New Axe in the Making... (7 String Baritone Explorer Content)

[Konfyouzd]

[BlackMastodon]

You tease...

[7stringDemon]

My pants are getting smaller. . . . . . .

[Konfyouzd]

That's all I got, y'all!

[Konfyouzd]

Bump...

Dave you told me you had more eye candy on your camera.

[warhead78]

Damn this is nice, baritone and explorer in the same axe, perfection

[djohns74]

Originally Posted by Konfyouzd

Bump...

Dave you told me you had more eye candy on your camera.

I have a good excuse, I was 1700 miles away from the guitar for the last 2 weeks.

Grain filler was added to the mahogany just before I left and everything was sanded down to 320 so it's all nice and smooth at this point. Painting is scheduled to begin tonight with the vinyl sealer and should proceed through the color coat this weekend assuming I don't get a ton of rain. This is as far as the sample pic posted above got, so hopefully it will be looking pretty neat in a couple of days. Clear coats should happen next week if all goes well.

I'll post some pictures later if I remember, have time, and am not feeling particularly lazy.

[djohns74]

So, I forgot, didn't really have time and was feeling fairly lazy this weekend, thus it's days later and I'm just getting around to posting. Hopefully, it was worth the wait.



Here, I've routed the recessed area for the control cavity cover to reside in to make it flush with the back of the guitar. As you can see, I have lines drawn in to do the same with the spring cavity cover, but after some measurements and test fitting, I discovered that the body is actually just a little too thin to recess this cover! Ah well, the cover is quite thin anyway and besides, Fender has got along just fine for all these years without recessing their cavity cover.



And here we have the cover itself! It was made from an extra piece of mahogany that was cut off when shaping the body and was then thinned down with my oddball router jig seen earlier. I managed to save a big enough chunk so that the cover could be one piece, which I'm pretty pleased with.



Of course, a recessed cavity cover wouldn't be complete without countersunk screws and this method of making them using the drill press seems to have worked quite well.



The test fit looks good to me!



Naturally, the next logical thing to do is making a matching spring cavity cover. It was made from extra neck wood that was cut away in the initial shaping process with mahogany ears glued onto each side. The whole thing was then thinned down just like the other cover.

This cover ends up serving more than just a cosmetic purpose. The hole in it is to allow clearance for the Ibanez Edge spring block lock bar, which protrudes just past the back of the guitar when the bridge is as low as it can go. So I had to cut a hole in the cover, which I wasn't thrilled about, but at the same time, it will prevent any interference with the bridge's operation if it hangs out the back at all.



This one's my favorite since I had a picture in my head of how it would end up looking and I ended up getting exactly the look I wanted on the first try. Again, a thinned down piece of extra quilted maple with the sides rounded over nicely. I found that the single screw holds it in place perfectly since it's wedged up against the fretboard pretty tight. The truss rod route doesn't look too bad really, but I think this is so much better.



At this point, a test fit of all parts seems appropriate, and then I figured as long as I was doing that, I might as well make it functional, eh?



And here's the (un)finished product, ready to rock! I played it a bit following this and everything worked as it should. The balance of the shape is odd to me, so I didn't take the time to get too comfortable with it, but this was really just a test run to make sure nothing was completely out of whack before I start layering lacquer onto it.


Speaking of the lacquer, that's where the story takes a bit of a detour. As planned, the sealer went on Friday night with no real drama. However, on Saturday, I started to spray the color and my gun started acting up. It's possible that it wasn't completely clean, I'm not sure, but it started throwing random dark chunks of what I assume is dried lacquer into the second color coat. I tried to correct it, but it just wasn't happening, so I had to abort. The partial finished was then removed on Sunday so now I have to start over with planning the process so it doesn't happen again.

On a semi-positive note, since I was on the second color coat, I was able to more clearly see that the color really was too red, so I feel like I would have had to scrap it anyway, and I might have gotten even further into it before deciding to! Oh well, I'm still learning how to deal with this spray equipment and lacquer and whatnot, no real harm done, just a little wasted time.

[Pikka Bird]

You'd have scrapped it?! I sincerely hope you mean "stripped the parts off and sold it bare bones".

I'm totally in love with how this is turning out.

[Konfyouzd]

I think he means scrap the paint job. He and I had been discussing whether or not the orange he mixed was too red.

[Stealthdjentstic]

Looks legit to me

[Konfyouzd]

^ I've almost finished my holoflash project too

[MrGignac]

that orange looks really cool, epic build. subscribed

[Konfyouzd]

I'm really diggin' that TRC. Pleasant surprise since we never talked about that before. Completely slipped my mind tbh.

[djohns74]

Originally Posted by Konfyouzd

I'm really diggin' that TRC. Pleasant surprise since we never talked about that before. Completely slipped my mind tbh.

Kind of a rare moment of inspiration, I'd say. When I first thought of it, I was concerned that a thin piece of quilted maple might not be strong enough to be a cover, but for such a small piece, it seems to work just fine.

[Levi79]

droooooooool

[Konfyouzd]

So when you say you played it do you mean through an amp?

[asher]

I lurve me some Kelly, and some baritone, and some brightass orange. And they're all together!

[djohns74]

Originally Posted by Konfyouzd

So when you say you played it do you mean through an amp?

Through my POD X3, at any rate.

Sanding sealer attempt #2 went on last night and didn't give me any trouble. That stuff dries almost immediately, so it will be ready for sanding, masking and new color coat as soon as the opportunity presents itself.

[Konfyouzd]

EDIT: Not a request for sound clips... I was just curious as to whether or not those pups would balance together well given the placement / woods involved. I have much faith in the Blaze Custom.

[djohns74]

Originally Posted by Konfyouzd

EDIT: Not a request for sound clips... I was just curious as to whether or not those pups would balance together well given the placement / woods involved. I have much faith in the Blaze Custom.

I had no problem at all with the bridge pickup. The neck was fairly weak by comparison, but I didn't have any height adjustability available at that point and I think it was way too far from the strings really. I intend to cover the pickup and control cavities with shielding paint after the rest of the finish is done and will be using foam under the pickups for height adjustment, both of which will likely help the tone significantly, so I guess I can't say I know what it will actually sound like yet.

[asher]

Oh, I have something serious to ask now.

Where are you planning on putting the strap pins? I've got a Jackson KE-7 at home, and even with a wide strap it neck dove like mad until I stuck the strap pin onto one of the neck joint bolts. It's a lot better now, but even still it's not the best balanced.

[Konfyouzd]

Good question...

Could moving the rear pin in conjunction with the relocating the front one have any positive effect on the situation?

On a semi-related note... I now have another question. How's the weight on that bad boy?

[asher]

Maybe, I'm not sure where you'd relocate the rear to. Moving the front one did help a LOT, particularly with a wider strap, but it's still no well balanced SuperStrat

[Konfyouzd]

I thought maybe moving it up or down might hold it in a way that would feel more balanced, but I'm not the best with physics...