Hi all I’ve made a few guitars now under Mark’s expert tuition, some from the online courses and two at his workshop in Scotland. I have posted some vids in the electric and acoustic sections of this...

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That is a great build too Herb, I like it in black too. I have just looked up Albert Lee and I see what you mean. I obviously hadn’t seen this design of guitar before. It’s made by Ernie Ball Music M...

And finally... The body was stained with Crimson Guitar's black water-based Stunning Stains. This resulted in a dark plum colour over the mahogany. Liberal coats of Crimson Guitars Finishing Oil were ...

Next was routing the neck pocket using a template and checking the fit of the neck. During the final sanding of the neck a line began to appear and with a sinking feeling in the guts I became convince...

Now some carving... first the body contours, then the neck. Attachment : HP_160304_IMG_3824.jpg Attachment : HP_160317_IMG_3860.jpg Attachment : HP_160317_IMG_3871.jpg The fingerboa...

I routed the truss-rod slot after practising on a scrap of wood - I got it slightly off the centre line unfortunately. This contributed to a problem later on... The neck and headstock routed to rough ...

I have recently bought a new part for this build. It wasn’t in the design but I changed my mind. I wanted to have the strings go through the body from the back, through the bridge and up to the tuners...

Time to clear coat the body. I masked up the neck pocket, turned on my air compressor, got my spray gun ready, mixed my lacquer (clear coat), put on my PPE and sprayed the guitar body, two coats. ...

I decided to finish the neck in a nice silky smooth Tru Oil gun stock finish so it got many coats. I treated the fretboard with Lemon Oil. Attachment : 713D192D-2366-4DF2-8FB8-A6630AFC7DA9.jpeg ...

Ok, back to the neck. Installation of the frets and preparing the nut slot. Attachment : 09851DCA-72B3-4709-894C-C60A7C350ACB.jpeg Attachment : 8A379F6B-FC81-4423-A720-5198AA165A1A.jpeg ...

I then gave the whole guitar body several coats of sanding sealer and left to fully cure. Attachment : 7587ECD4-C789-4295-9DD2-F9B82E74600D.jpeg

As Ash is an open grain wood, I wanted to use grain filler so I could achieve a high gloss finish with lacquer (I used auto clear coat actually). I applied the filler with a paint brush as I let down ...

Next, a bit of body carving. A belly cut and a knee cut. I used hand tools for this, rasp, files and sandpaper. Attachment : 198FBD81-9778-47A5-B563-3AC5BB3E3A96.jpeg Attachment : F64C2730-...

To transfer the corresponding screw holes to the neck I put the neck into the body, it was a nice snug fit. I then slowly drove the screws through the holes in the body until I could feel them pressin...

After some test fitting of the neck and careful placement of the neck plate, I marked the holes for main neck screws. I then drilled them out carefully on the drill press. Attachment : DB070146-1A...

Now it was time to mark everything out onto the top, ready for some routing. Several jigs were used to route out the pickup cavities, control cavity, the main body and the neck pocket. Note: normally ...

With the nature of Spalted wood being inconsistent and unpredictable, it has to be stabilised. I did this by applying CA glue (super glue) liberally and spreading it around with an old credit card. I ...

Time to laminate the Spalted Maple top to the Ash body blank. I just lined up the centre lines after applying the glue and used lots of clamps and weights, and used some strategically placed screws an...

It sounds great and Mark played well. Carol is just cheeky ???