Tangent.... Up The Front at Motorhead NYC....

It was 9-9-09, and Motorhead were in town here in NYC playing the Roseland Ballroom....
After sending an email out to a bunch of friends to gather a posse, I headed to Roseland all by my lonesome. No-one was interested.... weird, I think - it's not everyday that Motorhead come to town.
Anyway, they were supported by Nashville Pussy and Reverend Horton Heat - neither of whom I had seen live.

Nashville Pussy's lead guitarist is a chunky chick, dressed in black skinny jeans (aka painted on jeans) and she slings a black SG. The moment she put her leg up on the foldback and literally ripped the strings off her SG, I was sold.
Reverend Horton Heat kind of started off 'cold'... and I was a little disappointed with the reverend's sound - his gretsch didn't have that snarly 'KKRANNGGGG' that we all know and love. After a few tunes, however, they warmed up. By the end, I wanted more - a great, tight little 3 piece with many cool psychobilly numbers.... and a mini country set to boot....

So there I was, all by meself.... damned if I wasn't going to get me a good spot. So I went right up to the front. As the lights dimmed, the crowd became increasingly dense. If you hadn't moved forward by this time, forget it. Ten feet behind the front row, a group of tattooed dudes with no shirts were starting to get 'antsy'. Once the show started they were full on shoulder thumping each other - super aggressively but that was their game. This went on throughout the show, as did the flow of bourbon.

Don't get me wrong, where I was located wasn't sesame street. It was basically a fight between falling and subsequent inevitable trampling and ducking out of the way when some crowd surfer's foot came from nowhere.

The mosh pit was surprisingly soft (blokes from Long Island covered in a layer of tatts, which covered a layer of the good life), and despite Matt Sorum's best efforts to impart rhythm to the experience (he was on drums that night) the crowd was surprisingly rhythmically challenged.

Finally, this was the loudest gig I've been too. Don't get me wrong - I like it loud - I used to gig with 2 marshall quadboxes in small clubs - but this was alarming. My brain was trembling. And by the next morning, hearing still hadn't been restored to it's pre Motorhead state. It meant that you couldn't really hear anything at all. Coupled with the fact that most of Motorhead's songs are heavily distorted E chords in various guises and the sound was essentially mush.

But I loved it anyway.

Shaping the neck!

Most of the big stuff is now done - so now I can actually do most of this at home - rather than go to the workshop. This means I can do it in the evenings, or when I have a spare hour or two.
I used a spokeshave (which is like a vegetable peeler for luthiers). Make sure you get one with a straight cutting edge. They come with radiused edges and I was a little confused as to which I needed.

So I clamped the neck in a vise, and started shaving. You pull the spokeshave toward yourself as you cut. Continue around the back of the neck, slowly, removing a little material at a time. The birds eye figure in the wood did make the blade jump around somewhat - as long as there is no gouge that goes deeper than you want to go...
I also used a rasp to remove large amounts of material.

Using a contour gauge, I measured the profile from my Fender Custom Shop Jerry Donahue Telecaster neck.... I made a form for the 1st fret, 5th and 12th frets.

I basically kept shaping til the neck matched the profiles I made. I also did some sanding with 180 grit in between.

Pearl Inlays

I decided to go with real Mother of Pearl inlays. 6mm diameter.
Best thing is to mark the center line of the neck, then make a cross using diagonally opposite corners of the rectangle that surrounds the destination of the dot.

The holes are best drilled with a 'Brad Point' drill bit - 6 mm. Brad Point bits produce razor sharp holes with no tear out. They also have a point which helps mark out the exact location of the hole...

You drill deep enough so that the inlay sits just proud of the hole. Then you sand it flush.

I used a drop of medium viscosity clear superglue to seat the inlays. You could also use black glue if you have a dark colored fingerboard.

Final Thicknessing - Neck

I needed to do a little more sanding here - using the 12" sanding block again. This time I was measuring in multiple spots along the length of the neck. I 'evened up' the thickness along the length, and took it down to just under 1" thick.
Ready for inlays.....

Routing the cavities..... DISASTER!!!! (almost)

Ok. Here is where inexperience can really suck. I certainly couldn't see this one coming.
The body template I was using is 1/4" thick. In order to rout the control cavity, I extended the router bit all the way out so that the flush trim bearing could ride on the template. This cause the bit to descend deep into the body.... and I commenced to rout. Then I heard the most awful crack you can imagine and the router was suddenly silenced.... It had kicked because of the amount of material I was trying to cut - and it basically burst out of control, eating a chunk out of the cavity in an area I was not planning to rout. The noise startled everyone in the workshop. All eyes on me. It looked ugly. I thought I was going to cry..... like a big sook.

Then I realized that the tele control plate will actually cover this eyesore..... In reality, I did have to do a minor repair to the bottom side, which actually looks great the pic isn't posted yet).

To solve the problem, I made another body template - this time using 1/2" MDF. I sandwiched the new one to the original 1'4" template (actually screwed them together).
This gave me the necessary height to be able to rout the cavities in multiple passes, extending the router with each pass....

Moral of this story? Always remove a little material at a time.....

Shaping The Body....

First, I needed to trim the maple top - it was wider than the body blank.
After drawing the outline, it was time to cut it out on the bandsaw.
Then I need to rout the sides.... It needed a pass on the top side as well as the bottom side - the router bit isn't long enough to do this in one pass....

Cleaning up the sides reveals that the top is attached cleanly... relief....

The Body Blank....

I bought a beautiful body blank that consists of 3 pieces of light swamp ash, joined by slices of Cocobolo Rosewood.... Really is stunning. The blank should give me a body that weighs in between 3-4lbs. Like everyone, I love a lightweight tele.... and in this case it's especially important because the maple top is heavier than the equivalent thickness in ash...

I marked out the center line (which will be lined up with the bookmatched seam), spread the glue, placed the top down and clamped it tight. I also put in a few wood screws (outside of the body area!) to make sure it didn't move while clamping.

It's a good idea to find a piece of hard steel to clam down the middle of the blank - it is very difficult to clamp firmly in the middle of the piece...

The last picture is after it has come out of clamps (I left it in clamps for 72 hours).

Glueing the top....

After a light sand with 180 grit, the top was ready to be bookmatched. A dose of Titebond spread evenly and then into the clamps..... Make sure to clamp it level ALL along!!! (I find these steps s little stressful!) If you have nice staright edges, a slightly uneven join will flatten out when you sand it.

Here it is dried, before sanding.

The Flame Top....

I bought a BEAUTIFUL piece of AAAA flamed Canadian maple from www.veddermountainhardwoods.com
It really is stunning. I'm not a great fan of flamed maple that looks relly straight and symmetrical... so this one has a little 'curl' in it....

So the trick here is the thickness the pieces, then cut a smooth edge on the side they will be joined....

Easier said than done!!

Of course I decided to thickness the UNDERSIDE, just in case I ran into problems.... I discovered that machine planers don't like flamed maple AT ALL. They chop out horrible chunks of the flame. I didn't realize that the density & structure of the flame caused structural fluctuations.... This would have been better achieved on a power sander. But we get by with what we have!!

The same 'chatter' occurred when I tried to use the jointer for the surfaces that were to be joined..... just couldn't get a clean cut.

So off to the table saw I went.... really - with a sharp thin blade, the table saw can produce a beautifully flat clean cut. Relief!

Sanding the transition on the head....

A spindle sander is great for this. Really makes the job move quickly.... But power sanders and guitars aren't really the best of friends (potentially). Keep your touch light, do a little at a time, and CONSTANTLY stop and check that you haven't gone too far...

This was an exciting step. All of a sudden this piece of wood felt and looked like it was turning into a guitar neck....