12 String Telecaster: Shaping the Headstock

Finally a few hours back in the man cave today after a mad Christmas and New Year season. With only a little time at my disposal I was at least able to shape the headstock on the 12-String Telecaster build and get most of the sanding done.

With the headstock chock full of tuning pegs, the kit didn't leave too much space for anything fancy in terms of shaping. I finally opted to just round off the corners to create a Fender-esque curve to the top. With a little trial and error I found that the small Timbermate container provided the perfect radius. Out came the pencil and it was quickly traced to create the corners.

The small Timbermate container has a perfect radius.

Curve drawn and ready for the jigsaw.

With the line drawn, out came the trusty jigsaw and I cut just outside my line. Unfortunately the blade on the jigsaw was a little coarse for the rock maple and some small pieces were gouged out of the edge of the cut. Wouldn't you know, they were out of the front side of the headstock not the back. Lesson learned - always draw your line and cut from the front size of the headstock. I grabbed the disc sander to bring the curve down to my line. A nice job apart from the gouges.

Jigsaw cut complete and tidied up with the disc sander.

Gouges in the front edge of the headstock, care of the poor jigsaw skills.

With the shape cut it was then on to sanding. I started with 80 grit on the top (cut) edge to remove the burn marks created by the disc sander. The 80 grit really made light work of it. If you are having trouble removing marks and burns etc on your kits then I suggest starting at a lower grit. It really is the secret to a getting the finish you want in the quickest time. I worked my way from 80 grit to 120 then 180. With the 180 grit I started on the flat faces of the headstock and the neck as well. With 180 grit complete it was then on to 240 and 320 for the whole shebang. Very nice and smooth now. I would have gone down to 400 grit, but I seem to have run out. I raised the grain once with water and knocked it down again with 320 grit.

With the gouges requiring filling, I turned to my old friend Timbermate. Of all the containers I had lying around the man cave, the Pine seemed to be a reasonably close match to the maple. I filled the holes and waited 12 hours for it to dry.

Pine Timbermate to the rescue. Hopefully it will stain the correct colour.

Finally, I got the 320 grit sand paper out and sanded off the excess Timbermate. It looks *ok*. The fills are quite obvious, but I'm hoping that with a little Amber dye they will be less so. When all is said and done I may have to paint the headstock black but I really don't want to go there if I don't have to. I do love a nice yellow maple neck with a black Telecaster.

The Timbermate sanded off. Camera is blurry, but you get the idea.

The neck is now almost ready for phase 2. I need to get my hands on some 400 grit sandpaper, raise the grain a few more times and then I cal slap on some amber dye and Tru-Oil. Still a ways to go before assembly, but getting there now!

Jeremy's Mahogany LP: Sanding, Sanding

Well, a little more progress on my other current build today - Jeremy's Mahogany Les Paul. Again today I was attacking wood with sand paper - 120 and 180 grit on mahogany to be exact. Two hours I laboured, using paper over both my cork sanding block and my eraser, with the end grain at the heel, and the concave sections (especially the cutaway) proving their usual pain in the arse.

I'm not sure why these two areas, in particular, attract the majority of machining marks, but every guitar body I've worked on has had issues here. The cutaway I can imagine is a problem area - the factory presumably uses a sanding wheel or similar to give the tight cutaway a rough finish prior to binding. But the heel? It's out there for all to see, and it's way convex. There's no excuse. If only they ran a 120 grit sanding wheel over it before doing the binding! Grrr...

Anyway, on a positive note, one thing I did do this time around was hit all the glue spots with some Goof-off glue remover from Bunnings. It didn't remove all the glue completely, but boy did it make a difference when it came time to sand those glue spots off! I can highly recommend giving this stuff a try on your own builds. I did 3 passes of the stuff on each spot before starting to sand. No wire brushes required this time!!

With the usual machining marks from the factory estimated (in my mind at least) between 20 and 80 grit, unfortunately it just takes time and elbow grease to remove them with 120 grit. It's a bit of a trick to try and remove these machining marks without sanding through the binding, but I think I managed it mostly OK. Unfortunately, there are two marks (cracks) on the heel of the body which aren't going to sand out - no matter what the grit.

Two small cracks on the heel of the body. These won't sand out.

With the 120 grit paper I was able to remove all the glue around these cracks that the factory had obviously used to try and patch them. Believe me they look much better than when I started! Hopefully once the dye and clear coats go on, these cracks will all but fade into the background. If not, they will have to be put down to "character" in the final build. It's just the way with these cheap kits - there's never a perfect body to be found. We amateur luthiers just have to do our best with what we've been given.

Next step for this bad boy is to continue sanding with 240 grit and 360 grit. Once the 360 comes out I can actually start on the front veneer, but it'll only be the lightest of licks. There's no way I'm risking sanding through on this project! Stay tuned...

Burley 335: Sanding the Figure

I started sanding the top of my 335 with the Birdseye burl maple top today. Man what a bitch!! I started with 240 grit and quickly realised that this was too coarse - the grit quickly scored deep scratches all over the veneer. This stuff has grain going all over the place so it's very difficult to 'sand with the grain'. I'm sanding top-to bottom like I always do, but this stuff is more like end grain to sand than anything else!

Anyway, I quickly skipped to 360 grit, and this has made things much better - I've been able to remove most of the original scratches from the veneer and the top is slowly getting smooth. One of the big issues I'm now facing is glue spots. I am thinking now that I might like to dye the top veneer, but large patches of glue exist in and around each of the burls. The factory has quite kindly filled the burls with some kind of bog to give the veneer a much flatter surface. Unfortunately, in doing so the area surrounding each burl is one large glue spot (or so it seems).

I'm slowly going around each patch of glue and sanding it out. It's very slow going with 360 grit I can tell you. Here's a couple of patches that I've cleaned up.

I reckon it's going to take me a week just to get the 360 grit done. Still, that's what I signed up for with this guitar building lark, so nothing to do but to revel in it and savour every new piece of wet and dry! It will all be worth it in the end. I'm thinking a darker wood tone for this one now, maybe a caramel or red mahogany with some kind of burst. I'm looking around the interweb for examples to inspire me..

Scratch Pine Body: Fender Toronado!

Shopping for a decent body shape for this pine scratch build, I happened upon the Google docs Guitar Plans Collection. Here you'll find plans for every guitar body shape under the sun! Since the neck I am going to use is a cheap Chinese Telecaster neck, a Fender shape was always on the cards. Rather than make yet another Telecaster, however, I opted for a body with a similar size and neck pocket but with more of an alt shoe-gazer feel. Enter the Fender Toronado!

It's kinda Jazzmaster'ish, with its large top horn and small lower nub, and I really like that look. It's a shape that I personally associated with "Vintage" looking guitars, even though the Tele, amongst others, is a much older design. Anyway, the plans from Google docs include the body shape, pickguard and neck pocket so I should be able to use it for all my routing and cutting requirements.

After 24 hours, the clamps came off the body today and it was on to the 40 grit sandpaper to get the front and back of the body levelled up - basically what professional luthiers, or even sane individuals, might do with a thicknesser. I've got one of those fucking annoying orbital sanders with the little bar clamps either end. Do you think the paper would stay fixed in there for more than a minute at a time?? Nup!

Consequently it's taking an age to get the body blank level(ish) but, with dogged determination, I'm persevering. $400 for a cheap thicknesser? Believe me, it's looking cheaper by the minute ;) ! Despite my little whinge, the results are very promising! The blank is looking nice (and piney) and is just wide enough to accomodate the Tornado body shape.

I have printed out the plans (downloaded as pdf) and am in the process of sticking them to 12mm MDF so that I can cut out templates for routing. I'll let you know more about how that goes in the next installment. Stay tuned!

Solid Body PRS: Turquoise Dye

Today the PRS was sanded to 400 grit, the grain raised, and the first wash of turquoise dye applied to the front veneer and basswood body. To pop the grain in the veneer I used a variation of the one-pass dye method I have used in the past. In this method, you get a first pass of dye over the entire body, then while it is still wet, keep washing over with more dye, not letting it settle in any one place. The theory is that  dye is taken up more by the figure than the plain wood. Today I varied this process by bringing in a clean cloth to soak up the excess dye from the non-figured wood after each subsequent dye wash, allowing more to be put in the figure only. The technique seemed to work well. Here is  how the flame veneer came out:

The "turquoise" colour created using a 1:1 mix of blue and green Colortone dye is very hard to photograph. Without the flash it looks blue, with the flash it looks green. To the human eye the colour sits somewhere in between the two. I've included both versions for you to compare.

The basswood was another story completely. I managed to get a pretty weak wash coat of dye over the entire body.

The colour, however, is pretty weak so far and it will need at least one more going over with a much stronger mix. It is interesting how the various figures in the basswood have popped with the Colortone huh?

Flamed Telecaster: Trace Dye

As I was worried about sanding through this flamed maple cap, I decided to get the trace-dye on their as soon as physically possible to minimize the amount of material required to be taken off it. So after sanding the cap lightly with 360 grit, on went the Red Mahogany Colortone dye. The dye went on evenly, and surprisingly there doesn't appear to be any glue spots at all!

I've gotta say, I really love this Red Mahogany colour - I never knew it looked so damn good! It's going to look awesome under the Vintage Amber and on the mahogany back and sides.

Next job: sand the top down to 400 grit (thereby taking much of the trace-dye off again) and continue sanding the rest of the the mahogany body. With the body sanded to 400 grit I will be able to fill the pores with Walnut Timbermate - the next big task!

Stone Roses Tribute: Video Diary #4

The fourth instalment of my video build diary for the RC-1 Stone Roses Tribute is now on YouTube. This instalment deals with sanding off the Timbermate (pore filler) and applying the primer to the body.


It's the must watch series of 2014. Ok, maybe not.

Stone Roses Tribute: 2 Coats of Primer

After a week of preparation I finally got the first coats of primer onto the body and headstock of the RC-1 today. I filled the pores with a slurry of Timbermate after sanding to 400 grit, and then sanded back with 400 until nothing was left on the surface. Finished it off with 600 and then 800 grit before I was finally in a position to spray.

The initial 2 coats are on and it's starting to look like something! I'm liking the way it is turning out. Now that I've removed the masking to make sure all is well on the neck and the binding, I'll be re-applying new masking and then adding a final coat of primer. There's a couple of places where the masking has been placed a little low and has covered up a little of the wood (see below).

 

This needs to be rectified. Also, the current coats are still a little thin on the back, so one more coat  will not go astray there.

With the last coat of primer in place, I am planning on shooting 2 coats of white gloss acrylic. The body will then be ready for the Pollock/Squire inspired splattering to begin. I can't wait!!!

Stone Roses Tribute: Video Build Diary #3

The third instalment of my video build diary for the RC-1 Stone Roses Tribute is now on YouTube. This instalment deals with raising the grain and filling the pores of the Pitbull RC-1.


Self indulgent? Totally. Preachy? You betcha. But at least I didnt use the word 'trusty' this time around..

Stone Roses Tribute: Headstock Finalised

As you may have seen in the second instalment of my build diary, I finally got my headstock shaped for the Stone Roses RC-1 build. A little jig-saw and belt sander action left me with the headstock almost complete - just a few burn marks to take care of with some 180 and 240 grit sand paper.

In no time I had the original 'shark-fin' look that the Rickenbacker 330's are known for. Pretty sweet. I'm going to go for a clear Wudtone finish on the neck and back of the headstock, so it was important to get rid of all the burn marks from the belt sander before going any further. It was worth it! The maple neck and headstock looks real puurdy and should contrast well with the white headstock face. Now for more sanding!

Les Paul Florentine: Second Trace Dye Sanded Back

Today I sanded back the second trace dye with 360 grit paper and polished off with 400. Now that the dye is dry it is much lighter and the colour looks even more purple (pink even!) but it should darken up again when the Tru-Oil goes on.

The next step is to put the last dye coat on. It will be a more Cherry colour than the trace dye (the trace dye is 20% blue). I have not decided whether to use straight Cherry, or whether to mix in 10% Blue. It may well be that the trace dye will be enough to darken the Cherry enough. Hmm... needs some thought before I commit.

Les Paul Florentine: Bring the Bling & Second Trace Dye

Well, I changed my mind again. My gold hardware arrived today from Guitar Fetish and it looks awesome. Seeing it on the guitar with the original trace dye, it seemed obvious to me that more colour was required for this build. As you can see, there's a 335 style Trapeze Tailpiece, a gold Tune-O-matic bridge and a pair of GFS Dream 180 humbuckers with gold pickup surrounds.

And so it was back to the idea of wine red. I mean how awesome will those gold doodads look on a field of dark red! Over 2 hours I slowly sanded off the original trace dye with 240 grit, paying close attention to those pesky glue spots. 2 whole pieces of sand paper, and a little bit of my sanity later, the job was done and I couldn't wait to get a second trace dye on there to see if my sanding was complete. Here's the result..

All the glue spots are gone (hooray!) and the wine red looks great. This is a darker shade created from 80% cherry red and 20% blue Colortone dyes from Stewmac. Next step is to sand down through the grades again - 360, 400 and 600 to get the surface ready for clear coats and to take a bit of the colour back off the top. The colour will be replaced with a slightly lighter shade (95% cherry, 5% blue). Hopefully this will let the figure pop as much as possible. I can't wait to see the red with the gold!

I still need to decide on a colour for the bottom part of the guitar. I was thinking to just leave it natural with a slight tint from the Tru-Oil that is to come. Hmm.. still not undecided. I may hit it with a slight Amber dye, or a mix of Amber and Red Mahogany or even Medium Brown. I might need to do a couple of experiements to see what they look like though..

Les Paul Jnr Double Cut: Off With His Head!

With no question that the Vintage Amber headstock colour had to go, I decided to scrub it back to bare wood (just the face) and start applying Butterscotch Wudtone instead. With the decision made, all that was left to do was sand with 180 grit until all the colour was removed, then finish off with 240, 360 (plus grain raising) and finally 400 grits.

The Wudtone on the sides of the headstock remained unaffected, and didn't even twitch as the colour came off the top edges. This was a great relief I can tell you. I also managed to sand flat so that none of the colour was removed from the sides of the headstock at all.

The first coat of Wudtone went on thereafter (ever so carefully) and the transformation was well on its way. I am paranoid that I'll make a mess of the Butterscotch down the sides of the headstock, but I'm being as careful as I can be. Only time will tell if this step backwards has been worth it, but I already suspect that it has been. Even without 5 coats of Butterscotch, I like the new headstock sooo much better.

Les Paul Florentine: Sanding & Raising the Grain

Got some sanding on the Florentine done today. Started with 180 on the sides and back to try to remove some of the original machining/sanding marks. Still not sure I got all the suckers - end grain really is a bitch.  Moved on to 240 and then finally 360. After one go round with 360 it was time to raise the grain with methylated spirits and then another pass with 360 to knock it down again.

On the front I began with 240 and then moved to 360. The grain was raised with methylated spirits here too, but I made sure that the sanding was much lighter - I really don't want to sand through the veneer! The result is pretty smooooth.

Now that I've sanded to 360, there is just 400 and 600 grits to go before the Colortone dye can be applied. For each grit I will repeat the grain raising procedure. I'm still not sure what colour combo to throw at this bad boy. My current thinking is a blue top, with a darker colour (blue, black, blue+black?) in the initial trace dyes to allow the quilted maple figure to pop as much as possible. For the sides and back the jury is still out. I'm not sure whether to go for wine red / mahogany or maybe even go for an almost natural colour - maybe just Tru-Oil to accentuate the grain. Whatever I do to the back and sides will also have to be done to the neck and headstock. Hmm decisions..

Les Paul Jnr Double Cut: Preparing a Solid Body for Wudtone

Before adding Wudtone to my Les Paul Jnr, the wood surface must be prepared - and that means more than a few a few hours of sanding, sanding and (you guessed it) more sanding.

My standard preparation for solid body basswood guitars (without veneer or binding) is as follows:

• A really good sand with 240 grit, taking special note of areas where there is glue (there shouldn't be much if there's no binding) and filler (bog). I usually go over the body at least three times as there is no worries about sand through and so on. What does 'go over 1 time' mean in this context? Well, I tend to sand in 'sessions'. Basically, in 1 session I keep sanding until I've had enough and walk away. This is a single 'session' and on average it consumes one regular piece of wet-and-dry, and just a little bit of my remaining sanity.

• Move up to 360 grit sandpaper. I usually go over the body at least twice (2 sessions) with 360 grit.

• Fill the grain pores with a slurry of Timbermate and water. Dilute the Timbermate until it is like runny custard and then brush it on with and against the grain. For basswood I usually use a 'Maple' colour. For mahogany I go with a darker 'Walnut' colour. It all depends how much you want the grain to stand out. If you love grain, then typically the darker the pore filler the better.

•  Let the Timbermate dry completely.

• Use 360 grit paper to sand down the Timbermate until it basically disappears from the surface of the timber. Don't worry, it's still there in the pores, but the obvious Timbermate colour is gone.

• Switch to 400 grit paper. Give the body a light sand - not too much or you will undo all your good work with the Timbermate! The surface should be feeling very smooth by now.
• Raise the grain of the wood using water in a damp cloth. Let the surface dry completely.

• Sand the raised grain back down  with 400 grit paper.

This is my pre-Wudtone preparation for basswood bodies. For maple necks, I do all this, but without the pore filling step. This is as far as I go for Wudtone as more sanding makes it hard for the Wudtone to soak effectively into the surface.

Disclaimer: Many exponents of Wudtone strictly adhere to the mantra that you should only sand to 240 grit as preparation. Personally I find that sanding to 240 makes it almost impossible to achieve a high gloss finish. I've only completed one Wudtone project so far, so maybe time will out on this one. At the end of the day it is up to you!

For other finishing products, in particular Tru-Oil, it is important to sand down to at least 600 grit paper. When doing this, I repeat the last 3 steps (400 grit + grain raising) with 600 and each subsequent grit size. Typically, though it is only one more to 600 (to save my sanity more than anything else). I have read build diaries online where other builders continue to 800 an 1200 before dying and oiling. It is definitely the case that Tru-Oil finishes benefit greatly from finer sanding, as the smoother the surface is to begin with, the less wetsanding you'll have to do to get a nice smooth finish.

Siena's Stratocaster - Grain Raising Misadventure

I got the neck sanded today in preparation for my Vintage Amber Wudtone Neck Finish. The talk around the campfire is that you should only sand to 400 grit maximum before applying this stuff so that the oil based colour can actually soak into the wood. With this in mind, i sanded the maple neck with 240, 360 and 400 grits. I raised the grain at both 360 and 400. Hmm, I hope I didnt go overboard.

Here's a tip. When you are raising the grain on a neck with a rosewood fretboard and you plan on using methylated spirits (de-natured alchohol) to do it, be very careful. If the fretboard has any black dye on it (and most of the kit rosewood fretboards do), that alchohol will take the dye straight off. If you're unlucky, the dye laden alchohol will find its way straight onto and into your cleanly sanded maple neck.

And believe me, it's a fricken bitch to clean off again.

ES175 Hollowbody - Tru-Oil, Tru-Oil, Wet-sand, Repeat..

The ES175 is coming along nicely. During the last few weeks I have been applying successive thin coats of Tru-Oil to all surfaces. After 12 initial coats of Tru-Oil, it was time for wet sanding. During the dying process I managed to get all surfaces of the body sanded to 600 grit, so my wet sanding couls start at 800 grit. I always wet-sand the Tru-Oil with boiled linseed oil. I find that wet-sanding with Tru-Oil itself can lead to problems when it dries too fast, leaving messy marks on the surface if you dont get the excess cleaned off in time. Typically I apply 5 or so coats of Tru-Oil between each wet-sanding grit, moving from 800 to 1200, 1500 and 2000.

If you don't want to sand with oil as a lubricant, I have found another technique on this build that works equally well 'dry' if you are careful - especially for the coarser grades. Take your sandpaper and sand very lightly with the grain in small strokes over the entire surface. When you are satisfied with the smoothness of the finish, wipe the surface with a rag soaked in methylated spirits to make sure all the fine grains are removed from the new scratches you've made. Remember that wet-sanding is a technique that reduces the chance of creating deep scratches in the finish. If you are working 'dry', like this, then you run a much higher risk of marring your final finish!

After sanding to 1500 grit, this baby is really staring to look awesome. The flame maple figure is really popping, and although I would have liked a deeper orange colour on the front of the guitar, the whole look is really coming together.

Sweet huh? I have hardware ordered, including GFS Retrotron pickups and a B70 bigsby. I just can't wait to get this bad boy assembled - it's going to be a rockabilly beast!!

BC Rich Avenge - Sanding, Pore Filling, Grain Raising

More holiday fun yesterday as my son and I sanded the Avenge kit through successive sand paper grades from 260 through 320 to 400. This was all done primarily with the orbital sander. The old sanding block was only trundled out for the sides. It was then time to fill the pores. We used a slurry of Timbermate - a good Australian product - after the first round of 400 grit to achieve this.

The entire surface was covered with the mixture and pushed into the pores using t-shirt material rubbing in small circles against the grain. Excess was squeegeed off and allowed to dry.

A second sanding with 400 grit (now with sanding block only) returned the surface to its former glory. It was then time to continue on the sanding block to lightly go over the body first with 600 and then 800 grit. The final preparation before primer was to raise the grain using methylated spirits to soak the wood. Once dry, we rubbed the now stubbled surface against the grain with coarse weave cheese-cloth. The result was a guitar top that feels like glass :). The end-grain was a little more stubborn, requiring a lick of the 800 paper to smooth it. Can't wait to see how this baby comes up with a little colour sprayed on her!

12 String 335 - Sanding Woes

So, being the ever enthusiastic, noob guitar finisher that I am, I almost ruined my 335 project before it even got started. I've been at it for a couple of weeks now inbetween work commitments. Started sanding with 260 grade wet and dry paper, and after one session progressed up to 360. All was going well, but (regular) work started to get in the way. For 10 minutes here and there I would pick up the sanding block, throw the 360 grit on there and just slough away. This went on for some days, actually kinda some weeks. I never kept track of just how many times I had 'completely' sanded the thing with 360 grit but it was a few let me tell you.

And then one day I noticed a few small flaws creeping into the front surface of the guitar. On the headstock, a dark, uneven ridge appeared. On the guitar top towards the base of the veneer panel join (running the length of the top where the matched veneer halves join) the glue seam was looking like it was thinning and opening. All evidence seemed to point to the fact that I was about to sand through the maple veneer on both the top and the headstock.

And so my sanding efforts came to a grinding halt. My finishing plan, at least the sanding and dying part of it, went straight out the window. I was planning a trace dye and sand-back to pop the grain before moving on to 400 and 600 grits. No such possibility now. Instead I looked for alternative methods to pop the grain that would not involve any more sanding. Fortunately i came across this youtube video from Bill of Canadianbreed Guitars.

This method uses only one dye pass, but pops the grain by applying a darker concentration of dye over the top of a lighter concentration while the first wash is still wet. The aim is to get the more concentrated dye into the figured grain whilst the non-figured wood, still wet from the less concentrated wash, accepts no more colour. Bill applies his method with vintage amber, and then deepens the effect using Tru-Oil. The oil essentially soaks into the figure to enhance the visual effect. His results look impressive and I was convinced to follow in his footsteps...

Jackson-Style Flying V - My First Guitar Kit

I finally completed my first guitar kit build this week. I'm no woodworker or luthier. Hell, I'm not even that good with a hand-drill, but this was a great experience (and relatively simple to complete) and I encourage anyone who is contemplating putting a kit together to give it a go. Guitar kits start cheap (in Australia you can source them from Pitbull Guitars or DIYGuitars) and everything you need except for sandpaper, paint, and lacquer is supplied.

The Kit

The kit was a solid basswood kit sold on eBay and shipped in two pieces with a bolt-on neck from Guitar Kit Emporium Australia. As the kit was a present from my brother, I can't tell you what it cost. However, I've seen identical kits with basswood bodies at Pitbull Guitars and DIYGuitars, so check those guys out to get an idea.

The style of guitar is a Jackson Flying V -  not the larger Gibson V - but smaller and elegant in its own way. The electronics did not come pre-soldered, but the holes for bridge and stop bar were pre-drilled as were the holes for the bolt-on neck. The kit was routed for humbuckers and came with volume and tone pots, and a 3-way switch. The headstock came un-shaped, and some effort with a jig-saw was required to get some kind of reasonable look to the thing. I didn't waste too much energy trying to think of something cool, but here's how it turned out.

With my limited woodworking skills this could have been a disaster (and almost was), but I ended up with an OK (but not very metal!) looking shape in the end.

Sanding, Filling and Inlay

The body was sanded from 260 through 360 and 400 to 600 grit. The pores were then filled with a Timbermate slurry, rubbed in with a cotton cloth and then squeegeed off. After allowing the filler to dry completely, I lightly sanded with 600 grit paper until only the pores were filled. After filling, I drilled and set inlay for the headstock and body of the guitar using a jig and router bits purchased from Blues Creek Guitars. The inlay jig works very nicely indeed and, if handled by a professional (ahem), would have allowed for effortless inlay insertion.

As it was, I did a very average job and there were quite sizable gaps between the inlay and the surrounding wood. Not to worry - these gaps were filled with 30 minute epoxy coloured with a little black Colortone dye from Stewmac. I ended up adding Maltese Cross inlays to the headstock and the body. Setting these inlays was the start of my masking woes. The moral: Never go too hard too soon! I should have been satisfied with the simple kit and saved more complicated finishing techniques for my next projects.

Painting

After my final sanding with 600 grit, it was time to get the colour on. I went with a simple black metallic paint and gunmetal grey stripes running down the centre. This was 'Power Plus' touch up paint purchased from my local Supercheap Auto store. Simple yet effective. I still like the look every time I glance at the finished guitar. The simplest finishing (if not the most original) ideas are often the best!

The problem, of course, was what to do about the inlays now that they were epoxied in. In the end I bought a frisket sheet, stuck it down over each inlay and cut around them to mask them off. Not as easy as it sounds as the process of cutting the frisket with an Exacto blade invariably left slight marks along the edge of the inlay in the epoxy. Another lesson learned. Also, I put too many layers of paint on in the beginning (4 all up when you include primer and colour) and this made removing the frisket all but impossible without damaging/ripping/gouging the paint in one way or another. Suffice to say it took me several attempts at masking and painting before I got a satisfactory paint edge around, but not covering, each inlay. Never again!

Sealer and Lacquer

With the whole inlay + painting ordeal, at least I was through the most stressful part of the finishing process right? Wrong. Now the application of the clear coats started in earnest and unfortunately that too would prove to be a real challenge. I decided to use Nitrocellulose lacquer in rattle cans from Behlen. It's great stuff - easy to apply and providing an even finish with little fuss. I also used the Behlen vinyl sealer that is recommended for use with this lacquer. I sprayed one whole can of the sealer onto the body and neck and then assumed (quite stupidly) that this would be enough to support some wet sanding to flatten the surface prior to adding lacquer. I was wrong (!) and proceeded to sand-through within 10 minutes of starting to wet sand with 800 grit.

It was back to the paint cans for the third time to repair the damage and start clear coating again. The moral of this part of the story is that you will need 3 times as much sealer and nitro lacquer as you think you need (if you are a first timer that is) so once you think you've finished - keep spraying!

In the end I got 1 can of sealer and 2 cans of nitrocellulose lacquer on the guitar before I was kind of satisfied with the look. I could have probably used 4 cans of lacquer, but 2 was all I had. The finish I ended up with is a little too thin I think and may not stand up to day-to-day usage. Given my experiences with sanding though I didn't event try to polish the lacquer and the end result is a kind of semi-gloss. It still looks pretty darn good however with the metallic black colour underneath.

Pickups

The kit came with two generic, white, uncovered humbuckers in plastic mounting rings. After all the effort I had gone to to get the guitar finished to this stage, I wanted something a little better (but not too expensive) to power it. I had heard great things about Alan Entwistle's pickups and decided to give a set of the Entwistle Dark Stars a go. I chose these as the guitar has a metal vibe (it's a V right?) and I thought they would be in keeping with the look of the thing.

Anyway, I found a pair of zebra Dark Stars on eBay in a cream ring mount. I liked the contrast they would bring to the simple black and grey guitar top. Black pickups and rings would have been ok too, but to my eye the cream looks even better. Long story short, the Entwistle pickups sound awesome. As good as any other pickup in my collection, especially for that heavy rock lead and rhythm sound. Amazing for the price, and I recommend Alan's product to anyone in the market for a great sound.

Wiring and Hardware

With the pickups chosen and in my hot little hands, it was time to wire this bad boy up and fit all the remaining chrome hardware. With the Entwistle pickups providing  wires for coil splitting, I decided to add a micro-switch to the setup to tap the single coils of each humbucker when desired. The 3-way switch remains to select between each or both of the pickups, whether in humbucking or tapped single coil mode. The bridge earthing wire gave me some trouble as the wire was cut as I hammered in the post, but i managed to get the wire attached in the end. The setup is generating the faintest hum, but I think maybe that is because i haven't insulated the pickup or control cavity. It's something to think about in the future when I have a spare second.

 

Anyway, that's the build. I'm very happy with how the guitar has turned out. It looks great, plays great (even without a decent setup), and most importantly of all - with the Entwistle pickups it sounds great. I couldn't be happier with it, and I haven't put it down since i tightened up that last screw.