this is what i’ve been up to today….. glued the neck on the streamline, started cutting the brand new logo in pearl (the crappy look surface is acrylic paint to take the pencil line) and started the bracing process on the twins. good day so far;)

Live at The Dog’s Bollix on Saturday, loud as hell, i believe all you could hear was that nasty red guitar…..

Live at The Dog’s Bollix on Saturday, loud as hell, i believe all you could hear was that nasty red guitar…..

Hey, Yo! finished cutting the sound holes on “the Twins” and before you asked, no cnc machining here, just good old fashioned carpal tunnel syndrome….. i’ve also carved the recurve on the streamline, and had a productive chat with a potential customer who still sees the value in old world craftmanshipness. off to beer now….. NOW!

Streamline archtop acoustic neck in the process of fretting….. crazy wild Rimu fretboard, goes from zero to hero! spent today having a break from guitars, building some boxes for my brother in law. He has a fishing shop in auckland city, W.S Laurie & Co, pretty mean place if you like fishing….. which i don’t…… cause i suck at it…… and cause the ocean makes me feel claustrophobic. also, playing at The Dog’s Bollix on saturday night, should be a bloody good show!

I managed a fair bit today, and i’m not done yet! got the finger board on the neck which allowed me to square up the neck and cut the profile, then do a dry fit on the neck joint…. i’m a happy camper. next is fretting, inlaying, carving the rest of the recurve and gluing in the neck. final sand and it’s off to paint. i’ll be done by next winter i suppose;)

The week started ok, but i got sick, and frustrated, so instead of some great milestone this week all i can show you guys are the bits and pieces i worked on in the hope that they will help me this coming week to get some stuff sorted. so in no particular order, coffee, binding with rewarewa (new zealand native) a couple of jigs i made, and the acoustic twins, with non matching/matching sound holes…. well in pencil at least;)

i'm looking to improve / customize one of my guitars but not sure where to start! it's a very very basic strat copy (hence the fact i'm risking customizing it). my skills are fairly basic but im just wondering what advice you'd give a first time customizer. Cheers — Asked by oxfordbornnotbred

Hey, good on you for having a go! that’s where it all begins you know. My suggestion would  be to look at who your musical influences are, you know, who plays a strat with tone you like. If you took hendrix as an example, you wouldn’t need to do much, maybe look at getting some kick ass pickups and putting them in. They make a huge difference. The bottom line with all modification is that you should only modify what you can justify. There will be little point in installing a new neck pickup if you hardly ever use it in the first place.

So interms of pickups, have a look around the web and see who is using what, then have a crack! nothing ventured nothing gained!

When it comes to Hardware, you’re looking to make sure all the pieces work well and work together properly. One of the first hardware changes i would make on a strat would be the tuning machines, as they are normally pretty average and they’ll help get the best performance out of you guitar. Next would be a nut replacement, ensuring there are no components that diminish the natural unamplified resonance of your guitar…. graphtech nuts are super good. Check out www.stewmac.com for their trade secrets newsletter which is really helpful with things like nut setups. Any more questions, fire away!

cheers

Glenn

Well, my true channel routing jig finally arived, thanks a bunch dhl and courier post for making a 3 day transit a 15 day wait in hell. booo hisssssss.

But on the bright side, it’s all set up and installed and despite the man flu i have contracted, i’ve managed to get the top and back plates trimmed to the sides, and today i will rout for binding. I’ve also managed to get a new neck jig all sorted, after i broke the last one, and this one is better in so many ways. but more to come on that one later. 

So it looks like i’ll be able to get the neck fabricated and onto the body this week, which could mean into paint next week. Good…… i really need to sell some of these guitars, might help feed the kids and all. next stop. a real web site. B00M.

It’s been a productive week so far, i’ve carved the back plate, and braced the top plate, tap tuned the top plate, made a new body mold, bent the sides, fitted neck and tail blocks and begun the linings, perhaps this week i’ll get the body all ready for a neck. fun times!!

Maxwell Custom Guitars 5 String bass. This guitar really cranks! it’s resonant and lively, has huge bottom end and really shiny top’s. It’s ALL New Zealand grown timber, Monterey Cypress body, Rimu neck and fingerboard and Rewarewa headstock facing. 

Hipshot bridge, Gotoh tuners, Bartolini musicman stingray style pickup with a seymour duncan preamp (bass mid treble and push/pull switch for fat eq)….. it’s all too much! we played it breifly at band practice this week and it was ahhhhmazing! B00M!