Great Chris, have fun!
I am curious about your plans.

cheers

Bart

Posted by: @chrismcconnell1011

Hi all,

I did the "Build your first electric" course a few years ago, built another guitar in my shed afterwards, and have stuck together a few partscasters to use up odds and ends recently. Getting back into "real" building, and I'll post my progress on here. Hopefully going to try and keep up with Mark's Workshop Wednesday videos, so I've just ordered a fretboard...

I'll add a wee picture of my plans as soon as I work out how.

Cheers,

 

Chris

 

 

Cool Chris - Thanks! You will likely be able to post images after 24hrs...it is a security feature. FYI The Attach Files button is a paperclip icon right under each post. If it still does not work tomorrow please let me know - ta!

Still can't attach files, however to whet everyone's appetite, I'm planning on building a copy of a Harmony H44, which is a tiny short scale department store guitar from way back in umpteen-oh-eight. I saw a video of Dan Erlewine repairing one and looked them up straight away on Reverb. To my surprise, there were plenty available, but few below about 2k. So that got me thinking...

Being a draughtsman by day, I started drawing up a set of plans in CAD based on various info I pinched from the internet. These strange wee guitars have are built as a neck-through, and have a single neck pickup. If you've heard much of Marc Ribot's playing with Tom Waits, you've probably heard one. I've amended the headstock design slightly because on some of the reference material I had, it seemed a bit out of proportion and I'm much happier with the way it looks now.

Once I'd finished the design, I remembered that away at the back of my wardrobe, I'd stashed a bass neck blank about two years ago. However - it was just too short to use, which seemed a hell of a shame. "Back to the Drawing Board" and I revised the scale length from 25.5 to 24" which actually looks better against the petite body, and it fits my blank! 

So I've been meaning to get a start on this for months now, but it took until seeing Mark's recent Workshop Wednesday video to get me fired back up. I'm quite happy to make the CAD files available for the community if anyone else fancies a go, or would like to try their own interpretation.

Hopefully more pictorial evidence on the next installment...

Cheers

Right, so I need to refine my drawing a bit to suit the parts I've scrounged up. I've got a fretboard, a cut-off tele bridge and a 42mm nut, so I'm diverging a bit to suit my parts bin.

I'd drawn up a fairly accurate plan, and was gonna do an accurate replica, then it occurred to me that I could develop the plans a bit further and make my own double cut version...

Not sure what I'll do next, but there are a few jigs to be getting on with in the meantime.

Also, having never done a through neck before, I really need to draw a section through this and hope the height of the fretboard gives me enough height at the bridge.

Also, having never done a through neck before, I really need to draw a section through this and hope the height of the fretboard gives me enough height at the bridge.

It won't - you will need to route the front of the body down to acheive the neck angle - It is not hard but you need another jig - keep an eye on @bill flude s latest build - he is about to do this:

https://guitarmaking.co.uk/community/showcase-electric/the-phoenix/paged/3/#post-1413

Because I needed a different neck break angle from my Bandsman I built a new jig to do neck and body break angle - I had bought some Firebird drawings and then drew out the side view onto tracing paper to be able to check that the body to string height was going to be about right at the bridge.

I then built a double ended jig, neck break angle at one end and body angle at the other - the side rails are high enough to accommodate the height of the blank - the jig is about 1200mm long.  The body angle was cut first on bandsaw having used the jig to mark the angle and then was finished with a router - same method as headstock angle just a longer cut.

Thanks chaps. Really need to review the drawing video again to work this out. The way the originals are made, there's no break angle at all, and they seem to work fine with a simple floating bridge.

When you draw the string above the fretboard to work out your bridge height, how high do you make the string off the fretboard? 3mm?

Cheers

Top of fretboard to bottom of string about 3-4mm.

The drawing is easy to change - cut wood not quite as easy.....

Refined my design a wee bit tonight after hours of looking at pictures of these. I'm gonna push on and try doing this flat like the originals. My heights are 9mm at the nut, and 9.8mm is the lowest I can sensibly put the outside barrels of the tele bridge, so I think that'll work. Will probably do a dry run on some spare wood before I do any more.

@chrismcconnell1011

Hi Chris,

Have you ever thought about producing a 3D model of a Gibson 335 back and/or front? I know lots of people (OK, at least two!) who would be very grateful if you could produce a file that allows me to CNC machine moulds for these parts. Let me know if you might be able to help.

Regards

Darren

Darren,

Yeah, I'd have a stab at it if I could find a set of 2D plans to pull dimensions off of - or a 335 that I could measure.

I'd love to build one myself, think Mark was talking about potentially being able to offer these on a course soon? 

I don't know what exactly is required in terms of moulding these, but I'd be more than happy to help sort it out for the community.

If you've got any info I could use, let me know, and I'll start getting it fired into conFusion360...

Update...

About 30 seconds of googling later, I've found a good set of plans with the contours broken down. Need to re-draw them in CAD so we can convert it to bleeps and bloops, but that's a ten minute exercise.

What kind of milling machine setup do you have?

Hi Chris,

Fab! I use VCarve Pro 9.5 (Vectric.co.uk) to generate the 3D toolpaths for my CNC router and it can import native Rhino files and whole host of other formats which I can give you tomorrow (I haven a full copy of Rhino BTW). I also have some 2D plans of an arch top with what amounts to a contour map of the raised front and back. They’re not for a 335 but if you can also work from this type of data it would be very useful to know.

This is all working towards Mark’s 335 course so your help is, and will be, very much appreciated by all of us.

Regards

Darren

Search YouTube for Jason Beams channel, some years ago he did an insane replica of Eric Clapton’s 335 using techniques equivalent to those used by Gibson, including laminated top and back and bent sides. There are around 50 episodes. It takes a while to watch, but worth it.

It looks like @chris is sorting you but another alternative?

https://www.electricherald.com/gibson-es-335-templates/

Not sure they give you everything you need? It’s free.

if you want Cad options...it does cost $10 to $20 depending on what you need.

https://www.electricherald.com/shop/guitar-dxf-gibson-es-335/

lots more blueprints if your interested in other templates. ??

https://www.electricherald.com/templates/

Hi Guys,

I just wish some one had a 3D modelled front/back available off the peg as it would then be very simple for me to CNC the moulds and start some test pressings.

Was the contour map helpful Chris?

Darren

Have you seen Joel's new pickup winder? Awesome!

Impressive winder from Joel!