Musiclogic
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- Aug 6, 2005
- 6,505
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- Owner/Builder: HJC Customs USA, The Cool Lute, C G O
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5 string fretless showcase: Habanero V
- Thread starter adam.beauchene
- Start date
Thanks, everybody. That's one thing I enjoy about this forum, it's really positive, we're all encouraging each other... a nice break from, say, the comments on CNN. Jeez.
Anyway, Design Change 1... I'm going to use Schaller BMLs instead of sperzels on this one. I have 4 already, and their light weight makes them a nice choice for this bass. I've got one more on the way. It also means I had to redesign the headstock, to accomodate the larger BMLs:
It looks big on the bass, but it really is a small body. Not quite as small as the headless habanero, though. I'm still playing with the cavities as well, probably not going to end up with 2.
Anyway, Design Change 1... I'm going to use Schaller BMLs instead of sperzels on this one. I have 4 already, and their light weight makes them a nice choice for this bass. I've got one more on the way. It also means I had to redesign the headstock, to accomodate the larger BMLs:
It looks big on the bass, but it really is a small body. Not quite as small as the headless habanero, though. I'm still playing with the cavities as well, probably not going to end up with 2.
The new h/stock looks good. Just...to my eyes the sharp swirl and edges at the top of the h/s don't fully echoes the rather smooth lines of the body. Yes, there is a sharp angle in the body too. But it's hidden by the neck. I would probably round up the edges of the h/stock just a bit. But that's me 
Cavities are a good thing if you what to keep the weight down. And they're fun to route 
I'd go for two. I suppose you could move the tuners closer to each other? that would give you a more compact h/s.... well...did I confuse you enough? I can go on forever 
Cavities are a good thing if you what to keep the weight down. And they're fun to route I'd go for two. I suppose you could move the tuners closer to each other? that would give you a more compact h/s.... well...did I confuse you enough? I can go on forever 
I like the headstock a lot better than the first one. For some reason it complements the design of the body better and now it is more balanced I think. Go for it! 
Thanks guys, I appreciate your input. I seem to have a really hard time designing headstocks that are congruent with the body, but I like this one. It took me a long time despite it's simplicity. Kind of like Ric's 'cresting wave' without ripping off Ric, and a little like Jerzy Drozd without blatantly ripping him off, either. I think I'll roll with it. It should look nice with a cocobolo veneer.
Got some full-size plans printed at staples, time to start on a neck...
Got some full-size plans printed at staples, time to start on a neck...
Got a little bit done today! Truss rod channel:
It takes forever to get set up doing it with a fence like this, and I can never get it exactly in the center. This one is off by about .5mm, won't see it under the truss rod cover but still. I need to make a truss rod jig.
Cut the neck taper:
And bookmatched some headstock veneer.
It takes forever to get set up doing it with a fence like this, and I can never get it exactly in the center. This one is off by about .5mm, won't see it under the truss rod cover but still. I need to make a truss rod jig.
Cut the neck taper:
And bookmatched some headstock veneer.
Looking good! Nice headstock veneer; how thick are these?
That routing of the trussrod chanel. Mostly I use a gide beam(long straight piece of wood with carpet tape fixed to table) and center the neck with the gides of the router to it.
That routing of the trussrod chanel. Mostly I use a gide beam(long straight piece of wood with carpet tape fixed to table) and center the neck with the gides of the router to it.
Just finished taking them down to just under 1mm on my safety planer, they're edge gluing now. I'll scrape them to about .5mm one they're glued in place.
Epoxied the headstock core and ears. Forgot to take intermediate pics, and sorry for using my cell phone 
Headstock roughed out.
Making headstock veneers tomorrow, better pics, promise
EDIT:
Grabbed my camera after dinner, and grabbed some details of the roughed out headstock. The scarf will be hidden under veneers. You can see how my safety planer is getting dull, it burned the maple a little bit. Time to find the directions on sharpening that thing.
Headstock roughed out.
Making headstock veneers tomorrow, better pics, promise
EDIT:
Grabbed my camera after dinner, and grabbed some details of the roughed out headstock. The scarf will be hidden under veneers. You can see how my safety planer is getting dull, it burned the maple a little bit. Time to find the directions on sharpening that thing.
Let me know how it works out. I recently sharpened mine for the first time, and found the stone had much smaller radius corners than the "full bullnose" wheel that's used to produce the blades, so it was a bit of work, and I think the result could have been better with a better-shaped wheel.barnaclebeau said:
Thanks y'all.
Got a little done this morning. Put my wide re-saw blade on Little Tykes and made some headstock veneers:
That's cocobolo, maple, and ebony. I changed my mind on the previously-shown bookmatched headstock veneer, I think it will end up looking too busy so I'm going with this more understated stuff.
Then I finished shaping the headstock prior to lams:
While I was re-sawing, the furnace pulled that smoky cocobolo smell up into the house and gave my wife a huge headache. That stuff messes me up too, I wear a respirator when I cut it. My bad, I'm done for the morning.
Got a little done this morning. Put my wide re-saw blade on Little Tykes and made some headstock veneers:
That's cocobolo, maple, and ebony. I changed my mind on the previously-shown bookmatched headstock veneer, I think it will end up looking too busy so I'm going with this more understated stuff.
Then I finished shaping the headstock prior to lams:
While I was re-sawing, the furnace pulled that smoky cocobolo smell up into the house and gave my wife a huge headache. That stuff messes me up too, I wear a respirator when I cut it. My bad, I'm done for the morning.
OK, smoke's cleared out. Time to start laminating. Thin coat of epoxy on headstock and veneer:
Clamped up, the curve part is mashed down with foam. I learned that trick here in the LC but I can't remember who's thread to give credit to, my apologies.
Only have to do that 5 more times. Maybe I'll do the top veneers in one shot since they are flat.
So while the epoxy is curing, Time to work on fingerboard lines. Mine will just get regular lines in cocobolo, nothing fancy. I took a cabinet scraper to my fingerboard stock then tacked on the lines plan with spray adhesive:
I traced the lines with ball point pen to darken them a bit. Double checked the 12th fret distance before getting out the saw:
Hold up...that's supposed to be 17.000" inches. Maybe the spray adhesive made the paper expand. Checking the reference plan:
Aaaaarrrgggh, Staples printed it bigger than 1:1!
So I double checked the model, it's spot-on. And the printouts I am doing off my own printer are measuring right, so at least I haven't ruined any wood yet. I went back to Staples tonight, tried printing it again twice with both scaling off and scaling set at 100%, it was off by the same amount both times. So I'll be scraping that bad one off of my fingerboard, and trying to find somewhere else to get my plan printed. Even though it's just lines, I still want them accurate, so I'm not going to try taping together 8.5x11's or measuring them by hand.
Clamped up, the curve part is mashed down with foam. I learned that trick here in the LC but I can't remember who's thread to give credit to, my apologies.
Only have to do that 5 more times. Maybe I'll do the top veneers in one shot since they are flat.
So while the epoxy is curing, Time to work on fingerboard lines. Mine will just get regular lines in cocobolo, nothing fancy. I took a cabinet scraper to my fingerboard stock then tacked on the lines plan with spray adhesive:
I traced the lines with ball point pen to darken them a bit. Double checked the 12th fret distance before getting out the saw:
Hold up...that's supposed to be 17.000" inches. Maybe the spray adhesive made the paper expand. Checking the reference plan:
Aaaaarrrgggh, Staples printed it bigger than 1:1!
So I double checked the model, it's spot-on. And the printouts I am doing off my own printer are measuring right, so at least I haven't ruined any wood yet. I went back to Staples tonight, tried printing it again twice with both scaling off and scaling set at 100%, it was off by the same amount both times. So I'll be scraping that bad one off of my fingerboard, and trying to find somewhere else to get my plan printed. Even though it's just lines, I still want them accurate, so I'm not going to try taping together 8.5x11's or measuring them by hand.
I had major headaches with my Staples, too Wasted a night trying each large printer they had, with nothing close to proper scale.
Could be a mixture of paper and aluminum expansion/contraction. Is your rule aluminum or stainless? Looks about 3/32"
Pilot: I had good luck with Kinko's on my last two builds, but there isn't one around me. There's a commercial printing place I just found, I'll have to try it out. I'd love it if someone made a 12" wide laser printer that used roll paper, my printing headaches would be cured for life.
Greenman: discovered the problem with a steel rule, the photos are with an aluminum rule. It's about 50 degrees F in my shop. Same measurements in the 68 degree house.
Greenman: discovered the problem with a steel rule, the photos are with an aluminum rule. It's about 50 degrees F in my shop. Same measurements in the 68 degree house.
Aluminum 17" long going through a temperature change of 20 degrees F would only grow or shrink by .004", so that's not much of a factor in this. Stainless would be 2/3 of that.
Printers pretty much suck as a rule, when you want true scaled output. They don't even have the same error on each axis.
Printers pretty much suck as a rule, when you want true scaled output. They don't even have the same error on each axis.
