Winter build off 2019 - Victory 5D

[Jon Clegg]

This mashup will be made up of the following design elements:

- Gibson Victory Bass-Side of the Body
- Fender Dimension Treble-Side of the body with the Victory Bevel on the lower cutaway
- Bolt-On 5 String Fender/MM Style Neck
- 5 String MM Style Bridge

Specs:
Body: 2-piece Cherry back, Walnut accent layer, quilted Maple top, chambered
Neck: Maple with Maple Fret-board, Black Block fret markers, black binding from eBay vendor.
Neck Type: Bolt On
Scale Length 34"
Strings: 5
Electronics: Wilkinson 5-String MM Pickup, Passinwind's Open Source LPF Preamp.
Controls: Volume, Bass/Treble (stacked), LPF Cutoff, LPF Resonance
Color: Natural finish

Police composite picture:

 

[Jon Clegg]

More fully realized composite:

 

[Beej]

Cool!

 

[Jon Clegg]

Clamp farming!

Will it put a smile on my face five miles wide?

 

[bound'n'blocked]

Got a "Rick-ish" look to it...


BnB

 

[Jon Clegg]

Got a "Rick-ish" look to it...


BnB

Didn't notice that before, but you're right.

 

[Reedt2000]

I don't know if you have the pickup yet but a slanted MM pickup would look really cool and be a nod to the victory bass. Maybe a blade pickup meant for a wider spacing?

 

[Jon Clegg]

Already have the MM pickup. I might look into that since I haven't routed anything yet. If I did a slanted pickup it would be a less severe slant than the Victory, more in line with the lines of the dimension pickguard.

 

[Jon Clegg]

Well I tried a slanted MM style pickup on my composite photo, and I'm not sold on it.

Meanwhile, I'm piecing up the walnut layer from a couple of 1/8" x 3" x 18" pieces of walnut I picked up off of eBay: The piece for the upper horn needs to be 20" long, so I'll splice two together:

the trick will be to position the splice away from the bass-side chamfer.
The glued-up back:


I'm thinking of putting a 3/8" wide back strip down the center to obscure the non match. (Also I like back strips!) I'm thinking a central stripe of walnut flanked by strips of maple or cherry with two more strips of walnut. to contrast with the cherry.

 

[Beej]

The glued-up back:

I'm thinking of putting a 3/8" wide back strip down the center to obscure the non match. (Also I like back strips!) I'm thinking a central stripe of walnut flanked by strips of maple or cherry with two more strips of walnut. to contrast with the cherry.
View attachment 3260936

Fantastic idea, I just may have to poach that sometime...

 

[Jon Clegg]

Fantastic idea, I just may have to poach that sometime...

You could even fry, scramble, or hard-boil it

 

[Jon Clegg]

Decided to make my back strip from mahogany, maple and walnut

Milled to size and ready for installation

Installed, about 1/16" proud.

Milled flush wiped with a bit of naptha:

Other side flattened

Next I'll cut the body to shape and apply the walnut layer.

 

[Jon Clegg]

Back roughly band-sawed to shape:

Cherry is tough stuff! Much harder to cut than the walnut I used in last year's build! While routing the channel for the back-strip went really smooth, I'm thinking that the final trim to shape will be done with the spindle sander to avoid all kinds of nasty tear-out problems.

 

[Beej]

I bought a bunch of cherry this past summer too and have been working it into more instruments. So far seems to be making pretty good body cores for me. This is coming along nicely...

 

[Jon Clegg]

I bought a bunch of cherry this past summer too and have been working it into more instruments. So far seems to be making pretty good body cores for me. This is coming along nicely...

Thanks! I bought a nice 4/4 (almost 5/4) piece 8" wide and about 6' long for around $20; planning on maybe making an SG/EB-3 core out of what's left.

 

[Beej]

The price is another nice feature. I'm not paying very much for it either! I also like that it looks like I can regularly get it in 6/4, so a little less milling and loss to shavings as well.

 

[Jon Clegg]

Added the walnut layer: since I wanted to maintain the centerline as a reference for the top, I started from the inside out:

Several steps later, coarsely trimmed and ready for some Bruce-i-fication routs before I put on the top.

 

[Jon Clegg]

Spent some time marking out Bruce-i-fication routs and wiring channels

The Bruce-i-fication routs will be 3/8" wide with 3/8" walls. I'll do the actual routs tomorrow.

 

[Jisch]

And people say I'm moving fast? You've got three builds going at once! nicely done.

 

[Jon Clegg]

And people say I'm moving fast? You've got three builds going at once! nicely done.

Thanks! I'm trying to do common operations at the same time to minimize tool setup. It's funny but it feels like I'm dragging compared to everybody.