My £100 Guitar Challenge 09

It lives...

2009-03-05T15:14:00.000-08:00

Ok, I'm a little late with this post but I've been distracted by my new guitar! It's a bit of a beast!
Having stained the body, I finished it with a couple of coats of Danish Oil (with a bit more stain added) and then wire wooled it when it had dried. A coat of Briwax to polish it up and the body was done! I over-rubbed some areas to give a worn look to compliment the worn EMG pickup covers. I think it works really well.
The headstock got my tribal monogram and lots of clear lacquer before getting a sand back and a polish.
So one month, less than £100, and here's the result: the SM Viper!
I'm so chuffed that I managed it all in the month deadline! The first week went really well but by week 3 I was still wondering what finish to go for. I really fancied giving the camo finish a go but I didn't want to risk screwing the whole thing up, and in reality there really wasn't enough time to try something as complicated as that. But it is something I'm going to try on a scrap piece of wood at some point, just out of curiosity. The ebony stain and oil finish was also a first for me, so I'm totally delighted that it turned out ok. I've used oil in the past on furniture but I wasn't sure how tough it would be on a guitar. It turns out that it works just fine! And I got the exact sheen I was after too. Not too matt, not too glossy, just right.

There's never 3 bears handy when you need them, is there?...

I've loved this build. The time and budget constriction really made me think about what was achievable, and I pulled it off. The body carving was a great night! The tunes were blasting and my chisel was flying! And it's amazing what you can put together with a small budget and a lot of thought.

Now, I really must build that Tele I promised myself. Oh, and an Explorer too while I'm at it.

Happy days!!!

I'm sure there was something else...

2009-02-26T13:30:00.000-08:00

So I've spent the last week concentrating on the staining and oiling of the body.

I wasn't happy with the finish on the front, so I had to strip it back and start again. A bit of a pain admittedly, but nothing major, just a small set back. I applied a few coats of Danish oil with some added stain and left them to dry. This all took several days but the end result looks promising.

But on Tuesday night, with a week left before the challenge deadline, something was bothering me. Had I done something wrong? Had I forgotten to drill something before I'd started on the finish? No, everything was as it should be. And then it hit me.

I still had a headstock to shape, paint and lacquer! How could I forget about that? Mild panic! Haha, what an idiot!

Nothing a coping saw, a Dremel and some sandpaper can't fix, mind you. An hour later and I'd cut the ESP style shape and sanded the whole thing down ready for spraying. And here it is with some initial coats of black:

Still got a logo to put on and then some top coats of clear lacquer. I'm going to go with my tribal monogram that I put on MFK's Explorer, it works really well with this style of guitar. A couple of nights and I reckon it'll be done!

You can have any colour as long as it's black

2009-02-22T10:43:00.001-08:00

Ok, so it's been a few days but I've made progress. Honest!

After much humming and hawing about finishes, I've settled on an ebony stain. I was going to try a graphic paint job but there simply isn't enough time, and I don't want to mess up a decent bit of wood with paint. There's some nice grain on this cherry and it would be great to bring it out as well as get a black(ish) finish. I tried some other colours/finishes but they didn't bring out the grain the way the ebony did, so it was no contest in the end.

So here we have some detail of the stain with the grain:

Once I've sealed it with oil, it'll darken a bit more, but still leave the grain texture visible as well as the red figuring lines, which I really like. Its a shame there's more on the back than on the front! It should only take a couple of days to get some coats of oil on and then I can fit the whole guitar together.

Backside

2009-02-16T15:53:00.000-08:00

So yesterday (Sunday) was spent getting the rear cavity routed out and the back carved to match the front. It took pretty much the whole day, save for a trip to the chip shop, but it was worth it because I now have this:

So that's it! It just needs some final sanding with some high grit paper and then it can get sprayed. I'm still arguing with myself as to what finish to go for. It would really suit a black finish as it's getting a set of active EMGs in it, so metal is most certainly the flavour. But then I've seen ESP do it in a camo finish and I think that could look killer too. And then there's cherry red! And purple!

Well, maybe not purple (sorry, Junior).

I'll weigh up the options tomorrow and make a start on the finishing on Wednesday.

Here's my spend so far:
Body : £2.50 (reclaim yard)
Neck and hardware : £25.00 (from a donor guitar)
Neck screws and ferrules : £3.95 (Axetec)
EMG 81/85 active pickups with full wiring and pots : £42.62 (bought from an ad on musicradar.com)
Current total : £74.07

Friday pints?

2009-02-13T16:40:00.000-08:00

It's Friday!
It's that day that you spend at work looking forward to that pint at half 5...
So why am I not in the pub? Everyone else seems to be. Even my girlfriend has went out for the night.
No, I'm at home, in the kitchen carving my body! And if truth be told I'm loving every minute.
There's something very primal about this whole guitar building thing. Tonight, it's just me, a slab of wood and a chisel. It's like I'm Stone Age man and I've got an axe head to make so I can hunt and feed my family. It really feels that essential! I NEED to carve the body of this guitar and nobody's going to stop me.

This feels good. It's been a while since I've had to do this sort of thing and I've really missed it. I used to be a furniture maker and it has been many years since I've had a reason to chisel away at something just for the sheer hell of it. Bring it on!

And here it is, 3 hours later. The front is now totally carved and sanded and I'm ready to do the back now. But it's late and I really deserve a beer!
Woohoo! Friday pints wins after all!

Screwing

2009-02-12T12:47:00.000-08:00

Not much done today.
I got the neck holes drilled for the recessed ferrules and I screwed the neck on.
I'd do more but there's stuff on tv soon that I want to watch, which may or may not involve vodka.
Happy days!

Anagramalinglong

2009-02-11T16:18:00.001-08:00

I had plans for today. Big plans. I was going to get all the routing done and hopefully the carving too. But alas, it was not to be.

It all went wrong when I woke up this morning with someone's name in my head. A name I'd seen at work yesterday. A name calling out for an anagram.

That name was Shamugam Sriskantharajam.

Now do you see why I got sidetracked? How could I possibly let that name slip by without a decent attempt at making it better?

So rather than attack the guitar, my morning was spent with tea and chocolate, some paper and a pen...

And this is what happened:

Manga mum's Sikh Sahara jar!

Fabulous! I was happy with that. I went to the shed and set up my tools, but, some more words came in to my head and so I returned to the paper and the pen and the tea and the chocolate. And lo:

Hamas jam: man 'H' at sugar risk!

Oh yes! Give that man a pound!

"Enough" I said. "There is a guitar to be built"!

So only got a couple of things done today, but I'm sure you'll agree it was worth the distraction.

Routed out the pickup cavities using a template left over from a previous build

Ooo, moody!

Brrr!!!!

2009-02-10T12:14:00.000-08:00

So what to do with my Sunday off?

Snowboarding? Hmm, very tempting with all that lovely snow... but no.

Or I could sit inside with the heating on, eating pizza and drinking wine.

No. I won't do that cos that's silly.

No, I know what I'll do, I'll go outside and stand in my freezing shed all day. That's a MUCH better idea! Well, you've got to suffer for your art, right?

So with ice cold hands and steamed up goggles, I got the neck pocket routed and angled, and drilled and fitted the bridge and tailpiece.

Went back inside to the comfort of central heating and had a test fit to make sure the bridge position was ok and the neck was sitting straight. And all was good! :)

I'll get the pickup and cavity routs done on Wednesday, and then it's on to the fun bit: carving!

Oh no! Snow!

2009-02-02T15:44:00.000-08:00

Day 2 of the wonderful challenge, and the weather decides to show its face and ruin it for everyone! Well, some of them taking part didn't want to venture outside but I worked round it. To be fair, it didn't really snow much here, but I did have some outdoors cutting to do and there was no way I was doing it in the dark, cold and wet. So I emptied one of my sheds and rigged up some electrics to it. Lo and behold, I was able to router round the template to get a nice clean body! And all from the relative comfort of a 4'x6' shed. Luxury!Not much cleaning up to be done on the edges, which is great. In case you're wondering, it's based on an ESP Viper, and I've drawn on the lines for the body carving. I wasn't entirely sure what wood I'd ended up buying. Initially it looked like mahogany, but having cut it and seen the end grain, I'm pretty sure it's cherry. It was hard to tell in the timber yard as it was heavily varnished and also had bonding agent on the underside. But cherry's nice!

Tools!

2009-02-02T15:22:00.000-08:00

Ok, so here's the plan. I've got a donor neck but I want to build a new body for it. Having tried various sources I finally found a length of quality hardwood at my local timber reclamation yard. It's 50mm thick and cost me a paltry £7.50! Bargain. It's long enough for 3 bodies, so the wood for this build comes in at £2.50. Not bad! I cut it to length and then reduced the thickness using a combination of plane, router and sander. I cut a body template from MDF and used that on the wood to rough cut the shape with a jigsaw. Aren't tools great?

Yep, you guessed it! I ran out of sun. I just had enough light to do the rough cut but then I called it a day. A good start!

And so it begins...

2009-02-02T14:49:00.000-08:00

The £100 guitar challenge 2009 is GO GO GO!
Some ingenious people over on the musicradar.com forum have laid down the gauntlet for all who want to try: can you put together a guitar for no more than £100, and complete it within a month? That's the kind of challenge I like!

So, question 1: Can I build a guitar for under £100? Well, of course I can. I can buy a guitar brand new for that money so of course it's feasible to make one.
Question 2: Can I complete it within a month? Now that's a different story. I've got a day job, I don't have a workshop, it's February, and living in the north of Scotland means I run out of daylight for working outside by the time I get home!

What am I going to do...???