The Definitive Top Carve Thread

[tonyflies]

A few shots of the body and the process to get to the final body. Prob some inaccuracies but hey ho!
I've tried to show this as a mix of traditional techniques and cnc combined.

The Mahogany Base

Rear Route

Straight Routes

Body Angled on a GIG at 4 deg then cut the rest!

The body

 

[Rubetel]

I love that guitar. I want a LP with a Floyd one day

Hello Daniel
take a look at this video

By the way I love the color of that Light burst guitar

 

[nuance97]

Hello Daniel
take a look at this video

By the way I love the color of that Light burst guitar

Interesting. Definitely easier than building a specific guitar just to have a Floyd

 

[Rubetel]

Interesting. Definitely easier than building a specific guitar just to have a Floyd

Yes
This type of tremolo is designed to be installed on the same posts of a tune or matic bridge and the posts of the tailpiece and the nut safety are installed by removing the nut and screwing it in the same holes of the truss rod cover, being able to use without affecting invasively the integrity of your guitar and whenever you want you can remove it and replace your tune o matic bridge

 

[willio]

Recently came across some fine species that can take advantage of this template. Thank you for your efforts and sharing it with us here.

The woods:
Indonesian Mahogany, Indonesian Rosewood (sonokeling), Canadian maple.

 

[Musha Ring]

This thread is a fascinating and educational read.

You guys are awesome!

 

[Mattia]

Hi folks, lurker here coming out of the woodwork to say thanks for this series of pics and plans. I’ve been building guitars (strictly hobby) off and on for almost 24 years, mostly PRS-inspired style for electrics and my own acoustic shapes. I’m busy putting together a CNC machine (long term project finally coming to a head), and started playing with Fusion 360 back in mid-July, with zero CAD background. I started my attempts at modeling carved tops with these Les Paul plans. Didn’t go so well first time around.



Since then I’ve been getting more comfortable with the software ((a few renders of initial own designs) and thought I’d challenge myself and model it properly. I’ve got the body mostly done, will do the neck as well (but without the Gibson headstock because lawsuits) and share source the file with a Creative Commons attribution - give back to the community. I would have loved to have some files to play around with and learn from when I was starting out!
I don’t own a Les Paul, so I have a few questions:

- what’s the proper back radius for this vintage?
- I’m assuming pots are drilled roughly perpendicular to the top, what’s the thickness under the controls supposed to be?
- Correct depth for the control cover recesses? 1/8”?

here is a preview of what I have so far.

 

[nuance97]

Hi folks, lurker here coming out of the woodwork to say thanks for this series of pics and plans. I’ve been building guitars (strictly hobby) off and on for almost 24 years, mostly PRS-inspired style for electrics and my own acoustic shapes. I’m busy putting together a CNC machine (long term project finally coming to a head), and started playing with Fusion 360 back in mid-July, with zero CAD background. I started my attempts at modeling carved tops with these Les Paul plans. Didn’t go so well first time around.



Since then I’ve been getting more comfortable with the software ((a few renders of initial own designs) and thought I’d challenge myself and model it properly. I’ve got the body mostly done, will do the neck as well (but without the Gibson headstock because lawsuits) and share source the file with a Creative Commons attribution - give back to the community. I would have loved to have some files to play around with and learn from when I was starting out!
I don’t own a Les Paul, so I have a few questions:

- what’s the proper back radius for this vintage?
- I’m assuming pots are drilled roughly perpendicular to the top, what’s the thickness under the controls supposed to be?
- Correct depth for the control cover recesses? 1/8”?

here is a preview of what I have so far. View attachment 566411

Looks good.
The roundover radius on the back is 3/16”
Thickness under the controls is something between 1/4” and 3/16” (so long as a short-shaft pot will fit)
1/8” cover recesses

 

[Mattia]

Looks good.
The roundover radius on the back is 3/16”
Thickness under the controls is something between 1/4” and 3/16” (so long as a short-shaft pot will fit)
1/8” cover recesses

thanks!

here is an initial model. Not perfect, for sure, but I think it’s close. And the neck is very non-Gibson in terms of headstock -use a modified version of my standard neck for this model. The tunomatic and tailpiece are models off GrabCad (Here, tailpiece by the same user)

LP_Gold_Standard_mattia_v1.f3z

drive.google.com

for the fusion users: top created with a pair of lofts, using a cutout of the first to define the midplane for the second, which gave me smoother results. The neck is parametric (modify -> edit parameters to tweak things like nut width, headstock angle), although it breaks the model if you don’t roll back to before the heel and tenon were modelled, and then roll forward again. Not sure why. It’s version 1.

I’ve got the profiles tweaked to the splines and the height, which don’t adhere all that well to the isocurves, but I think the look is right. For machining, the tenon and pickup cavities are extruded at the 4 degree angle of the neck plane.

comments and suggestions more than welcome, still pretty new at modeling! Do and modify as you see fit, if you do use it I would love to hear about it, and credit this post/resource!

 

[Kennoyce]

thanks!

here is an initial model. Not perfect, for sure, but I think it’s close. And the neck is very non-Gibson in terms of headstock -use a modified version of my standard neck for this model. The tunomatic and tailpiece are models off GrabCad (Here, tailpiece by the same user)

LP_Gold_Standard_mattia_v1.f3z

drive.google.com

for the fusion users: top created with a pair of lofts, using a cutout of the first to define the midplane for the second, which gave me smoother results. The neck is parametric (modify -> edit parameters to tweak things like nut width, headstock angle), although it breaks the model if you don’t roll back to before the heel and tenon were modelled, and then roll forward again. Not sure why. It’s version 1.

I’ve got the profiles tweaked to the splines and the height, which don’t adhere all that well to the isocurves, but I think the look is right. For machining, the tenon and pickup cavities are extruded at the 4 degree angle of the neck plane.

comments and suggestions more than welcome, still pretty new at modeling! Do and modify as you see fit, if you do use it I would love to hear about it, and credit this post/resource! View attachment 567096

Awesome work, and thanks for sharing! I've messed around with modeling the carve top using NX, but I don't have the CAM license for NX, so once I eventually build a CNC I will have to lean Fusion so this will be very helpful!