Custom Build Left Handed Neck Thru Electric Guitar – Part 2

All the woodwork complete and ready for spraying!

Part 1| Part 2| Part 3| Part 4

As I mentioned in Part 1 last week, Allan came on our 1 day Design Your Own Guitar course where I helped him design this guitar.

Most of the woodwork was done but I still had to glue on the fretboard before the rest could be completed.

With a neck thru guitar like this it is very difficult to get in and drill the holes for side dots after the fretboard is glued, which is when I would normally do it, so I drill them first.

The fretboard was the glued as usual.

While the glue dried I got on with making the custom inlay – looks pretty cool doesn’t it? The shape was made on the computer then printed out and ‘spray fixed’ to a piece of Mother of Pearl. I use a really fine jewelers saw to cut it out and a set of needle files to clean up the edges if needed. A slot is routed into the fretboard and the piece glued in with black superglue. After some sanding and cleaning up it looks like it grew there!

I have already rough carved the body but now it was time to make the re-curve. This was carved by hand with a gouge.

I then flipped the guitar over to carve the heel and the rest of the neck. Allan stopped by to check on progress and have a feel – he seemed pretty happy with it!

The frets were hammered in and jack socket drilled then a matching quilted maple headstock veener glued on and cleaned up before final sanding.

All the woodwork is now complete!

Next:

The guitar is now ‘in the white’ which means sanded and ready for spraying – it will have a dark cherry burst with a matching cherry stripe up the back of the neck – I will show this exciting process in part 3

Maybe you have your own ideas for a custom guitar? We are here to help!