I wanted to a) see if I could create a mould for the carbon fiber idea and b) see how things would turn out, so I set out to create a simple mockup without a bandsaw. I had a spare can of spray insulation, so that seemed like a good idea:
but not really…. So, I went to Bauhaus (i.e. home depot) and got myself a sheet of styrofoam, the kind used to insulate floors.
It was a lot of fun. It taught me a couple of things as well. First of all, the “raised” (or rather, “uncarved”) portion where the controls are supposed to sit will not work. I have angled the edge to sit more comfortably on the leg, so will have to re-think one or the other. Secondly, I made the upper left corner, where the arm rests, quite carved. This is very comfortable and standard “stratty” but will not work out with a body made of a glued on top out of a different material than the bottom. Re-think #2.
It looks like a very good idea having two leg rest carvings on the guitar (where the one close to the bridge gives a more upright position as shown in the pictures in one of your other posts. I haven’t seen it on any guitar before.
Regarding the problems with carving through the laminated top: I read a suggestion on Project Guitar forum (http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.php?showtopic=9869&hl=) that if you make a forearm contour on a guitar body with a laminated top, you could add a thin laminate in a contrasting colour between the body and top – which would make the fact that the lower layers of wood are visible in the forearm contour “not a bug, but a feature”. Depending on the wood you plan to use, it might look quite good.
BTW, have you considered using Scandinavian wood instead of swamp ash? I’ve seen that Ares Guitar (www.aresguitar.se) uses Swedish elm, birch, oak, and maple among others. He claims it works well.