# My Blackmachine B6 Clone build!



## Silence2-38554 (Aug 6, 2017)

This is my second summer taking on a build project (see the first HERE). This is the first that I've done completely from scratch, meaning building the neck myself as well! I had access to a woodshop via SF TechShop, though most of the work was done on our kitchen island haha.

Pics!

First AllParts order:

<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/36273690321/in/datetaken/" title="IMG_1410"><img src="https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4386/36273690321_56c8f781c4_b.jpg" width="819" height="1024" alt="IMG_1410"></a><script async src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Rough cut body:





Lining up template:









Rough Forearm contour:





Back cavities, rev. 1





Pickup cavities:





Sizing up routing for the switch & realizing something's off with the template's cavity sizes:





Just didn't look quite right. A little small.....





A quick shot of the "workshop" (SF bay area problems haha). I also realized this is the only picture I took of the neck blank + ebony veneers getting glued up:





After running it through the planer:





Fancy new acrylic routing template!





Workshop morning:









Neck blank with headstock extensions added:





10º fresh off the band saw:





10º ramps made & ready for the router:





Looking good:





Looking better:


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 6, 2017)

Gluing the rosewood headstock veneer:













Test fitting the new plate:





Stainless T-nuts in the neck before gluing the fretboard:





The center line rules all:





Truss rod looking good:





Pickup test fit:





Electronics test fit:





Neck profile shaping! Angle grinder = your friend





Not bad!





Time for some Tru-Oil on the body:





.....Excellent





That Hannes!





Leveling & radiating the fretboard. This took.......awhile:


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 6, 2017)

Time for frets!





This is Cookie guarding the body while I work on the neck:





Last visit to TechShop, pressing frets:





Tru Oiling the neck:





The fretting went well:





Leveling / crowning party:





Getting some F1 oil on that fresh board!





The wiring begins:





Tuning machines installed & looking fabulous! Note the spacer on the 4th string machine, though. Sperzel done messed up lol. The correct one in en route.





Shielding done & done:





So close!





Wiring done up right:









Oh yeah, Luminlays!





That's it for the build! Pretty pics & specs in next post!


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 6, 2017)

Please standby as I'm now realizing Photobucket is completely useless.....


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## Bobo (Aug 6, 2017)

What's the deal with Photobucket? I was going to post a topic with some pics and I use Photobucket...


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## LiveOVErdrive (Aug 6, 2017)

Silence2-38554 said:


> Please standby as I'm now realizing Photobucket is completely useless.....


Yeah this kind of ruined most threads older than a month ago.


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## KnightBrolaire (Aug 6, 2017)

Bobo said:


> What's the deal with Photobucket? I was going to post a topic with some pics and I use Photobucket...


basically they're trying to extort money out of people so that their pics can be seen on other sites. it's like 400$ a year for image hosting. try tinypic, flickr, mixtape.moe


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## IGC (Aug 6, 2017)

I uploaded to google pictures or photos in google plus that worked ok. If you click on the little photobucket icons you can view the pics. Looking good !


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## Mr_Mar10 (Aug 6, 2017)

Really excellent work mate, looks virtually identical to the real thing!!1 whut are those clear pickups? (Want)


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 6, 2017)

I'll have to fix that Photobucket nonsense later. In the mean time...

SPECS:

35mm thick swamp ash body
3 piece maple neck w/ ebony veneers
Rosewood fretboard, headstock veneer, truss rod & cavity cover
25.5" scale
16" fretboard radius
Dunlop 6100 fret wire
Sperzel open gear tuning machines
Schaller Hannes bridge
ASL Blackbird pickups
Dunlop strap buttons
Switchcraft switch & jack
CRL solid shaft 500k pots
Graphtech Tusq XL nut
10-54 Stringjoy strings, set up for drop C

Weighs in at 6lbs dead 




fullsizeoutput_7032 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7033 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7031 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7037 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7038 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_703a by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7028 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7017 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_703c by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7040 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7042 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7047 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



fullsizeoutput_7049 by Kris Yates, on Flickr


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## Lemonbaby (Aug 6, 2017)

Very nice and clean work!


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## KnightBrolaire (Aug 6, 2017)

looks great


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## DistinguishedPapyrus (Aug 6, 2017)

Dude that build is flippin amazing. Without the "handmade in London" rear plate it would be difficult to tell it apart from the real ones. I love that you used tee nuts in the heel of the neck. I did a couple bolt on's like that... my favorite way to build a bolt on. It's rock solid as if it were a set neck but is super easy to remove and does not strip out any wood. Another thing, I love the attention to precision inside the electronics cavity that can be seen in your photobucket library. To me, this is a real test of someone dedicated to their work - how well do you shape it in areas where someone typically won't be able to see? Nailed it!

Where'd you get the bolts for the neck, and are there any ferrules or do they seat directly against the wood?

Think I may have to do one of these one day.


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 6, 2017)

DistinguishedPapyrus said:


> Dude that build is flippin amazing. Without the "handmade in London" rear plate it would be difficult to tell it apart from the real ones. I love that you used tee nuts in the heel of the neck. I did a couple bolt on's like that... my favorite way to build a bolt on. It's rock solid as if it were a set neck but is super easy to remove and does not strip out any wood. Another thing, I love the attention to precision inside the electronics cavity that can be seen in your photobucket library. To me, this is a real test of someone dedicated to their work - how well do you shape it in areas where someone typically won't be able to see? Nailed it!
> 
> Where'd you get the bolts for the neck, and are there any ferrules or do they seat directly against the wood?
> 
> Think I may have to do one of these one day.



Thanks for the kind words man! The neck bolts themselves are straight from the hardware store. There are ferrules, though they are extremely low profile & as far as I can tell, only available from one company:

http://www.leevalley.com/us/wood/page.aspx?p=47230&cat=3,41306,41316&ap=1

I used the #10 brass. They call them "countersunk washers". From what I remember, a Canadian company holds a patent on their design. 

As I stated previously, this was only my second build & had to alter a lot of the build plans along the way to make it more accurate to the real thing. I'm pretty confident if I were to give it another go it would be a dead ringer for a real B6 (minus the plate logo, of course).


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## bpprox22 (Aug 6, 2017)

Amazing work! That looks awesome!


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## KR250 (Aug 6, 2017)

Very well done sir! Only one problem that I can see..... it's missing a seventh string!


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## electriceye (Aug 6, 2017)

Absolutely gorgeous!


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## crackout (Aug 7, 2017)

Nicely done!


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 7, 2017)

KR250 said:


> Very well done sir! Only one problem that I can see..... it's missing a seventh string!




That's the next build (B7)


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 8, 2017)

Anyone know which Moderator I can message to allow editing of the OP? The useless Photobucket links are killing me.


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 9, 2017)

Dear Mods- if you come across this thread, please replace the original posts with these. If not, everyone else enjoy working pictures!

This is my second summer taking on a build project (see the first HERE). This is the first that I've done completely from scratch, meaning building the neck myself as well! I had access to a woodshop via SF TechShop, though most of the work was done on our kitchen island haha.



Pics!



First AllParts order:





IMG_1410 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Rough cut body:





IMG_1434 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Lining up template:





IMG_1435 by Kris Yates, on Flickr





IMG_1436 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Rough Forearm contour:





IMG_1444 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Back cavities, rev. 1





fullsizeoutput_707b by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Pickup cavities:





fullsizeoutput_707e by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Sizing up routing for the switch & realizing something's off with the template's cavity sizes:





IMG_1458 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Just didn't look quite right. A little small.....





IMG_1462 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



A quick shot of the "workshop" (SF bay area problems haha). I also realized this is the only picture I took of the neck blank + ebony veneers getting glued up:





fullsizeoutput_70c2 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



After running it through the planer:





IMG_1502 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Fancy new acrylic routing template!





IMG_1509 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Workshop morning. Note the size-corrected cavities on the back of the body:





IMG_1511 by Kris Yates, on Flickr





IMG_1512 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Neck blank with headstock extensions added:





IMG_1513 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



10º fresh off the band saw:





IMG_1514 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



10º ramps made & ready for the router:





IMG_1515 by Kris Yates, on Flickr


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 9, 2017)

Looking good:





IMG_1517 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Looking better:





IMG_1518 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Gluing the rosewood headstock veneer:





IMG_1603 by Kris Yates, on Flickr





IMG_1604 by Kris Yates, on Flickr





IMG_1656 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Test fitting the new plate:





IMG_1730 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Stainless T-nuts in the neck before gluing the fretboard:





IMG_1743 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



The center line rules all:





IMG_1744 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Truss rod looking good:





IMG_1745 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Pickup test fit:





IMG_1762 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Electronics test fit:





IMG_1763 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Neck profile shaping! Angle grinder = your friend





IMG_1799 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Not bad!





IMG_1801 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Time for some Tru-Oil on the body:





IMG_1841 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



.....Excellent





IMG_1890 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



That Hannes!





IMG_1891 by Kris Yates, on Flickr


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 9, 2017)

Leveling & radiusing the fretboard. This took.......awhile:





IMG_1983 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Time for frets!





IMG_1985 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



This is Cookie guarding the body while I work on the neck:





IMG_1996 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Last visit to TechShop, pressing frets:





IMG_2015 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Tru Oiling the neck:





IMG_2019 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



The fretting went well:





IMG_2020 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Leveling / crowning party:





IMG_2025 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Getting some F1 oil on that fresh board!





IMG_2026 by Kris Yates, on Flickr





IMG_2027 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



The wiring begins:





IMG_2029 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Tuning machines installed & looking fabulous! Note the spacer on the 4th string machine, though. Sperzel done messed up lol. The correct one in en route.





IMG_2030 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Shielding done & done:





IMG_2032 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



So close!





IMG_2033 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Wiring done up right:





IMG_2035 by Kris Yates, on Flickr





IMG_2036 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



Oh yeah, Luminlays!





IMG_2042 by Kris Yates, on Flickr



That's it for the build!


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## crankyrayhanky (Aug 9, 2017)

Wow!!!


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## _MonSTeR_ (Aug 9, 2017)

I am literally in awe of everything about this guitar. Especially the fact that you made it in your kitchen!

Simply stunning


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## Slaeyer (Aug 9, 2017)

Kudos to this amazing and extremely clean work!


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## Spicypickles (Aug 9, 2017)

Very clean work, awesome!


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## Sir Ibanez (Aug 9, 2017)

Nice!


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## Lorcan Ward (Aug 9, 2017)

Great work dude!!


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## Mechanos71 (Aug 9, 2017)

Very nice job. At first glance I didn't realize it was a clone.


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## Walshy (Aug 10, 2017)

Surely this isn't your first rodeo. Either way, stunning work! I've still yet to make a full ash body guitar but it's on the cards. Looks like it's nice to work with.


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## Silence2-38554 (Aug 10, 2017)

Walshy said:


> Surely this isn't your first rodeo. Either way, stunning work! I've still yet to make a full ash body guitar but it's on the cards. Looks like it's nice to work with.


Second body ever, first neck ever  I have been doing extensive repair & modification work for years, though.


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