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another in a series of DIY exploits...
I recently finished making a guitar... this wasn't a 'new' project. ive been working on it off and on for about a year now; maybe even more. at first i wanted to make a fretless bass/guitar type thing which would be used sort of as a cello... my interest waned on this initial idea..
a year later, i begin work again on the guitar after being very bored one day. I sanded down the guitar... and got lots of laquer and paint fumes in my lungs, so... tip #1 always wear a dust mask of some kind, i dont know how many of you wouldn't but ALWAYS do it. I even doing when soldering for extended periods of time now.
In the orriginal phase of working on the guitar...(when i wanted it to be a cello, i sanded the neck down poorly and as a result it was not a smooth surface, there was lots of ridges... i sanded too much aroudn the frest. also i hacked apart the body of the guiar (it was a gibson copy)... bad idea. this would come to haunt me later.
again, jump ahead a year to where i was sanding without a mask... i get it all stripped of paint and stain it. relaquer it. im not impressed by the way it looks, looks hacked up, which it was. in a nice stroke of luck a friend brings by a guitar that he doesnt use, its missign some hardware but it will do well in this project. it's missing the tuning heads and apparently the pickups don't work...
after being put off from the shitty outcome, i realize the guitar the guy dropped off is perfect to use, the body, neck, pickups, etc. so i have a big burst of energy in this project and sand it down (with a mask of course this time), paint it matte black, install the new tuning heads and somewhat repair the pickups. it was laughable inside... the reason why it didnt work was, one the jack wasn't properly grounded. not everything was connected to ground. the volume pot wasnt hooked up, and the pickup selector switches also were tied to ground so when you tried to turn on the pickup it would actualy short to ground too! what idiocy!
What the design turned to of the guitar was a more baritone guitar i guess. i wanted to use it to make low and heavy riffs basicaly. metal stuff. i opted to go with a A string on bass, low B on guitar, and an E and A. so it would have a very heavy sound. also, yes 4 strings.
The orriginal bridge on this guitar was... CRAP. i dont remember what kind he called it, something with a "B" "bogsworth" maybe? it was a bridge with a whammy on it. anyways. it was missing the whammy bar and the spring it needed to bring it back to the orriginal state. so if it got pressed down, the guitar would go out of tune by a semitone. this wasn't good because it tended to stick in that position and not return back.
got the guitar somewhat set up... sounded pretty good but constantly went out of tune after playing it for about 30 seconds!
so... went to my local guitar shop today and talked with the people there for a while. apparently there has to be a 'scale' for the guitar... and it should be the overall length from the nut to the bridge. this is news to me, since im not a guitarist. it also apparently needs to be the same distance from the nut to the 12th fret as the 12th fret to the bridge. and this gutiar did not have that. one reason why it wouldnt stay in tune. and two, the bridge was horrific. they said to make the overall scale 24 3/4"...
they suggest i buy a new bridge, and show me a bass bridge. it was relativley cheap, so i baught it. also got a new strap peg, gotta have one if im gonna play metal.
get home, take the strings off, installed the new bridge with the measurements in mind. restrung the guitar... and! it works! excellent, doesnt go out of tune horribly now! now on to further fixing the pickups and internal electronics.... oh! i forgot to mention, whoever wired this guitar up before also made the tone pot wrong, used a way too big of a cap and also grounded one the free lug on the potentiometer so it would act as tone AND volume...sheesssshhh.
I changed what the switches did... (i think they were using it to sort of phase with the two pickups using the + and - of the pickups, but of course it didnt end up that way for them... so i changed it so the switches turn on and off the pickups and the two pots are pickup volumes. now, get that all finished.... go into my studio, plug it in and! WHAMMMM sounds awesome! soo fucking heavy. tuning is nice and stable now. i can't wait to record with it.
ill get pics up when i take some, its very 'metal' looking, all matte black, and chrome accessories.
so, all in all, it took about...50$ to build. about 18$ for the strings (a string cost the most at 9$), and 24$ for the hardware: new nut, bridge, strap peg. and we'll say the remainder was misc supplies, spray paint, sand paper, etc.
the majority of time spent working with the new guitar body (which by the way ISNT the gibson copy...) which i consider is the time it took, really was about 3 days. not bad! its a nice guitar for gigs, because i dont care too much about smashing it up.
hope you enjoy this little DIY exploit read.
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10/10/07
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bleen
you know the drill...
pics or STFU! 
10/11/07
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adcBicycle
yep, I'm illiterate...
needs pics.
10/11/07
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mynameismud
metalllllllllllllllll ive been stagnating on a diy guitar build project.. i made a body from wood, it remains unpainted, i have pickups/hardware in boxes
10/11/07
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Psyingo
dood, do it, its not hard!
10/11/07
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utofbu
thats so great! and to think i wasted money on a tele
10/11/07
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mlbot
Pics and Mp3s
in the meantime, you stfu, everyone else can enjoy:
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link
10/11/07
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Roshi
LOL @ wangcaster
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