# Build #5 - Quilted Maple Top, Indian Rosewood Neck Super Strat



## StarbardGuitar (Jan 12, 2016)

Hey guys!

I will be starting my 5th build soon, which will be some sort of a super strat . I typically don't like to build copies or clones of guitars that already exist, like say making a strat copy, because I just think if I am going to build something from scratch it should stand out somehow - you know? I just think it shouldn't look like something you would see on the wall at guitar center. However, I've been wanting a super strat style guitar lately, and when I came across this pic of a Blackwater guitar, I got really inspired.







So, this build will be very much inspired by that guitar, but with my own personal touches - because like I said, I don't like the idea of building a copy or clone of something else.

I'm still waiting on my order from LMI which has some key things I need to start this build like the top wood, neck wood, fingerboard and some other things. But I do have a drawing I made for the design of the guitar...






Here are some specs, though some may change as the build actually progresses.

-Mahogany body, Quilted Maple top
-Indian Rosewood/Bubinga/Maple neck
-Birdseye Maple fingerboard, 24 frets
-25.4" scale length
-Ibanez ZRII trem
-Dimarzio Norton/Illuminator pickups
-1 volume, 1 tone, super 5-way switch for some split tones

I think that's about it. Hopefully I'll be back soon with some updates once the rest of the materials arrive!


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## electriceye (Jan 13, 2016)

Me likey!!


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## turenkodenis (Jan 13, 2016)

Nice headstock shape design


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## Killemall1983 (Jan 13, 2016)

why at 25.4" scale? That is normally an acoustic scale.


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## StarbardGuitar (Jan 13, 2016)

electriceye said:


> Me likey!!





turenkodenis said:


> Nice headstock shape design





Killemall1983 said:


> why at 25.4" scale? That is normally an acoustic scale.



Thanks guys!

Actually, I wanted it to be a 25.5" scale and my drawing is at that scale, but when I was ordering my fingerboard from LMI I used their fret position calculator to make sure I could fit 24 frets at that scale plus enough room behind the nut for a floyd rose style locking nut, and their standard size fretboard wouldn't quite be long enough. I suppose I could have bought a bass fingerboard to get the extra length I needed... but I figured that going slightly shorter would be just fine because - it is slightly cheaper, I've seen that some Mayones guitars use this scale, honestly I figure it probably won't be that noticeably different, and I would like to make this build relatively light weight so I figured this would pull the headstock just a liiiittle bit closer towards the body making it easier to balance. It wouldn't be much but every little bit counts.

In honesty I made this decision last minute while I was ordering, because I didn't check to make sure all my specs would fit their standard size fingerboard until I was ordering it. It may be too late to change my order now that I realize I could have just got a bass fingerboard instead , but I also don't see any downsides to going with a 25.4" scale.


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## pettymusic (Jan 13, 2016)

In honesty I made this decision last minute while I was ordering said:


> Looking good! LMI have called me in the past if my order wouldn't actually fit on the board. I don't know if they would charge for a full bass FB though, they might. They are awesome people to work with in my experience.
> 
> Like you said; it's not a big issue anyway. ...or at least that I could tell from my small amount of experience.
> 
> Looking forward to seeing your build! Good Luck!!


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## StarbardGuitar (Jan 13, 2016)

pettymusic said:


> Looking good! LMI have called me in the past if my order wouldn't actually fit on the board. I don't know if they would charge for a full bass FB though, they might. They are awesome people to work with in my experience.
> 
> Like you said; it's not a big issue anyway. ...or at least that I could tell from my small amount of experience.
> 
> Looking forward to seeing your build! Good Luck!!



Thanks! Yeah, I've had the same experience, one time I ordered a fingerboard that was only 1/4" thick (most are 5/16" before radiusing) and had asked them to radius it and slot it for me, and almost immediately after I placed my order online they called me to let me know I would need to change that. They're pretty quick on catching those things, so I think my 25.4" length will work just fine since I haven't gotten a call yet haha. I checked with both LMI and Stewmac's fret calculators and using a 25.5" scale with enough room behind the nut for a locking nut wasn't quite enough for the standard 20" fingerboards. Yes also, the difference between the two scale lengths is around 3/32", I'm not sure how noticeable the difference will even be.


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## StarbardGuitar (Jan 20, 2016)

LMI delivery came today, most of what I was still waiting for before I can start was the rest of the wood. So here's some wood porn for you guys...






Got the Indian Rosewood for the neck on the left, the Bubinga is under that and the mahogany for the body is underneath that. Birdseye maple fingerboard (it ended up looking like I could've gone with the full 25.5" scale rather than 25.4" after all, because there's plenty of room after the 24th fret   ) and the quilted maple top.

Close up of the top:






So here's the deal with the bubinga, I've had it for like 2 years now and have never used it for a build yet. I want to try and finally use it, but since it's so heavy and I want this build to be relatively light, I'm going to see if I can get it cut into strips to use in the neck. If not, the neck will still be a laminate neck and I will just use some maple veneer between the strips of rosewood.


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## pondman (Jan 21, 2016)

That top


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## StarbardGuitar (Jan 24, 2016)

I glued up the body and neck blanks last night, cleaned them up this morning.






The neck is Indian Rosewood with Bubinga strips and Sycamore veneers to set them apart.


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## StarbardGuitar (Jan 26, 2016)

I had a little bit of time to work on the build today so I made the body template and cut the body out.






I planned to do more tonight but had to stop early because I caught my finger in the planer/jointer and took a big chunk of skin and nail off... Thankfully it didn't go really deep but that finger is nice and flat now after bleeding like mad 
I let my guard down for just a second, that's all it takes. I got lucky this time since I still have all my fingers and this should hopefully heal mostly normal, but I won't let that happen again.   Note to self: pay the f*** attention


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## Ram150023 (Jan 26, 2016)

Holy s#it thats gotta hurt! Hope your alright! 

The build looks great so far! He4es to a speedy recovery!


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## StarbardGuitar (Jan 29, 2016)

Ram150023 said:


> Holy s#it thats gotta hurt! Hope your alright!
> 
> The build looks great so far! He4es to a speedy recovery!



It was definitely one of the most painful things I've experienced! Lesson learned.

I decided to not let the injury slow me down too much though, so I carried on. I haven't done too much more work on the guitar yet, but I made some jigs to make my life easier. I already had a sanding jig for 10 degree scarf joints, but this one is going to be 13 degrees so I remade part of the jig so it can be swapped out either 10 or 13 degrees.






I also made this super crude scarf joint table saw jig, because on the last guitar I did the initial cut with a band saw and it took a long time to sand down to the correct slope. This way was far quicker, the sanding jig was pretty much just used to clean it up after the initial table saw cut.






And I have my scarf joint glued up.


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## StarbardGuitar (Feb 1, 2016)

Progressing slowly but surely...

I routed for the truss rod the other night.





Then cut the neck to size today.





Finished off the day by getting the top glued up.





Also, I hope I don't gross anyone out by showing this, but this is why you don't stick your finger in the planer, kids!  This is after almost a week of healing.


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## jwade (Feb 2, 2016)

Jesus dude, that's brutal. You are so lucky to have gotten away without losing more!

Also, digging the build thus far. Really like the sycamore veneers between the laminates.


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## charlessalvacion (Feb 2, 2016)

Really nice to watch build threads. Nice guitar sir!


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## StarbardGuitar (Feb 2, 2016)

jwade said:


> Jesus dude, that's brutal. You are so lucky to have gotten away without losing more!
> 
> Also, digging the build thus far. Really like the sycamore veneers between the laminates.





charlessalvacion said:


> Really nice to watch build threads. Nice guitar sir!



Thanks for the compliments guys!

Yes I am very lucky and thankful that I still have all of my fingers! It's very hard to get used to playing guitar without using that finger now, but at least I know that after a month or so I will be back to normal. I guess I'm lucky that this happened with my planer because the blades are shallow and they probably couldn't have taken too much more than they did anyway... but if it happened with a router table or a table saw this would likely be a different story!


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## StarbardGuitar (Feb 5, 2016)

Carved the arm contour in the mahogany.






Since the top is 1/4" thick, I decided to use this method of routing a bunch of small reliefs to help bend the top around the arm contour I carved. I don't have much experience routing with a dremel so they aren't pretty but no one will see them...






Unfortunately, when I rough cut the top to shape, there was one small tear-out which turned into a crack when I was test bending the top. I thought that super glue might work to fix it, but instead it just made a mess and wouldn't hold the crack together. So instead I used wood glue and clamped it up.






While that was clamped up, I also glued up the headstock veneer and cleaned that up the next day. Don't mind the veneer looking sloppy around the truss rod rout, I plan on widening the rout at the headstock a little to make it easier to adjust so it won't look like that soon.






Here's the crack in the top after being sanded. I wasn't able to get as much clamping pressure as I would have liked to really hide it, but I'm thinking that once the top is cut to final shape and the binding is installed that it should be very small and hopefully not very noticeable at all. 






The crack in the top had me a little nervous about trying to get the full bend around the arm contour without using moisture as well. So I did a dry clamp run to get the top pre-bent to the correct shape with the wood soaked around the contour. This really helped it bend around the contour easily along with the small reliefs I routed on the other side. 






There are still some gaps around the contour in some spots even with a ton of clamping pressure, so I think the contour isn't perfectly flat and needs a little work before I can glue it up. Also, I have to make a jig to be able to rout the binding channel around the arm contour, but I have some ideas for that.


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## StarbardGuitar (Feb 17, 2016)

I glued up the top last night and cleaned it up this morning. 






Looks pretty good, this was the first time I'd ever tried to bend a top around a contour.






Also thinned out the headstock, drilled the tuner holes, and installed the binding.


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## dankarghh (Feb 18, 2016)

This is looking too good man. Very keen to see more. I must be one of the few who like the scarf'd piece to match the neck though i'm sure.


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## StarbardGuitar (Feb 19, 2016)

dankarghh said:


> This is looking too good man. Very keen to see more. I must be one of the few who like the scarf'd piece to match the neck though i'm sure.



Thank you! 

Yeah, on my last build I used the same wood as the neck for the scarf joint, but it was ever so slightly misaligned and it bugs me to see because the laminate stripes are just a hair off. I figured on this build I could avoid that by using a different wood, and maybe it'll turn out interesting looking too. Also, the rosewood I bought for the neck wouldn't have been long enough for me to make the scarf with the same wood. Maybe on my next build I'll try the trick that people do on here where they put some veneers between the scarf to hide any slight misalignments.


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## electriceye (Feb 19, 2016)

That's looking really nice! I think you could have gotten away without the relief routes in the top. That counter doesn't look too extreme.


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## StarbardGuitar (Feb 20, 2016)

electriceye said:


> That's looking really nice! I think you could have gotten away without the relief routes in the top. That counter doesn't look too extreme.



Thanks! This was my first time ever bending a top, and I also had a small crack near the contour area on the top from a piece that tore out while cutting the rough shape out. So I just took every precaution I could to make sure I didn't make it worse. I figured it'd be better to play it safe on my first attempt, and you're probably right that if I were to do this again it might not be necessary.


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## StarbardGuitar (Mar 1, 2016)

Slight change of plans with this build! I recently came across a pic of this tele that I used to dig, and I decided to go with that color scheme for this build rather than going blue with the birdseye fingerboard like I had originally planned on.







So I ordered an ebony fingerboard from LMI (this time at the full 25.5" scale lol) but unfortunately they sent me one that was wrong. I had asked for 3/4" behind the nut to leave me room to make the shelf for the locking nut, but the one they sent me only had 3/8" which isn't enough. I got in contact with them and they said they'd send me one with correct specs as soon as possible, so I can't complain! It just means I have to wait a little longer to continue working on this guitar because there's not much else I can do at this stage. Also, I now have a left over birdseye maple fretboard and an extra ebony fretboard, so maybe I can save those for future builds. 

Also, unrelated but I turn 20 today! Man time flies.


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## StarbardGuitar (Mar 7, 2016)

I got the correct fingerboard in the mail the other day, and got that glued up tonight. Should be another update up soon with some more pics!


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## StarbardGuitar (Mar 8, 2016)

Got a little more work done today. First I cleaned up the edges of the fingerboard so now it's flush with the sides of the neck.






Routed for the binding channel, installed that and cleaned it up. Looks good.






I also cleaned up the sides of the body from the router marks so that is ready to rout for the binding channel. I wanted to get more done today but ran out of time. Next step is to make a jig to be able to rout a binding channel with an arm contour.


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## J_Mac (Mar 11, 2016)

Noob question - What made you decide to go 13 degrees rather than 10 dude? Is it down to looks?


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## StarbardGuitar (Mar 12, 2016)

J_Mac said:


> Noob question - What made you decide to go 13 degrees rather than 10 dude? Is it down to looks?



Well, on my last build I used 10 degrees for the scarf, and I feel it wasn't quite steep enough to hold the strings at the proper angle past the nut without having to wind the strings on the tuners more. In theory you really want as few windings around the tuner as possible so there's less string to slip and cause tuning issues. I saw that Warmoth uses 13 degrees for their scarf joints so I figured I'd try that, it seemed like it'd be a good angle where it's not too extreme and potentially easy to break, but steep enough to hold enough tension and angle on the strings past the nut. The scarf joint angle is probably going to be something I'll keep messing with in future builds until I find what seems to be a happy medium for me. But hey, thanks for asking, I never mind answering "noob questions" haha, I'm always happy to share what I've learned so far!


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## J_Mac (Mar 12, 2016)

Thanks man  interesting stuff \m/


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## StarbardGuitar (Mar 14, 2016)

Made up the jig for routing a binding channel around an arm contour.






This is the underside, you can see it's basically just a copy of the jig stewmac sells where that little donut is what actually rides on the edge of the guitar. You can also see the holes from when I tried to use a different router at first, but it was too heavy so I went with a palm router instead.






It doesn't work perfectly, as it doesn't quite cut to the same depth as it makes its way around the contour. I could adjust my jig but it wasn't hard to file down the rest just around the contour. I also can't get in the horns with the jig so I had to do those by hand. I'm still pretty happy with the jig and I think it'll be useful for all sorts of edge work since it is far steadier than holding the router by hand. 






I may go a little overboard with the binding tape.... lol






My goal tonight was to get the neck pocket routed and the neck fitting, and I achieved that so I'm happy! Also started the route for the neck pickup since I knew I wanted it right up against the neck pocket.


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## MoonJelly (Mar 15, 2016)

Lookin' snazzy


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## J_Mac (Mar 15, 2016)

Nice jig! The cut looks superb. How does it stay flush with the contour?


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## StarbardGuitar (Mar 16, 2016)

J_Mac said:


> Nice jig! The cut looks superb. How does it stay flush with the contour?



Thanks, it could use some adjustment but works pretty well! If you take a look at the second picture on my last post, you'll see the circular piece of mdf with the chamfered edge around the router bit. That is what actually rides against the edge of the guitar, the 1/8" or so of flat surface on that piece of mdf. As you pass the guitar through, the jig moves up and down with the contours because only that little bit of material is actually riding on the guitar body. And since the part of the jig that the router is attached to rides up and down the tall box part, it always stays level. 

Hopefully that makes sense, it'd be easier to explain if I could visually show you it in action.


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## J_Mac (Mar 19, 2016)

Aha I think I get it yeah  nice!


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## StarbardGuitar (Nov 15, 2016)

Unfortunately, I no longer have time/motivation to finish this project. I've decided to sell the unfinished project, and I figured I should share that here, since a lot of you guys would be interested in finishing it or have the skills to do so. (I hope this isn't against the forum rules, and if it is I apologize in advance.)

http://www.ebay.com/itm/272451082041?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649


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