160910

Thursday the 16th day of September 2010

We’re steadily working through the backlog of yore and coming through to some more recent orders, and some very interesting projects are coming up in the next months..

for now we’re working on Mike’s new slim.. the fret slots are cleaned up and champhered a little

while here’s a look at igors prototyping on a new tremolo unit..

..he does get annoyed when I have him working on several projects at once!

I’m having some fun with the processed cocoons of the lac bug!

very very pretty!

the top has to come off this old Harmony jazzer.. in fact this is the only bit of glue that’s holding the top in place, and I do love playing with fire!

some more glue has failed.. so this is remedied..

I, meanwhile, re-glue a loose piece of this classical.. not surprisingly they were both in the same room.. a rather warm and dry room at that!

Mike’s fretboard is routed for binding

the inner strips are glued in and then sawed through

before glueing the outer strip and end piece on.. this gives the frets more area to bite into..

now, this is where we left the 24 hour guitar build..

and we’re back on camera for a day.. the video will be released shortly.. once edited etc of course!

now, the excess glue is scraped away

the body shape is finally routed

and I start working on a new pickup template, this is being loaded with gold covered bareknuckles and the cover makes them a bit bigger..

like so..

the simple control layout is drilled next

and the control plate recess

the time has come for carving..

after a padouk control plate is cut and fit of course.. the last bit of raw woodwork  here

other than the carving of course.. bubinga is hard!!!

an all-access neck joint.. of course

and some ergonomic carving, the center dips about 10mm as well as the belly carves etc..

the jack socket and wiring hole are drilled..

and the sanding process begins.. I do love my bobbin sander!!

we start running out of day.. and light,

but get to 180 grit before calling it a wrap.. more shooting in a few weeks..

the jazzer has a top re-attached

and we cut frets for MIkes..

we use a mixture of good hard pressure and glue.. the pressure to hold it in place and the glue to fill any hole left over.. thus you end up with a truly stable neck!

..talking about a neck, the Harmony has hers glued back on..

setup for the spray booth..

some masking..

and a lot of 2-pack primer is sprayed..

the fret ends are filed flush and at a slight angle to the fretboard

then the side dots are installed..

next up the headstock shape is finalised

and a pretty pretty headstock it is!

the planer thicknesser kicks out some shavings as the tops are prepared for Mike and Dave’s guitars

..mmm

some jointing

and some glueing..

some routing..

and we’re on the way to Mike’s guitar being a guitar..

the body is prepped for the top

and the neck cut down to size..

this baby is going to have a deep set neck tenon

this is pre-drilled

a bit of planing while I get my head in the right space for some rather critical routing..

and igor gets to work on the twins

..the deep set neck tenon joint is routed

the ends are carefully squared off

and we end up with the best joint I could possibly have!

the rest is all a matter of glue and pressure..

All my best,

Ben

Crimson Guitars UK