3 is also completely free of dead spots, which I attribute to the use of carbon fiber. Here, I am enclosing a double-expanding truss rod inside the carbon fiber tube. I weighed the neck after having routed a normal 6 mm channel and then after enlarging the channel to accommodate the tube. The removed weight was almost to the gram the same as the weight of the carbon fiber tube, which means that this solution is weight neutral, but I expect it to have the same sonic properties as on #3. On Chris’ guitar, I am not taking any chances. He will have a quite thin ‘C’ shaped neck profile, so I am not including any sound channels in it. His rosewood fingerboard is also incredibly light-weight. In this picture, you can see the access to the truss-rod adjustment. I have made sure to leave sufficient material below the fretboard to support fastening my string locks directly into the wood. #6...
Learn MoreMark Davis, from outside Melbourne, Australia, had a busy last winter building a very interesting and innovative carbon fiber guitar. He recently purchased a second EGS bridge, so I am looking forward to seeing what is in store. Mark is active at the Aussie Guitar Gear Heads forum and has a thread documenting this whole build there. This guitar has a core of Australian pine-like wood King Billy and is fully carbon fiber. It has several fairly unique features, such as pickups mounted out of view from behind (to give an un-interrupted CF top) and glued on frets (again to not ruin the fibers of the CF weave). Mark writes: The total weight of this guitar is 1.3kg or 2.875lbs. Pickups are Adeson Icendiary in the bridge and a Fenton Weill in the mid position. Switching is single / single and split h/b in series , and bridge h/b. Frets are hardened SS and glued on. Nut is home made to suit purpose as are the knobs. I new exactly what I was aiming for from the beginning with the hidden P/U’s this was due to the fact that I wanted uninterrupted fibers running all the way to the bridge This creates the problem of getting the strings close to the body so...
Learn MoreSome progress on #5 and #6 – did final shaping of body side contours and fretboards, slotted fretboards and assembled the custom hardware for...
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