…Design session and making the fret boards…

Day 1 of 7:

2pm till 6pm

Dave and Kevin are starting on the build your own custom guitar course today while Nick continues on his acoustic he started last time– we normally have four builders so it was an especially easy half day to get us going. We’ll be joined by a different person every day starting tomorrow with Duncan who is also making an acoustic.

Dave brought his own drawing of a les paul he wants to make. He decided to make some binding for the fretboard and around the headstock by gluing together a boxwood veneer between two sheets of ebony. We certainly have our work cut out as it will not only have crown inlays on the fretboard but he will also be inlaying the headstock with a design he made at home and brought along with him.

Kevin designed his own guitar completely from scratch so it was necessary to do a drawing. He is making a bolt on style guitar with a parallel headstock. It will have a maple neck with a birds eye maple fret board. The body is ash with a flamed maple cap and for hardware he chose a Schaller roller bridge and two humbuckers. His guitar will also have sound chambers and and f-hole.

Nick is on the second part of his Build your own acoustic course and is aiming to finish by the end of this visit. Today he made the binding to go around the edge of the guitar which is rosewood to match the body and fitted the end graft so tomorrow he can cut the binding channels and hopefully get it all glued on by the end of the day. He also glued up the mahogany and maple laminates for the neck  which also has two black pinstripes.

All three worked on their fret boards today- Nick and Kevin’s are now slotted, radiused and cut out ready to glue on tomorrow. Dave’s will take a bit longer as it will be radiused after the binding is glued on. More tomorrow!