Pictures (Guitars)

[Valoosj]

Just one last time:

http://s297.photobucket.com/albums/mm227/ValoosjFX/Les%20Paul/?action=view&current=DSC02251.jpg

[PMcG No.6]

Nice axe, V!

[Skruffyhound]

Unknown possibly East German Mandolin, sweet sounding
'78 Tele - Rocks
'67 SG - Rocks
No Name bass
Ibanez Artwood ,Korean
'50's Kay Archtop - Vintage tone
Mid 70's Guild 12 string - beautiful

[G. Hoffman]

Most of my guitars, in their humidor.  I live in Minnesota, which is perhaps the worst possible place in the world to have guitars, as our wide swings in humidity are possibly the worst thing you can possibly do to a guitar.  Since I don't have enough cases for all of my guitars, and as they would almost all need custom cases (except for a couple of strats), this was easier and cheaper.  (You know the saying about cobbler's children never having shoes?  Well, a luthier's guitars seldom have cases!)



These are my three favorites, at the moment.  That could change, though.  The acoustic was the first guitar I ever owned, made by my dad.  The Strat is a USA Custom Neck and a cheap but light Ash body, with Seymour Duncan Classic Stack Plus pickups (KILLER pickups, by the way).  The 12 string is my "surf" guitar design, with TV Jones TV Classic pickups (also killer pickups).  Unfortunately, I can't afford to make myself a six string - I've got to sell what I build, you know?  Most of the rest in the cabinet are prototypes. 

Some actual production guitars I've made:






Gabriel

[guitarman89]

Here's my collection of axes:



Ibanez Rg 370dx



Fender Stratocaster with some tweaking: gfs lil killer on the bridge and a little op-amp based preamp from diyguitarist.com (thanks paul!). I love this guitar because it's my first electric guitar and it's great!



Epiphone Les Paul Standard: it's my friends gift for my 18th birthday. Heavy guitar with a powerful bottom sound. I've used it on most of my recordings (check them out on myspace.com/filospinatopunk). Initially i wanted to change pick to an EMG set ( 81-85) but it sound very well so I decided to leave that pick up! Their body and neck are moghany. I compared it to a '97 Gibson Les Paul Classic with the same amp and settings, and i was very shocked : same heigth, same sounds!



Washburn G-8V: this is guitar is older than me! It came to me from years of disaster (it probably was made in '83-'88) two months ago. So i picked up what were necessary to bring it to life. It has moghany body, maple neck and carbonite fingerboard. Emg select pickup (cheap passive line of EMG) that sound ok for my taste; floyd rose single lock und. lic., but it works very well. With that amazing circuitry, every pu has a switch (bridge pickup can be tapped for single coil use) so you can combine them in many ways and get very cool sounds from funky to hyper lead!

And finally, a family pic:



 

[jkokura]

Fairly rare guitar here - it's  Larivee Electric. The original neck was broken by the previous owner, a Chandler strat style neck replaced it. THe neck is super thin and fast, and I really like it that way.





Jacob

[solderman]

Just one last time:

http://s297.photobucket.com/albums/mm227/ValoosjFX/Les%20Paul/?action=view&current=DSC02251.jpg

That is amazing. I am totally overwhelmed.  Hats off

[solderman]

This is where it all started

OPL mm1 goes Fender
This was an OLP with humbuckers. I wanted SC so i rebuilt it to a Telecaster type of guitar. Well that left me with two spare humbuckers.



This is a Lap Steel Made in Bengts garage
What do you do if you have a couple of HB pickups to spare and a friend who has a wood workshop in his garage? Most people wouldn't do anything at all but I vent out and bought me a good piece of mahogny and made my self a Lap Steel guitar. I cant play it but it was fun to build and I think the result is OK for a biginner.

[Valoosj]

Just one last time:

That is amazing. I am totally overwhelmed.  Hats off

Thanks Solderman. At the moment I have a Jazzmaster planned. Wednesday I'm buying me some wood.

[studiostud]

Wednesday I'm buying me some wood.

that's what she said.

[Top Top]

not a guitar, but close enough... kind of.

This is my first time building a non-electronic instrument from scratch... first time using a jig saw, first time wiring pickups, etc... it isn't the level of craft some of you have, but it is my first time doing a lot of this stuff... The jig saw has become my best friend since starting this project.

first pic I took... you missed the part where I glued together two 3/4" sheets of pine and then cut it out with the jig saw at 10pm. Got to experiment with some beveling with the jig saw.



By this point I have cut some aluminum for the bridges and the hardwood tuning peg board, general layout of the pickups and transducers is there, and the pick guards/electronics plates are cut (they are made out of surplus aluminum/plastic sandwich paneling material that I picked up second hand for almost nothing).



Body painted, electronics cavity carved out, hardware, transducers, and pickups mounted, some wires run.





Laying out the electronics for drilling



Electronics drilled, pick guards in place. The knobs are a volume and tone for the output and a volume for the drivers. The jacks are output and input and a power jack for the internal amp. There will also be a switch added between the knobs and the jacks to choose the input source for the drivers (built-in pickups or external input).



Up next is to drill holes for the tail piece and put a plate on the bottom for strings to go through, and string it. Eventually I am going to be putting in autoharp style chord selector levers, but want to string it and see how it will  be tuned before I can do that. It is going to have 36 strings - 18 notes in octave pairs. The transducers are for a sustainer system/sympathetic string effect (you can plug in another instrument to it), and are powered by a ruby amp. The pick guard is white, but has a paper string guide taped over it right now until I get string notches in place on the bridges.

This has been half-planned, half make-it-up-as-I-go endeavor, as you can probably tell, but it has taught me a lot about a lot of different areas as pretty much everything but building the ruby amp was new territory for me.

[sean k]

Well done Top top! I'm impressed by your efforts especially as this is a first for you in so many ways. Its such an expansive territory you've leaped into and I wish that others would do so as it opens up so much more of ones ability to actually listen to the sounds we can create.

I remeber back to when I was first introduced to this kinda stuff and this guy was using a plain zither, with pickups hacked onto it through a digi reverb set to backwards and he was using a hand held magnet to cancel out the pickups ability to create a flux. Absolutely wonderful noise! About a year and a half later this guy has mostly dropped instruments, as such, and just uses a big fruit box, cardboard, with a piezo attached to drive his array of FX. He kinda suffers from his inability to build stuff which is a pity because he's got absolutely the right mindset to explore possibilities cheaply and efficiently.

I can't give you any advice simply because your in a process of learning that can only be hands on, making mistakes and learning from them, and neither can I offer you a bunch of links to other people who do similar stuff as you are much better working in as much a vacuum as possible to start off... you learn more that way. It's the hard way but the payoffs later on are much greater.

The only thing I could possibly suggest is that if you can spare it look at buying some top quality carving chisels and learn to sharpen them. Being able to cut finely and wherever you want is a tool in your belt you might wanna consider as important at this stage.

Being sharp, making sharp and staying sharp are useful to you in many ways... and meaningful in so many other ways.

[sean k]

Oh, heres one of mine from a while back.

and heres me playing it... first time after finishing it and just making sure it worked then taking it to the gig and finding out what it did!

[Valoosj]

Wednesday I'm buying me some wood.

that's what she said.

[Top Top]

@ sean k

That thing looks fantastic. Did you ever figure out what it does?  

Well it is a little misleading for me to say this is the first thing like this that I have done... I have done a lot of experimenting with things in small ways (contact mics, electronics, very crude stringed instruments, small repairs, building things out of whatever I could find at the hardware or junk store, etc.) so I've had a lot of practice. I've also been exposed to a lot of other peoples' DIY and experimental instruments and my dad is pretty handy so I have seen a lot of things built from the ground up.

But indeed, it is my first thought out instrument, and first time building an instrument because I want it and it doesn't exist, rather than just messing with stuff in a purely experimental way (not that there is anything wrong with that). I did a lot of careful consideration, some research, and a lot of thinking on how to solve problems and features that I wanted to include.

One thing that has helped me a lot with this project is this incredible junk/art surplus store that we have very close to where I work. Basically all the wood, metal, and paneling came from there for a total of a few dollars.

About the carving chisels, I actually have a set and learned how to do basic wood carving when I was a kid, but I wouldn't say they are either sharp nor good  . They were good enough to carve out the electronics cavity, though my hand was mighty sore after that day.

[markeebee]

Sean, I am a great fan of your work, you know that

Without fail, your posts have informed and entertained me in equal measure.

I have amassed a huge amount of respect for you and your enterprises.

But, seriously.....orange trousers?

[sean k]

Well thankyou Mark... and seriously yes! Orange trousers... and thats me dressing quite conservatively

Normally I run round the house working and in bare feet, a black t-shirt and black denim shorts that go down past my knees. I find this the ultimate work wear and in winter it's pretty much the same with tight jerseys and thermal long johns under my shorts. I like to be able to move, climb, jump... whatever but the point is that the end of etch day I'm usually filthy.. but anyways, when I go out I like to brighten up considerably... and I actually make all of my own clothes as well!

[markeebee]

If I was wearing a hat I would take it off to you, sir. Awesome.

[markeebee]

Oh, hang on......

[head_spaz]

Hey Couch Dundee,
Dissin' here's fer you...



Gitcha a honda bellhousing, couple of tia-yoter bumpers and a windersheild wiper and you're halfway there.
(Good look getting the blonde, as you look like you just raped a lawn sofa, judging by those faggy pants.)