Building a Chambered LP

[Mr Bones]

Ok, now it's time to bring these two parts together by routing a mortice for the tenon:


Then slowly test fit the tenon, and the make adjustments, then test, then adjust etc etc for about an hour until the joint lines are perfect. I use Freddy G's advice with the tenon of making it tight enough to pick up the body by the unglued neck and not have it fall out.

Glue time:

[Mr Bones]

Time to stop for a bit and clean up the shop. I've been moving at a pretty good pace, and haven't stopped to clean up since last Sunday.

[61LPSG]

Fantastic thread ! I admire your work, and love that top...mmmmmm.
I've always wanted to do this, and may find the time when I retire.
Can't wait for the next "episode".

[Mr Bones]

Thanks 61LPSG, but you won't have to wait long. I went down to start cleaning up, and inevitably didn't get very far before I decided to do "one more thing." I use a stew mac fret slotting jig, but only to get a mark on where the slots go. I dont like the saw, and have much better results using a different saw, and doing the final fret slots after I have radiused the board.

After I have cut all 22 slots plus a cut for the "23rd fret," i.e. the end of the fretboard, and the nut, I cut the two ends off with a hand saw:




I found these inlays for a steal about a year and a half ago, so I bought about 15 sets. They aren't especially vintage-correct, but I really like the look of them on a nice dark board:

I lay out the inlays, and trace around them with pencil

then start routing the cavities with a dremel and a 3/64" bit:


I then clean up the routes with a .055" straight cut bit. These tiny bits are perfect for getting the points routed.

Then one by one I fit the inlays to the routes and glue them in with Duco cement. Nice tight routes with very few gaps to fill. I did get one inlay off center which Im pissed at myself for. That 6th inlay will bug me for the rest of my life

[single cut 54]

Great work nm ,How many hours do you estimate it will take to complete the project and what's the average hours you spend on a Les Paul type guitar.

[lp59aholicDon]

IS that neck Tenon longer that the original LP type configuration It sure looks like it from picks , Neck angle? and how much cant does the neck have ? How are you going to radius the fretboard?

[single cut 54]

Originally Posted by lp59aholicDon

IS that neck Tenon longer that the original LP type configuration It sure looks like it from picks , Neck angle? and how much cant does the neck have ? How are you going to radius the fretboard?

I'm looking forward to the radiusing of the board too.

[tiedstick]

This is pretty amazing MM. I plan on giving my Epi LP a new burst and finish next year and I'm looking forward to seeing how a pro does it beforehand. Awesome work so far!

[BCRGreg]

I love seeing stuff done WITHOUT CNC.

Well done, sir.

[Mr Bones]

Originally Posted by lp59aholicDon

IS that neck Tenon longer that the original LP type configuration It sure looks like it from picks , Neck angle? and how much cant does the neck have ? How are you going to radius the fretboard?

The tenon goes past the fingerboard into the neck PU cavity, I will take a shot with the fingerboard on soon. The neck angle is 4 degree for this one. I really could have taken it down to 3.5 and been fine, but wanted to give a little room. The last time I tried to get a neck angle as small as possible, everything worked out great on the drawings, but I came up about 1/64 short and couldn't get a super low action.

[Mr Bones]

I hope you guys aren't expecting anything elaborate for the radiusing. I know my table top is flat (I rechecked it), but to be sure, I clamped an MDF board to it, then taped the fingerboard with double-sided duct tape (I use this stuff for all templates/ temporary sticking), which I ran down the entire back of the fingerboard to make sure I didn't make the board uneven (I did pat the tape with cloth though so it wouldn't bond so tightly that I wouldn't be able to get it up, or would snap it getting it up).

Then I stick 60 grit sandpaper to an aluminum 12" radiused sanding block:

and proceed to go through all the grits from 60-2000. It's a nice touch to have a really polished fingerboard, as it plays more smoothly, and the polishing actually darkens the board, almost like it has finish on it. I like to get it to where it shines:

Radius:

On the guitar:

I can't wait to see the fingerboard once I get some oil on it at the end. This board turned out to be darker than I thought it would be.

[Mr Bones]

Originally Posted by BCRGreg

I love seeing stuff done WITHOUT CNC.

Well done, sir.

Thanks Greg. If I wanted to build more than just a couple of these a year, I would trade the hand tools for CNC in a heartbeat, but as it is now, my favorite parts are when I get to turn the power tools off.

[Mr Bones]

Originally Posted by single cut 54

Great work nm ,How many hours do you estimate it will take to complete the project and what's the average hours you spend on a Les Paul type guitar.

Hard to say. At this point I have around 40-50hrs in it, but time wise I would say I am maybe halfway at this point. It gets a lot slower once you get past the initial stages of making it look like a guitar. My first few guitars, I got to this point and thought wow, I am almost done, and then rush through finish sanding and paint. I learned the hard way that finish sanding and painting really should take about as long as the guitar if it going to look good. I'm still not there yet with the whole package, though I am learning to get better about the finish work, but as Flick can attest, as he has seen a two of my first three guitars, they look good from a distance, but up close you can tell I went too fast on the final stages.

[pinefd]

Wow, Nick, I can't believe how fast you just zip through this stuff. I would imagine, though, that since this is your 8th, you have all of your templates already made, and are beginning to get real comfortable with your techniques. And I know what you mean about things starting to slow down at this point. So, do you still think you'll be ready to shoot this before Christmas?

[Mr Bones]

I think so, since I am off work for next week, but with the baby you never know . It also looks like the weather may get above 50 next week, so I will want to get some painting done on some other guitars. The templates are already there, which REALLY helps time-wise, and I've added some tools like the table saw and mitre saw which really make things like the tenon go MUCH faster. I had the house to myself today too, which was nice to just immerse myself in it. The biggest slowdown for paint at this point will be when the pigtail stud bushings arrive. Neck binding should be here by Tuesday via stew-mac.

[Roman Rist]

I love this thread.

You are doing a great job and, It makes me a bit envious.

I usually have 10 guitars going at once..................but for other people!

I'd love to have the time to build just one, one at a time for me.

Carry on brother and enjoy yourself!

[Mr Bones]

Not a whole lot of progress today, as I spent most of the morning cleaning up shop:

I then went to work on truing the neck. The back side of the radiused sanding block is perfect for leveling as it is wide enough and perfectly flat:

I check it with a straight edge as I go until there are no dips twists or rises. There are shims under the end of the body and the back of the neck holder that you can't see in this pic, but they are there to stop the neck flexing while I sand on it.

Before I glue the fingerboard on, I want to route out the pickup cavities since I have to stick a template right where the fingerboard will be:

I was really nervous to see where my internal routing and blocks were going to come out. I knew I had measured everything, but could no longer see anything inside. Luckily everything underneath appeared where I expected it to:

I like to move the bridge pickup about 3/16" closer to the neck that a standard LP. I like em a little warmer, and with the wraptail, it takes a bit of the snap out of it while still getting the sustain of the wraptail:





I hope that my neck binding shows up tomorrow, or I will be treading water a bit.

[ReverendJWblues]

Im curous to know just exactly how you carve the tops.
JW

[Mr Bones]

Just take a fingerplane:

(mostly just the second one from the left) and slowly plane away the wood until the top carve begins to take shape. The pics you see now, the top carve is still not completely finished. There is still a bit of clean up to do, and as I get closer and closer to what I think is the final carve, I will spray sand and sealer on it so that i can see any high spots or dips or chips in the carve.

[BobbyK]

Wow... this is excellent.
I'd really like to get into this, I did a lot of research a few years ago, and started building a mandolin-size four stinged instrument.

Time, money, and tools slowed me down.

I suppose as, it was only a minor project (the thing doesn't even have a truss rod... but looking at yours, I might go that step further) I focused more on playing guitar...

I've still got plenty of time later in life to get into it though.

[Mr Bones]

Ok, I was trying to figure out this morning how deep to drill the stud holes, but managed to actually get ahold of the man at pigtail himself and get the question answered. I had already made a template for the stud holes, and marked out the guitar ready for the drill press:


Once I knew that the bushings and studs were 7/8ths I could drill the holes 15/16ths deep:



I spent most of today working on another guitar, but did get around to this one. My neck binding arrived first thing this morning, so I went next to gluing the fingerboard on. I am remiss, because I was squeezing this into a busy morning, and didn't snap any shots, but it was pretty straightforward. Gluing the fingerboard on it always tricky, and I need to devise a method to make it easier to not have the board slip sliding around. After a stressful minute or two I got it clamped up where I wanted it, using a cutoff of neck binding, and a dummy nut as a guide. I made sure to clean up any squoozen out glue so that it would not present any issues for the neck binding.
This evening I took the clamps off, and checked the board. As suspected I needed to do some leveling. Here is where the fine sanding I did earlier helped out, as I could see low spots pretty quickly. There wasn't too much to sand, but I want the board to be perfectly straight before fretting.

[Mr Bones]

Next, I started on finishing cutting the fret slots. I mentioned earlier that I don't much like the fret saw that comes with the stew mac fretting jig, so I just use that jig to outline the fret slot locations, and I cut the slots to depth using a hand saw, and a block to keep me perpendicular:

I take a business card and mark the depth of the fret tang onto it so that I can get my slots to the correct depth:

Then I bend some medium fretwire with a healthy bit of overbend:

(BTW, at this point, any tips from the pros are much welcomed. My fretting and fretwork knowledge is very, very basic, and my methods pretty crude.)
And proceed to hammer the frets into the slots:

Then clip the ends up to the edge of the board:



Tomorrow, I will clean up the fret ends, and bind the fingerboard.

[Roman Rist]

Here is a tip, fret and bind your fingerboard before you glue it on.

Much easier.

[Roman Rist]

Make an MDF clamping jig.

On your table saw cut a 1/6th inch "relief" for each fret so you are making good contact with the wood as you clamp

like this;

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--^----------^--------------^----------------^-------------------^---------

[Mr Bones]

If fretting off the neck, how do you deal with the backbow of the fretted board other than overcutting the slots, or is it even something to be worried about? My thinking was that it may make the fretting and binding a little more difficult, but it allows me to have better control over the fretboard and neck being dead straight before the frets go in.