First build - Jaguar 7

[Levi79]

Hey guys, after being interested in building for a long time I'm finally taking the plunge. After a few ideas I decided it would be really cool to make a 7 string jaguar. So that's what I'm doing! I have some specs in mind, but they aren't all set in stone yet.
These are the specs I have planned out:
27" scale
24 frets
Bolt on
Jaguar body
Hipshot RG7 bridge (already have this)
Black TUSQ nut
16" radius
3.8cm body thickness
Jumbo Frets
Tung Oil finish
Walnut body - Wenge/Paduak neck - Birdseye maple board

I'm pretty excited to start this. Going to start by ordering woods tomorrow or the next day.The place my dad works has basically every tool imaginable, so that'll help me along the way alot. So will the fact that my dad is a carpenter, so he'll be a big help in the woodworking area of things.

Any advice for me guys? What do you think of my specs?
Also, what's the best tuners I can get for under $60 that are 7 in line? And where can I get them?

[HighPotency]

7 lefts of these would come to around $40 I think.

Gotoh™ Steel String Enclosed - Information and Pricing at LMI

[Levi79]

Thanks for the link dude!

[BlackMastodon]

I got a set of 6 Gotoh 18:1 tuners from StewMac for around 50+shipping.

[Levi79]

Tight. Gotoh it is then!
Some people on other boards have made some really good points and I'm now back to square one for woods. Apparently wenge is very rubbery feeling and both wenge and paduak have large pores, so since it's my first build I should probably make it a little easier on myself.

I was planning on using this supplier for wood: www.exotic-woods.com
But I looked around and found a cheaper option here: Quality Curly, Quilted, Spalted Maple Guitar Tonewood | Bow River Specialty Woods
Now I'm thinking:
Guinea Walnut - New Guinea Walnut Guitar Body Blanks
Flame maple neck - Electric Guitar Necks
Zircote board - Electic Guitar Fingerboards

On thing I'm concerned about is that I can find lots of info on Black Walnut, but not Guinea. I have a black walnut and maple Carvin 7 and love the sound. But what's the difference between Guinea and Black?

[mwcarl]

I've ordered from Bow River woods before, they've been pretty good and helpful. I don't consider them that cheap though. Normally I prefer to buy wood from a local supplier so I can see it before I get it (in Calgary there's the Black Forest Wood Company), but they don't specialize in wood for guitars. I would source a top from somewhere online, since that's more guitar-specific, and get the other woods locally. For example, I bought two body blanks and a neck-through blank worth of bubinga for about $60. Way cheaper than most places online, and you can pick what you want, whether it's quartersawn or whatever. They can even do some resawing for you so that you don't have to do that yourself.

For your first guitar I wouldn't really go wild with the woods. You're going to screw up and it's worth developing your skills before committing with expensive woods.

[Levi79]

I thought about going local for woods, but Calgary is two hours away from me and after the probably $60-$70 in gas money, I might as well have ordered online. Plus if I order online I'll be getting wood I know is for what I'm doing. And honestly, I'm not saying I'm not going to screw up, but I've done alot of research, alot of reading, alot of watching so i think I have a decent grip on the concepts of building. But we'll see. Plus, my dad who is helping me is a carpenter and also has access to pretty much every tool imaginable so that's definitely going to help me alot along the way.
I just don't want to put hours upon hours of work into this project and finish it with shitty wood.
I thought I was keeping the woods pretty basic
Thanks for the input though dude! I appreciate it!

Also dude, your in Calgary so not that far from me, how much did shipping end up costing you from Bow River? What did you get?

[mwcarl]

Sorry, I wasn't sure where abouts you might be in Alberta. I didn't really mean to sound like I was discouraging you from choosing more expensive woods. Mostly I think it's good to choose woods for a first build that are at least some of the following:
- Easy to work with: some woods are very splintery (ebony, wenge) or otherwise difficult to shape or machine
- Not hazardous to your health: some are toxic (spalted woods, rosewoods)
- Easy to finish: some might be better with pore filling, some clog sandpaper quite badly, some are oily and don't take certain finishes well
- Stable: these require less care in making sure they remain dimensionally stable with reinforcement

I don't remember exactly how much shipping was, but for a large wood package (body + neck) I think shipping was in the area of $40. My first guitar was built with woods from them, I used spruce for the body (never again, very soft), hard maple for the neck and a 1/4" thick bookmatched flame top. Honestly it's an okay guitar, although I don't play it anymore. The fretwork is awful (could be fixed, since I'm now better at it) and it was mainly a good learning experience. I've built four total and I'm still not producing guitars that I'm totally happy with.

[Levi79]

Ah word. Yeah I'm in a small town called Ponoka about 2 hours north of Calgary. I would definitely love to hand pick my wood if I lived in Calgary. Maybe for my second build it'd be worth the drive.
I think the woods I chose should meet those guidelines, would you agree?

[mwcarl]

I don't know anything about New Guinea Walnut, but if it's anything like normal walnut it should be fine. Ziricote is a bit like ebony in that it's brittle and can split. If you're careful when sawing it won't be a big deal. Otherwise those woods meet all of those criteria.

When you start building if you've got questions I might be able to help answer them. On another note I can't wait for the weather to be better so that I can get back to working on my own builds since I work mainly outside or in an unheated garage. I'm trying to do four this year, we'll see if I get that far.

Best of luck on the build.

[edit]Oops walnut might show pores after finishing if you don't fill them[\edit]

[Levi79]

Holy shit dude! That guitar is beautiful! You should make a thread of all your builds!
and thanks for all the help man.

[SYLrules88]

i like all of your specs! i got excited when i read your first post and the woods you were planning to use but now it seems those arent set in stone.

i have absolutely no advice to offer in the area of luthery! however, i will be checking this thread often. any idea on the pickups you're going with?

[Levi79]

After talking to both Exotic Woods and Bow River Woods on the phone, it'll make alot more sense for me to go with Bow River, so I'm gathering some dimensions right now and getting an invoice.
I've decided on a Walnut body, Flame maple neck and Zircote board. I asked on the phone and they don't have any Rosewood neck blanks, so I'll have to see what I'm going to do for stripes on the neck. Is there anything I should definitely stay away from?
And I gathered these dimensions from measuring my Agile Septor 828 since its my only thing baritone. This should be roughly what I need.
32" x 3.5" x 2" neck blank
24" x 3.5" x 5/8" board blank
20" x 14" x 1 3/4" body blank

Edit: Another thing. Are radiusing blocks completely necessary? $60 for a bunch of angled blocks is a bit much. I could probably make these way easier/cheaper. No?

For pickups, I'm currently undecided. I have some Q tuners that I don't have in anything. I haven't even tried em yet cause I don't have anything to fit them in, but I don't want to route big holes in this guitar for them if they're not going to stay in here. And I think the Q tuners would look stupid with the woods I chose. I'll probably throw some BKP's in here. Not really decided yet

[Levi79]

So I now have everything on its way to me now but wood. As you can see, the first build is not cheap. Tools is at least half of that.
I may have found a local source for wood, but I don't know yet if it'll be more economical than buying online. We'll see. Things are finally starting to happen though, so that's good!

[HighPotency]

I have no idea what the lumber yards up there are like, but I've noticed that it is much easier to buy figured woods online. I've bought a couple pieces from eBay and they weren't too expensive.

I also bought the piece of swamp ash I have on eBay because I was being pretty picky. A lot of places (LMII) sell blanks that cost more than what I paid for mine and they're 2 or even 3 pieces. For some reason, I'm really anal when it comes to having a one-piece body (call me superstitious) and I wanted a light piece. Ended up with a light piece that had nice grain and was more than big enough for one body that cost me $75+shipping.

Also consider non-figured woods (i.e. woods not labeled as flamed/fiddleback, quilted, spalted, etc.) for builds as well. Some woods have really nice grain and coloring as-is. Bubinga, purpleheart, sapele, bloodwood, and wenge come to mind off the top of my head. They're cheaper than paying 5x more for a piece of quilted maple.

[Levi79]

Ordered wood today! Cost me $135 + $30 shipping for a Walnut body blank, Maple neck blank and a Zircote fretboard. Everything is coming! Stoked!

[Levi79]

So I've been thinking of not making this a Jaguar shape. I've been realizing it just won't match my specs very nicely. Others have said this too. I really like all my specs, so I'm not really interested in changing any of them. First of all, the 24 fret, 27" scale neck will look kind of out of place. Secondly, I don't think a natural Walnut Jaguar would look that good. As cool as it would be to have a 7 string Jaguar, I'm kind of leaning towards an offset strat shape now. It will also be much more satisfying to make something I designed myself. I spent a while doing some drawings. I'm no artist, but I think a body and headstock along these lines would be cool. Feedback?

[Levi79]

Got the wood today. Honestly a little disappointed in the Walnut. I was hoping for alot darker and more figured. I was hoping for it to be almost black dark, but I should have mentioned that on the phone, so it's my fault I guess. The Zircote however, looks awesome. The grain on the walnut isn't that strong in person, that's just my pro iPhone picture editing skills

[Solodini]

That fingerboard looks really nice. Grats.

[HighPotency]

Is that sapwood going to be included in the final product?

[Levi79]

Yeah, I really like the chunk of Zircote I got alot.

What's sapwood?

[HighPotency]

Originally Posted by Levi79

Yeah, I really like the chunk of Zircote I got alot.

What's sapwood?

That little streak of white on the side of the ziricote.

[Levi79]

Ah. I was thinking about that. Not too sure yet. I think it might be a cool little contrast. What do you guys think?

[brynotherhino]

Have you considered doing a singlecut? They usually end up looking pretty awesome...

[Purelojik]

Originally Posted by Levi79

Ah. I was thinking about that. Not too sure yet. I think it might be a cool little contrast. What do you guys think?

i love the contrast sapwood brings. it makes it seem so natural and raw. its the one thing i love about building guitars is seeing the before and after.

your call but if it were me i'd leave it in. its gonna look killer with a coat of oil