Updates. Not a LOT of action going on here, but it’s still moving forward. Mostly made progress on the case for this thing. Nailed down what I want the pickguard to be shaped like, and tuned up a bit of…   Read more»

It is amazing how much more “finished” the body feels after rounding over the edges. Since it’s so small, I went with a 7mm edge radius. I started placing the electronic components and getting the wiring routed out next. This…   Read more»

I know it doesn’t look like it, but I’m still working on this. Got the first cover made for the first pickup, and the pickup cavities routed. Here’s the pickup cavities routed out, and then a shot of the neck…   Read more»

Never built a pickup before, but here’s my first one. 4 poles, 2 Alnico 5 magnets that were meant for a Firebird pickup, arranged the same way a regular P90 pickup would be arranged. 10,000 turns 42AWG, clockwise wound, 7.1K…   Read more»

Neck and fretboard are unified. Truss rod is fitted, tuner holes are drilled and screw holes are pre-drilled. Next up is finish profiling the sides of the neck (they’re approximately 1mm oversize to allow final fitting of the fretboard, to…   Read more»

I see two options. Cut a filler strip from the end of the fretboard that’s the right width to fit the slot, (it’ll be fragile as heck) and glue it in. Cut the fingerboard all the way through the misplaced…   Read more»

Still no keeper bars, but I should have at least two made by tomorrow evening. After that, it’s only the pickup covers left to make, before I could route the body.   These showed up today: Also got both headstock…   Read more»

Made a stack of 4-pole P90 pickup backing plates tonight, I need to order some more bobbins to cut out and I’ll make a set of 8 pickups. I need to machine the plastic soapbar style covers this weekend, but…   Read more»

Got a little work done on this one this past week. Decided to cut the body out with the bandsaw, instead of using the CNC. I’ll finish out this body, make any adjustments to the prints, and then run one…   Read more»

Fixed it.



 
Barely any gap there, and what is there will fill out fine when I go to paint the body.

Well progress was made, but not in the direction I wanted it to go. I got a little carried away on the spindle sander on the tightest curve right next to the neck joint. I’ve REALLY sanded too far. I…   Read more»

Continuing on, the bandsaw makes short work of roughing out the body shape. I actually used two different bandsaws-the big one can’t get into the tight spots well, and the little saw still didn’t get into the tightest spot very…   Read more»

Started the second neck, but got a bit impatient and the scarf joint is poorly glued, the nut position is compromised, and I just feel like I’ve made a hash out of it. Next is to pop the glue joint…   Read more»

Well, I didn’t loose my house in the storm, but the school I work at took a bit of a hit. The building is fine, but we won’t have power or internet services til January, they’re telling us now. The…   Read more»

I wish the gouges were the only problem. I started double-checking the body template, and looking at my photos posted here. The neck is too short. Which is a shame, as I’ve just fitted the rear headstock veneer to it,…   Read more»

It definitely could have been worse, I could be getting out the wood bleach to remove bloodstains.   Pretty ugly looking, but would be completely hidden after fitting the neck into the body. There is still about 2mm of shoulder…   Read more»

Well, it happened. I ruined the good progress I’d made on the neck, I was bandsawing out the excess material at the tenon end and the saw caught. It rolled the neck and put two deep gouges into the top…   Read more»

I felt really silly though, because the scarf joint is only about 1cm of the tips of the headstock, I could have totally cut this out as a single-piece headstock.   That and I fear the headstock joint isn’t “clean”…   Read more»