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This is my first home built electric guitar. I wanted a high probability
of success so I opted to buy a completed neck from Stewart MacDonald's. Maybe next time I'll build my own. The body is a single piece of mahogany which I found in a local exotic wood shop for $25. The fretboard is rosewood. The bridge pickup is a Seymour Duncan JB model. The neck is a Seymour Duncan Jazz model.
The body is finished with Tru-Oil gunstock finish which is a polymerized linseed oil. It cures hard and can be built up into a thick finish, unlike raw or boiled linseed oil. I applied it with a paper towel. About 5 coats with 0000 steel wool in between every other coat. Took about half of a 3 oz bottle. Total cost of finish.....$3.00. Cha-Ching! I was afraid that the guitar would be especially "dark" sounding due to what I've read about mahogany and rosewood, but it turns out it's not. It sure is fun playing a guitar you made yourself! Weight - 8.8 lbs. |
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I've included a close-up of the string ferrules as this part gave me a lot of trouble. I ended up doing the inlay to cover up the first attempt. Just had to show that I did finally get it right.
Bass Guitar
One year later I built a bass guitar. This one is made from Ash. Not swamp ash, just ash. Probably the kind a baseball bat would be made of. The color is Minwax Accents Stain, Hunter Green. I think it may be more of a dye than a stain, maybe a mixture of the two. There was no clumpy substance in the can that needed to be mixed in. Anyway, it was very easy to get a light even color but a bit more difficult to get it dark and even. I persisted and it turned out ok.
This one is also covered with Tru-Oil. 4 or 5 coats. Nice and shiny although I didn't bother with filling the pores. Doesn't matter though because it looks just fine. Neck by Carvin. Still haven't wanted to tackle a neck. The pickups are Seymour Duncan Quarter Pounders with a blend pot. The bass sounds great through my Nemesis NC210 combo.
Equipment Update! It sounds even better through my Eden WT550 Traveler paired with an Eden 410xlt.
Weight - 9.8 lbs.
2nd Bass Guitar
I couldn't really find passive pickups with pole pieces that would line up with the strings on this bass - so I went with the Active Soap Bar pickups from Seymour Duncan. I was initially unhappy with the sound of the bass - I was getting an annoying "thump" type of sound, especially on the A string. I finally figured out that it was my finger striking the open E string after plucking the A string that was causing the "thump" sound. I didn't have that problem on a four string bass, since my thumb would be resting on the E string in that situation. The problem was solved by restringing the bass with a high C string instead of the low B. Now I can play a somewhat annoying version of Blackbird. :)
Weight - 9.2 lbs.
I finally got up the courage to build a neck. First I bought the pre-slotted Bocote wood fingerboard. Then I let it sit in my basement for a couple of years before stumbling upon some Maple at the local lumberyard. It's probably not the right kind of Maple, but the price was such that I wasn't going to feel bad if I ruined it. As it happens, the neck turned out quite well. I "completed" the neck 3 times before I got it down to a reasonable thickness.
Feel free to e-mail me with any questions or comments.
