Singlecut semi-hollowbody electric #015

Sitka spruce.

Lacewood.

The top glued and ready to start carving the arch.

The body has been routed with a template to remove the mass of material that makes this a semi-hollow.

The same template will serve to route the perimeter.

The body completely routed.

The top carved.

Straight edges are placed over the top to show the arch better.

Roughing out the inside arch.

Inside carve complete.

Body and top so far. Ready for bracing.

Braces are carved for an exact fit. No slop is tolerated for the braces.

Braces are glued into place.

Bracing complete. The brace ends will be locked into place when glued to the body.

The headplate veneers are glued onto the front and back of the headstock.

Neck taper and headstock shape are routed next.

Single top sound hole is sawed out with a coping saw.

The soundhole is smoothed and shaped with a razor and files.

Soundhole complete.

The top glued onto the body. Sweet!~

The recurve is starting to be carved.

The tailpiece in place to show how the guitar will look.

The binding is cut and taped into place after the inlay is completed.

The truss rod is filed round on the ends so that it fits into the round bottom slot.

The fingerboard is glued on. The tape over the truss rod prevent too much glue
from getting into the truss rod slot. The squeeze out will be enough to cover to the edge of
the channel. I use pieces of binding placed on the edges of the fingerboard with a larger clamping
board on top to make sure the edges are clamped tight.

Once glued the fingerboard is routed to fit using the neck as a template on the router table.

Here is a close up of the dragonfly inlay.

The next few photos show how I do the side dot markers. I use a shell dot, in this case Paua, and tubing to surround it. I used silver. First the holes are drilled.

For each dot the silver tubing is cleared and filed to fit the slightly oversized shell dot.

The tubing is pressed over the dot and tapped into place with a small hammer.

The dot is in place.

The tubing is cut the length of the dot material thickness.

The dot ready to glue.

The dot complete and ready to sand flush.

The bridge blank is scribed along the arched top.

It is then cut on a bandsaw and filed to shape.

I made this jig from the Benedetto book to sand the bridge bottom on the arched top.

The jig in action.

Perfect fit!

The bridge pieces:

The bone saddle. This is going to have a bone nut as well. It should have a great acoustic tone.

The outline of the bone is scribed onto the ebony piece with an awl.

Chalk is rubbed into the outline to give us a line to work with.

The ebony is taped to the table and 2 rails hold the router to height. The outline is routed to 3/16".

There is a little slop in the cut.

A mixture of epoxy and ebony wood dust is prepared.

After wetting the slot with just epoxy the mixture is pressed into the slot.

The bone saddle is waxed heavily and pressed into the slot and clamped until cured.

With just the saddle in a vise hit the ebony with a small hammer to realease.

Another perfect fit! Works great on acoustic guitar bridges too.

Next the thumbscrew holes are drilled.

Thumbscrews are in place.

The bridge is ready for final shaping and carving.

Here is a pic of my homemade fret press. I cut off an end of a Stew Mac radius sanding block and put a dowel in it to fit onto a drill press.

Here is a pic showing the fret being cut to size and the end overhang cut to fit over the binding.

All the frets ready to go.

First run a tiny bead of Titebond glue into the slot.

Then fit the fret in place. Use a small hammer if you need to tap it in a bit.

Then press it in with the fret press. Make sure it seats well.

The fret cleaned of glue and the ends trimmed.

The whole neck fretted.

The final step involves putting one drop of gap filling super glue on every fret end. This keeps strings from getting underneath them.

This setup is for routing the neck pocket. The guitar is clamped into place and the neck is clamped onto the straight edges.

Next a back stop is clamped into place and two layers of tape are put on the stright edges. For the final pass the tape is removed.

Nice tight fit!

Here is a shot from the front.

Top view.

The neck roughed carved.

Back view of the neck glued in place. That lacewood looks nice!

Top view of the neck in clamps.

Tailpiece slotted for the hinge.

Hinge detail

Complete. The rod is steel and the hole will be filled.

The guitar ready for lacquer. A coat of blonde shellac has been applied to give it that amber tone.

The wiring harness.

Ebony pickup rings. These are made with 1/8" thick pieces. First the ring is glued together and then a top piece is fitted. The holes will be routed nad drilled after shaping.

Sandpaper is taped to the guitar body to sand the covers to fit the curve exactly.

Fit to the curve.

          



Single cut Semi-hollowbody Electric #015
Top: Sitka Spruce
Body: Lacewood
Neck: Honduran Mahogany
Fingerboard: Ebony
Scale Length: 24.625?
Frets: 21
Pickups: Bartolini ZBS-75?s
Switching: Master volume, master tone,
      series/parallel pan for each pickup
Tuners: Waverly w/Ebony Knobs
Finish: Nitrocellulose Lacquer