Tele project coming!

[M29]

Hello,

Ordered a Tele swamp ash body today with the help from our honorable Bloozcat! Will be taking my time with this one, can't rush nitro lacquer. It is a Mighty Mite body.
Used a white pickguard on my Jazzmaster, not sure what I will use on this one. Maybe Tort.

Here is a pic.

http://webpages.charter.net/tankm4/swamptele.jpg

[Kazz]

Oh I cant wait to follow along on this one. When the weather breaks I will be doing one of these too....mine will have rear routes for the controls tho and no guard at all.

What neck are you using?

[guitardan777]

Nice looking slab of ash there M29 :AOK

Should be a fun project.....
We'll be watching:notme

[M29]

Keep us up on yours too Kazz, the rear routes sound good!

Thanks guitardanny777, :socool

[Bloozcat]

This is what I was referring to before M29. A tinted clear look kinda like this 54 Tele...which is undoubtedly tinted from the lacquer yellowing with age:
http://home.att.net/~dtstechnicalservice/54_tele_before_refin.jpg

Yours would look better because of the nice ash grain...:AOK

[mrmudcat]

nice arse.............errrrr I meant ash:thwap

[M29]

Finally got some grain filler on the Tele body. Not totally sure where I am going to go with this thing yet. It will take a while to build up the clear lacquer so I have time to mull over what pickups and what not I want to go with.

I am not looking for a country sounding Tele, I want something more rocky and something that would cover it all. I really liked the single coil neck and bridge humbucking on my Squier '51. I could go that route with this and re-route the bridge for a humbucking. I don't know if I want to stray off from a standard Tele with singles at both ends though. Decisions decisions decisions...

http://webpages.charter.net/tankm4/telefiller.jpg

[Tig]

I'm a bit tempted to do a similar project with a Mighty Mite sometime this next year. My problem is not having the slightest idea about setting up the neck to body joint to create the best angle/height vs bridge, etc, as well as how to apply nitro lacquer.

Also, I'd be tempted to cut in a little arm rest bevel and belly cut, for function over form. Tele-philes might hang me for that!

[Kazz]

M29 you could also get a stacked humbucker that is in a tele configuration....tele looks but bucker tone......they are also coil splittable so you would have the best of both worlds.

[M29]

Yeah Tig I like the idea of the body contours too. I am going to keep it pretty simple though, I don't want to work on this one too long. The lacquer will take long enough. It will take a while to gather up all the hardware to as moolah is somewhat tight of late.

Kazz That is a good idea I will check out some utubes on the stacked buckers. Thanks!

M

[marnold]

Also, I'd be tempted to cut in a little arm rest bevel and belly cut, for function over form. Tele-philes might hang me for that!
My old Charvel Model 7 had a belly cut but not an arm one because of the binding. I'd prefer the cut and dump the binding. Oh, and M29, I had similar thoughts of doing an upscale Squier 51 with a Tele body. 24 frets, maple neck. I need to stop talking like this . . .

[M29]

I am thinking more and more on the '51 type pickup arrangement Rev. I think I will let the tucks go though...

Keep talkin Rev keep talkin :poke :socool

[M29]

I bought a rosewood Mighty Mite neck off the bay and decided to replace the rosewood fretboard with an ebony board. I really like ebony for a fretboard and I wanted 22 frets which I could not find so now I can make my own.

I also decided to put abalone dots in it. These can be seen in the small clear plastic bag. The ebony board is a StewMac pre-slotted board.

I haven't decided yet how I am going to take the original board off. Probably just plane it off to make sure I get a good flat surface for the new board.

http://webpages.charter.net/tankm4/teleebony.jpg

[Katastrophe]

I bought a rosewood Mighty Mite neck off the bay and decided to replace the rosewood fretboard with an ebony board. I really like ebony for a fretboard and I wanted 22 frets which I could not find so now I can make my own.

I also decided to put abalone dots in it. These can be seen in the small clear plastic bag. The ebony board is a StewMac pre-slotted board.

I haven't decided yet how I am going to take the original board off. Probably just plane it off to make sure I get a good flat surface for the new board.




This is gonna be really cool. I can't wait to see how it turns out!

[M29]

Thanks Kat!!
I have taken on way too many projects right now but hopefully I can keep this going in a timely manner.

[Ch0jin]

Wow! Projects like this make me wish I had a shed, or garage, or, well you get the picture..

You're a braver man than me planning on doing abalone dot inlays. I assume thats going to take some serious precision craftsmanship.

[M29]

Hi Ch0jin!

The dots are not too bad. Just have to drill a hole and glue em in. With a proper drill bit they fit good.. The problem is in not letting the drill get out of control and coming out the back of the neck............:thwap

[Katastrophe]

Thanks Kat!!
I have taken on way too many projects right now but hopefully I can keep this going in a timely manner.

You have to. I live vicariously through your woodworking skills.:what

[Bloozcat]

M29 has two essential skills for success:

The ability...

And the will to try...

:AOK

[M29]

Thank you for the kind words guys. What was that Ian said about Ellie in Jurassic Park as she was leaning into the mound of Triceratops poo...She's tenacious! :what

If you do enough of something you will get good at it. I learned a lot of wood work from my dad but I still had to do it for my self. It takes time and somethings ya have to do over, boy did I ever :thwap , but it gets better as you go on.
I remember working on the first guitar I made back in high school, 1971. I was gluing the fretboard on and with all my experience (17 years old). I thought I would just line up the one edge of the board with the edge of the neck, this way I would have less to sand on the other side. Well...That made it easier to sand but the fretboard was cut with a taper. This put the frets at a slight angle and were no longer square with the rest of the guitar. I learned a good lesson that day. This was done without my dads assistance..........Yeah ya mess up a few and ya learn........:socool Always work off a center line with a guitar.

I have a question for you all.

I don't know if I will be able to get all the poly off this Mighty Mite neck and I am afraid I might have adhesion problems when I re-clear it with lacquer.
Blooz or anyone that has ever put a finish over polyurethane, do you find that it is very hard to get lacquer or other top coats to stick to it?
I have done a few projects now where I sanded down the poly and put lacquer over it, only to have the lacquer chip off if you barely bump it against something. I think the poly is so hard it is tough to get anything to adhere to it. Do you know of any clear primer that will adhere to poly and that the lacquer will adhere to the primer?


Thanks.
M

[Bloozcat]

If it's just the standard, thin poly finish that's on most MM necks, you can easily sand it off. I've done that on three MM necks and then had no problems shooting lacquer afterwards. It's easy to tell when you've got all the poly off. The sanding residue starts out a milky white color and then turns to plain maple sanding dust. It doesn't take very long to do. Then you simply shoot the bare wood with a lacquer sanding sealer and then the lacquer (or vintage amger tint dye, then clear lacquer).

The other alternative is to cover the poly with clear shellac as a base coat for the lacquer. You can't shoot lacquer right onto poly, but shellac being an organic compound is pretty much a universal undercoat. But, the whole reason for using nitro lacquer is so that you can get a nice thin but hard finish that buffs out to a brilliant gloss. So why spray it over poly and shellac first?

[M29]

Thanks Blooz,

In this case I will sand down to the maple but on other finishes I have put lacquer over poly because I got tired of sanding the darn poly. Like on my LP project I got almost all of the poly off but it seemed like it was so far into the wood that I could not get it all off. That was mahogany though which is more porous. Maple has a tighter grain which might help to keep the poly from sinking into the grain as much.

I was curious on adhesion to poly for other projects as well. I have found it hard to get poly to stick to poly, such as furniture and flooring. It was a general question that I probably should have explained more.

Thanks for the shellac tip Blooz!!

[ZMAN]

Otay M: now I realize what I missed. No wonder I haven't seen that guit out there. You MADE it. Cool. Sweet looking, and a Tele is a perfect project. I recently purchased my first Tele, and I am blown away by how easy it is to play. I think the Engineer was a genius.

[Kazz]

Those dots are really easy with a drill press.

[M29]

Well, I am finally back on my Tele project.
I got started planing off the rosewood fretboard on my new Mighty Mite neck. It had a slight twist in it that I needed to correct and I wanted an ebony board instead of rosewood. I could not afford a neck with these options so I decided to make one up using this neck. It will have a 12 inch radius and abalone dots. as well.

Here is a pic of the recent progress. If you look close you can still see parts of the white side marker dots as I got closer to the maple neck.

I am setting up the new fretboard for the dots now.

http://webpages.charter.net/tankm4/telenec1.jpg

[guitardan777]

Looking good M29 :applause

Ya know that would make a cool fretless neck:AOK

Hey if you haven't picked one up yet, I have a 12" radius sanding block you can borrow....

[M29]

Thank you for the kind words guitardan777. I picked up a 12 inch block a while back. Thanks for the offer!

I have the fretboard drilled for the abalone dots and drilled for alignment pins to keep my center line centered with the neck while I clamp and glue it.
Next I am going to trim the sides of the fretboard closer to the shape of the neck and then glue it on.

http://webpages.charter.net/tankm4/telenec2.jpg

[M29]

I finished gluing the fretboard on. I need to do some more polishing of the board along with putting the ebony stain on. I have it sanded to 400 grit in this picture. Once this is done I can get the frets on along with a nitro lacquer finish on the maple. Starting to get anxious on this one.
I picked up a Barden bridge and Grover locking tuners. Still have to get pickups, control plate, switch and pots.
I got my ebony fretboard, 12 inch radius, abalone dots and 22 frets. Lots of work but I like it aaahlott.

http://webpages.charter.net/tankm4/telenec3.jpg