SBO 24 - My First neck-through

[trevorpell0]

Thinking out loud about order of operations here -

I need to shape the horns, I probably ought to do that before I glue on the wings, at least to the inside of the horns.
I need to glue on the fingerboard and radius it. I probably ought to do that before gluing on the wings also.

I've got some surgery to do on the headstock, I don't think that matters so much, re: wings, but maybe its easier to do that before the wings too so I'm not wielding the whole instrument around.

 

[ddm0502]

that purple really pops. I'd put some kind of UV resistant finish on it so it won't fade to brown. Anybody know what works over purpleheart?

My experience with purpleheart is it is very dull when freshly cut, and brightens up with exposure to light. In my well lit shop out of direct sun, it takes a few days. In direct sun, only a few hours. After that, I feel it keeps its color quite well even without a UV protective finish, as long as you keep it out of direct sun. A finish with UV protection would probably help, given that the color change (both the initial brightening and the later fading with age) is faster in the sun.

I don't have as much experience with purpleheart as I do with padauk. Padauk's color change varies quite a bit depending on the piece. Every piece I've had is bright orange when freshly cut, but where it goes from there varies. I've had some boards stay a rusty orange, not ad bright as fresh cut, but still orange. Most go a rich maroon. I had one board that went almost black. The purpleheart I've used so far all has come from the same board, so I don't know how variable it can be piece to piece.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

need to shape the horns, I probably ought to do that before I glue on the wings, at least to the inside of the horns.
I need to glue on the fingerboard and radius it. I probably ought to do that before gluing on the wings also.

Absolutely, I do EVERYTHING I can on the horns before gluing on the wings. Are you planning on pinning them to the neck beam with dowels or biscuits? I've been doing that for a while now, seems to work really well, makes glue-up alignment easy, and I think it makes the bass a lot stronger overall. Cool build!

 

[trevorpell0]

I got a bit of time today to open up the headstock. I have some ideas for the front and back using the cutoffs from the body part of the neck thru. I'll need to do a bit of layout to see how much wood I've actually got. I suppose for the same reason the neck did this, the headstock side cuts down to the wenge strip, its not my favorite, but I suppose its nice that there is a bit of symmetry here.

 

[trevorpell0]

Absolutely, I do EVERYTHING I can on the horns before gluing on the wings. Are you planning on pinning them to the neck beam with dowels or biscuits? I've been doing that for a while now, seems to work really well, makes glue-up alignment easy, and I think it makes the bass a lot stronger overall. Cool build!

I hadn't specifically thought about that yet, but yes that is a great idea. I will likely do something like this.

 

[trevorpell0]

More progress:

I rough shaped the back of the neck, rough radiused the fingerboard, did some shaping on the inner parts of the horns

, and put on plates on the front and back of the headstock. Overall, things have gone from a Prince kind of thing into a Ziggy Stardust kind of thing. Cool.

 

[trevorpell0]

I did a bit of the "art part" on the headstock, I'll do a bit more reshaping and sculpting into...something. I feel like I haven't found my artistic voice in the headstock part yet.

Absolutely, I do EVERYTHING I can on the horns before gluing on the wings. Are you planning on pinning them to the neck beam with dowels or biscuits?

I'm getting ready to glue the wings on, I'm going to follow @Gilmourisgod 's lead and I cut small biscuts to help that glue-up. I routed out small channels in the neck block and I'll do the same in the wings before final glue up. I think I've got to go borrow a few more clamps for that, I'd rather be safe than sorry there.

 

[Level5wizard]

That purple heart really pops.

 

[trevorpell0]

I got a bunch of time in the spider shack today.

I glued on the wings and did some body shaping here.

 

[trevorpell0]

I did some contouring on the back of the neck and on the fingerboard transition. I also made an electronics cavity cover.

 

[trevorpell0]

More progress here:
I routed pickup cavities. Between them, I routed down a bit and inlaid a piece of offcut from the fingerboard between them, that way, I can route a channel for the wire rather than try to drill between cavities.

I also made side dots, but I don't have a vice, so we need to get a bit creative.

 

[trevorpell0]

I made some knobs!

 

[trevorpell0]

One million hours of sanding, and then staining.

 

[Matt Liebenau]

One million hours of sanding, and then staining.

View attachment 7022715View attachment 7022716

Only a million? You must have skipped a few grits.

 

[BeMoreFrench]

How much stiff it is ? yes

 

[trevorpell0]

Only a million? You must have skipped a few grits.

Ha! yeah maybe a few. I couldn't find any 148.25 grit, but I got most of the others.

 

[trevorpell0]

How much stiff it is ? yes

Hopefully stiff enough to hold strings!

 

[BeMoreFrench]

Hopefully stiff enough to hold strings!

My guess is it can hold all those Millau Viaduct ones

 

[trevorpell0]

A few days of oiling, maybe 10 coats, I think we're ready to let it rest for a few days before final assembly.

 

[trevorpell0]

Ready to rip: