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



## Konfyouzd (Feb 23, 2012)

Well... 

Some of you may have seen my 27" conversion neck thread for my RG7620. I was thoroughly pleased with the neck despite some minor complications we ran into in the middle of the build and decided I wanted a full axe this time.

Before I continue babbling, here's the mockup...







Yes... I know the color scheme is loud as hell. I wouldn't have it any other way. 

Now on to the specs...

-5pc Maple/Wenge neckthru
-27" scale
-27 frets
-Mahogany wings with quilted maple cap (wings only)
-Birdseye maple fretboard
-Ibanez Lo Pro Edge 7
-Sperzel Locking Tuners
-H/S config (Blaze Custom/Blaze Single) w/ two-way toggle and momentary killswitch
-Jem style input jack along the rear edge of the body
-Orange top with natural bevels and back

I just got an email from the guy building this the other day... Here are the supplies... 






My top...






Wet top...






Neck blank pieces...







Clamping the neck...





The neck blank is now ready for shaping... 






I'll keep this bad boy updated as regularly as I can. I'm very excited to see how this one turns out!


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## leandroab (Feb 23, 2012)

That's going to be one sexy guitar dude...


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 23, 2012)

I know, I can't wait! 

In his last email he said he'd be shaping the neck as far as possible before working on the body so it may be a little while before there are updates on the body.


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## mountainjam (Feb 23, 2012)

Whos doing the work?


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## ralphy1976 (Feb 23, 2012)

are you building everything in your new flat? that's ballsy man!!!


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 23, 2012)

mountainjam said:


> Whos doing the work?


 


ralphy1976 said:


> are you building everything in your new flat? that's ballsy man!!!


 
I'm not building it. DJohns74 is. He's also the one that built my conversion neck for my 7620.


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## djohns74 (Feb 23, 2012)

I've actually got a lot of updates on the neck that I've neglected to send so far as it's been a bit of a hell week. That being said, everything is going rather smoothly so far. I can only hope that the finished product lives up to the promise of the design!


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 23, 2012)




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## Mattmc74 (Feb 23, 2012)

Can't wait to see it done!


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## scherzo1928 (Feb 23, 2012)

Oh yes! I like where this is going!


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## iRaiseTheDead (Feb 23, 2012)

Whoa. Bright as hell man. Hope the finished product is that vibrant. I'm really diggin' the explorer idea!


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## ThePhilosopher (Feb 23, 2012)

This is a build of win.


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## skeels (Feb 23, 2012)

Liked.


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## Empryrean (Feb 23, 2012)

You stick that wood together, Kj >


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## Geognosy (Feb 24, 2012)

I love me some clamp action.


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 24, 2012)

So... I received a zip file last night w/ about 50 pics in it...

I'm going to slowly be adding them... 

FYI - I'm probably NOT going to be posting all 50 of them. I feel like that might draw some attention from the mod/admin level...


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 24, 2012)

Rough neck profile...






I believe this is where he's about to cut the scarf joint...






Gluing the ears onto the headstock...






Ears attached!






Let's put a top on that headstock, eh?
















Rough heel






Truss rod...
















Probably gonna need a fingerboard too, eh?











Got a finger board and some rough shaping of the neck/headstock...
















I know you're like me and probably dying to see this with at least a body template, right? Well, son... You will not be disappoint...
















It's late in the thread for a 56k joke, but I'm pretty sure 56k hates me as much as I hate it right now.


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## UnderTheSign (Feb 24, 2012)

That's a Kelly, not an explorer! ;P


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 24, 2012)

I didn't know if Jackson trademarked the Kelly name and I really don't want to get anyone in trouble.


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## djohns74 (Feb 24, 2012)

I also added the radius (430mm to match the Edge7) to the fingerboard last night and began the process of shaping the back of the neck. 

Frankly, my new oscillating belt/spindle sander is just about the coolest tool ever. I bought it on Monday and have already used it to smooth out the portion of the neck that will be visible along the back of the body, create the rough heel shown above, partially smooth out the area behind the headstock, take the neck down to near its final width and get the neck shaping started by sanding each end of the cut to an appropriate depth (pictures of this to come later). 

I believe this form of sanding is ultimately going to replace my router for a lot of final shaping operations, which is good since I've had some minor issues shaping with the router in the past and don't really need the stress of worrying that at some random point, the router is going to just decide to tear a giant chunk of wood out of the instrument. Both methods create a gigantic mess of either shavings or sawdust or both, but there's really not much that can be done about that. I'm far past the point of being terribly concerned about how much of a mess building guitars is making out of my basement really. 

If anyone has any questions about the build process, I'd be happy to share my (possibly odd) methods in more detail.


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## jarnozz (Feb 24, 2012)

awesome dude! very like my build xD only mine is going way slower in progress. money money money... ugh! love your build!


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## skeels (Feb 26, 2012)

The only thing better than a messy basement is a messy attic.


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## djohns74 (Feb 26, 2012)

Here we go with the carving of the neck. I started out by measuring the thicknesses I wanted near the nut and the heel then used the spindle sander to carve grooves that deep into the back of the neck.







Then I used a rasp to rough the neck profile into these grooves on one side.






From there, my trusty spokeshave and sanding block combined to connect and smooth the shapes at either end.










Then it's just a matter of flipping it around, repeating for the other side and smoothing everything out as much as possible. From there, there was still some excess wood behind the nut and at the heel, so the spindle sander was again instrumental in smoothing those areas out (have I mentioned that I love that thing?)






Here, the heel is essentially done. It might still get a little more shaping and sanding later, but this is good enough until the body wings are attached, at which point I'll know better what the true final shape needs to be.










One interesting aspect of using the spindle sander is that it was trivial to leave a shape in the wood that lent itself to making a nicely rounded volute behind the nut. This isn't something I normally do, but the extra wood was there so I thought I'd take a stab at it.










In the meantime around all this neck carving, the headstock was also sanded to its final shape. The sander made this so fast and easy that now I'm not sure how I ever got by without it.







At this point, the neck is just about at the target thickness that I had in mind, which is slightly under 20mm at the 2nd fret (about 1mm more than my RG7620) and right about 21mm at the 12th. Can't really go much less than that with the style truss rod I use, but it feels nice to me regardless. The 7620 is pretty flat right at the very back anyway, so this one is actually very similar but just slightly more rounded.

Next steps will be cutting out the shelf for the locking nut to sit on, which should be interesting, and then installing frets. On my last neck through, I installed the frets after the body wings were attached and I was seriously hating life after trying to maneuver an entire guitar around to press the frets in. So I won't do that again.


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 26, 2012)

I wanna take a bite out of that quilted maple.


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## Adam Of Angels (Feb 26, 2012)

Ok, so, this looks like its going to be sick when its done.


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## Konfyouzd (Feb 28, 2012)

So it appears that I have managed to bottleneck this process slightly by neglecting to send out the bridge and tuners... 

I'm sending em out tomorrow AM


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## djohns74 (Feb 28, 2012)

Nah, I'm just ahead of schedule, that's all. 

Neck is all but done including fretwork. Next steps are to get the mahogany wings thinned down (not fun) and at least partially shaped prior to gluing. Plus there is stain experimentation to be done and I need to design a control cavity at some point, so there's plenty of work that can be done in the meantime.


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 5, 2012)

Itchin' like a crack fiend for updates...


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## djohns74 (Mar 5, 2012)

Too many distractions this weekend... 

A lot got done just the same though. Should be able to offer proof this evening.


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 5, 2012)

Distractions will happen. Don't mind me I'm just a kid impatiently waiting for a new toy.


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## djohns74 (Mar 5, 2012)

Uh oh, prepare for the post(s) of a million pictures and endless boring commentary... 






_What the -- these frets are way too long! And they're perfectly straight! This will never do._






_This appears to be a device that can help with at least one of these problems._






_Yep, that seems to work._










_That's more like it._

The fretbender is one of those Stew Mac tools that a lot of people scoff at since it's overpriced, you can build your own that works just as well, blah, blah, blah, but in the end, you'll use it on every build that has any radius to the fretboard and it makes bending the radius into the frets a very accurate 5 minute job. The full lengths of fretwire appear to be bent quite a bit for the typically flat Ibanez radius, but that's mostly an illusion born of their sheer length. Other than that, they actually ARE bent slightly more than they need to be, which is a trick to make sure the ends get properly seated when they're pressed into place.






_Wow, how did they get all cut and nicely organized all of a sudden? It's almost like someone decided it would be awkward for a person with only two hands to take a picture during the cutting process._

Of course, the frets are all a slightly different length and you wouldn't want them to get mixed up, so keeping track of where they all go is a good idea. A left-over block of pine with 27 holes drilled into it works fine for me. Of course, two of those holes were brand new for this project, so that's why #27 is kind of off doing its own thing. On a side note, even with the width of a 7 string and 27 frets, I somehow only needed three of the lengths pictured above. I was positive I'd be cutting into the fourth one for at least a fret or two.






Time for another invaluable tool to make an appearance. The fret press is loaded up with a 16" radius insert, which isn't perfect for the 430mm fretboard, but it's damn sure close enough to get the job done.






_And we're off! This seems easy enough... Crap, wait, there's still 26 more of these stupid things to go_






_Looks like I'm about halfway done. Damnit, no, these things are getting closer together all the time for some stupid reason._






_So close, yet so far away!_






_Last one! Time for a beer!_

The process is simply to squeeze a line of thin super glue into a slot, set the fret into place, lower the press firmly onto it and hold it for a short time to let the glue set. All of which gets a bit tedious after a while, but it's one hell of a lot easier and faster than hammering the damn things into place, which I've done exactly once. A pleasant side effect is that accuracy is also quite high here which means very little fret leveling is required.

Following the pressing action, the frets are trimmed down using the same cutting tool that I failed to picture above, so naturally I skipped it again. It's possible that particular tool is a bit camera shy, though it does make a couple of cameo appearances in the background later on.






_What's this, a fretboard made of blue painters tape? Seems like a peculiar choice. I wonder what kind of tone it will have?_

By far, my least favorite task in neck building is filing and rounding the ends of the frets. There's a two-sided file that's flat on one end and round on the other. Starting with the flat part, you work the file under both sides of each end of a fret to eliminate the sharp edge left from trimming it back. Then, the file is flipped over and is used to carefully give the end of the fret a relatively smooth, rounded appearance so your fingers don't feel any sharp edges while you play. The process only takes a couple of minutes, but it had to be done 54 times in this case, and the entire job is done hunched awkwardly over the fretboard so you can see your progress.






Then the frets are individually polished with steel wool to smooth them out even more and the tape is removed to see the finished product. Yep, it is in fact worth all the effort.






Now we move on to the only inlays this guitar will have. I went with little 1/16" diameter black dots, so I just measured the vertical center of the fretboard edge, marked that line at the center of the frets that get a dot, used a little center punch tool to mark the wood then just drilled the holes fairly shallow by hand with a 1/16" bit.

(Continued)


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## djohns74 (Mar 5, 2012)

The "dots" actually come as a stick of plastic, so I just drop a bit of super glue into the hole, shove one end of the stick on in, wait for the glue to dry then cut it off.






Once all of them are in, the whole thing gets sanded nice and smooth.






_Mmmm, rounded fret ends...  _






Some random hardware has arrived, so I can move on to finishing the headstock now that I have the tuners in hand. I've never worked with Sperzels before, so I wanted to make absolutely sure the measurements were solid before doing any drilling into the headstock.










First, I measure everything out and drill the holes in my headstock template. Then I can just stick the template on to the headstock and use that to locate the Forstner bit. The block of wood behind the headstock helps prevent excessive tear-out when the bit breaks through the back.






_Let's get that ugly MDF out of the way and see how this turned out..... Nice and clean!_






The Sperzels have little pins on them to keep them from spinning as opposed to the tiny screws that a lot of tuners use. I guess I don't really care which method is used, they both require secondary holes to be drilled that need to be located precisely in relation to the parent tuner hole. The set screws seem to forgive a small amount of inaccuracy in their placement whereas the Sperzels require very precise measurements, but of course these will never strip when you're trying to unscrew them at a later date.










With the headstock complete, I can move on to attaching the body wings. Since I don't want to be removing a lot of wood from the body to smooth out alignment imperfections, I will repeat the method that I used on my personal neck through. This involves inserting two small hard wood dowels into each wing to line things up and keep them that way during the gluing process. It's just a matter of making some relatively precise measurements and drilling shallow holes into each piece.










Somewhat amazingly, they both fit perfectly on the first try.






Now just spread some glue, add a few big ass bar clamps and set the whole thing aside for a while.






Time to figure out the control layout for this beast. A pretty standard 3-control arrangement seems appropriate enough here so we'll pretty much just draw a rectange around the whole thing to keep the cavity smallish. I do want the output jack to be parallel to the neck, and it needs a flat shelf to rest on, so that edge of the cavity will be a weird shape in order to provide this. I intend to make the cavity cover a normal rounded rectange though.






I just drilled the three holes all the way through the body and transfered my cavity design to the back so I can route it out. Everything looks as though it should line up nicely at this point.






Stick the template in place and hog out most of the wood with a nice big Forstner bit (yes, I love those things).






The router steps in to take care of the rest and the template is removed once the cavity is deep enough.






And done! I'm sure it looks a little strange for this to be going all the way through the body, but the top has yet to be attached and it's a full half inch thick, so the route will still need to be extended into it once it's on. Having the cavity routed before the top goes on will allow me to route channels for the pickup wires to run through. I used this method on my recent bass build and it worked out great. On my first neck through, I waited until the end and wound up with the utterly nerve-wracking task of angling a very long drill bit just right to hit the neck pickup route from the control cavity. In that case, it happened to work out absolutely perfectly, but I kind of felt like I got lucky with it and decided to find another solution.

That's about where we are now. Next steps are the aforementioned wiring channels and then getting the top glued on. Things are about to get fairly interesting I think!


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 5, 2012)

Where's the "peeing my pants" emote?


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## russdogz_ (Mar 5, 2012)

last half of the pictures aren't working, /creyz


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## BlackMastodon (Mar 5, 2012)

None of the pictures work for me .


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## djohns74 (Mar 6, 2012)

The images seem okay to me. Maybe my server was down last night? Wouldn't be surprising the way it's gone lately.


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## Empryrean (Mar 6, 2012)

Wow Kj this is turning out very good, it gives me goosebumps!


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 6, 2012)

They worked for me around the time you first put them up (Yes I was on SS.org like all day )

And then maybe an hour or so afterwards I wasn't able to see them but they're back now so I'm not sure.


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 6, 2012)

Empryrean said:


> Wow Kj this is turning out very good, it gives me goosebumps!


You and me both. Dave is kinda the man. And an absolute pleasure to work with to boot.

Also...

@Dave - I remember during the planning I was asking about keeping the wings from sliding around while gluing and I noticed those little notches you put on there to plug it together like Ikea furniture. Pretty slick. I wouldn't have thought of that. Is that how it's usually done?


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## djohns74 (Mar 6, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


> @Dave - I remember during the planning I was asking about keeping the wings from sliding around while gluing and I noticed those little notches you put on there to plug it together like Ikea furniture. Pretty slick. I wouldn't have thought of that. Is that how it's usually done?


No idea who else does it that way to be honest, I'm sure it's not a new idea, but I also suspect that it's not that common. I do it because it seems like a way to increase accuracy in a manner which is transparent in the end and it works with the tools and techniques I have available to me. 

I also did it on the neck woods on my original neck through but that was before I had a table saw that very quickly and easily cleans up the finished laminates. In this case, I just slapped the neck woods together and clamped 'em, making somewhat of an effort to keep the woods lined up during clamping, but not worrying about it too much. Then, I roughly planed one side of the resulting blank by hand just to give a surface to ride along the guide on my table saw to cut the other side with. Since I had plenty of extra wood to work with, this worked well and resulted in a nicely squared neck blank with relatively minimal effort. 

I frankly couldn't think of a good way to accomplish the same thing with the body wings, so it was more important to me to make sure they came out of the gluing process already lined up and ready to rock. Which they pretty much did.


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## Levi79 (Mar 6, 2012)

This is really sick dude! Excited to see the end product!


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## BlackMastodon (Mar 7, 2012)

Pics work now, and it looks great! I'm realizing now how useful drill presses are for this hobby, and speaking of which, where did you get the fret pusher-inner?


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## djohns74 (Mar 7, 2012)

BlackMastodon said:


> Pics work now, and it looks great! I'm realizing now how useful drill presses are for this hobby, and speaking of which, where did you get the fret pusher-inner?


Stewart-MacDonald (STEWMAC.COM : Guitar Parts, Bass, Banjo, Mandolin, Hardware, Tools, Supplies, Free Information), which is where I've gotten almost all of my specialized tools. They're generally not cheap, but excellent selection and service more than make up for that in my mind.


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## Empryrean (Mar 7, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


> @Dave - I remember during the planning I was asking about keeping the wings from sliding around while gluing and *I noticed those little notches you put on there to plug it together* like Ikea furniture. Pretty slick. I wouldn't have thought of that. Is that how it's usually done?



I can't believed I overlooked that, pure genius! I shall use it in my next build


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## djohns74 (Mar 7, 2012)

Got some more progress to report tonight! 







Pickup wire channels routed out. Pretty much just took my best guess here and kept 'em straight and plenty large enough. With that out of the way, we can proceed to one of the major though fairly straightforward steps of the project.






First we'll protect our nifty channels from getting glue in them.






Now we'll spread out a nice healthy dose of wood glue






And... on goes the top! Here, I have clamps on each end of each half that are pretty loose, just enough to keep the top pieces from jumping around when the two large clamps going across the body are added to make sure the top is up against the neck wood nice and tight. The smaller clamps at the end are then cranked down good and tight.






Then it's just a matter of adding more of them, each with their own little piece of MDF to protect the top, and the large clamps are repositioned to join in the fun as well.






After a little while, the clamps come off and now it's really starting to look like something!






As long as we're here, I figure I might as well drill the output jack. I left the body in this area deliberately flat as lining the drill bit up perpendicular to the surface to be drilled is far less prone to error than doing it on an angle.






Here I use the output jack itself to determine how deep to drill the next hole. This looks about right...






I add a little tape to the bit so I know where to stop drilling.






Looking good...










Then it's just a matter of drilling all the way through to the control cavity with a half inch bit and it's done. If I did this right, the jack's threaded portion should stick into the cavity just enough to be able to secure it via its washer and nut.






Just right!

Next steps are to finish rough-cutting the body shape now that everything's in one piece then work on leveling and smoothing the top, which is still somewhat rough. I see a whole lot of sanding in my near future!


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## Pikka Bird (Mar 8, 2012)

This looks super proficient. Nice to see some fancy wood used in a Kelly-esque build.


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 8, 2012)

This is looking incredible!


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## ejendres (Mar 8, 2012)

Thats amazing man.


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## djohns74 (Mar 8, 2012)

Okay, I have to amend one of my statements from last night real quick. NOW it's starting to look like something. 










The rough cut represents about 5 minutes of work. A band saw with a fresh blade is a very good thing.


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## somniumaeternum (Mar 8, 2012)

Looking great so far!


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## vampiregenocide (Mar 8, 2012)

This is going to be awesome.


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 8, 2012)




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## Fiction (Mar 9, 2012)

Most excellent work, chap.


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## Astcyr17 (Mar 9, 2012)

Guitars looking killer dude, keep up the clean work. I think I better head back out to the garage and get working on my 7!


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## Kwampis (Mar 11, 2012)

This is a seriously awesome build. It's making me want a Kelly.


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## djohns74 (Mar 11, 2012)

Sweet! A new page to clutter up with endless photos and nonsense. 

Things are really starting to happen here as we move from the "it's starting to look like something" phase directly into the "it's starting to look like a 7 string Kelly" phase, which is undoubtedly far more interesting for most of us.






Time to finish up the control cavity. First up is to re-measure and drill the proper holes through the top.






Now the body is flipped over to finish routing the cavity. The existing cavity through the mahogany is plenty deep enough that a template isn't needed, the router just rides along the sides of the initial route. The cavity is taken to within 1/8 inch of the top surface.






Might as well test fit the controls. Looks good to me!






Continuing the joy that is routing all the various cavities into a guitar body, I decide to tackle the trem next. First I'll drill a bunch of large holes all the way through the area where the spring block will reside.






Like such.






A makeshift router template made up of scrap MDF will be sufficient to complete this step.










Once it's deep enough, the "template" gets out of the way and I continue until it's all the way through.






Step 2 is to position the post holes and finish the rear portion of the route.






And that winds up looking this way. The next step is to use another template to create the "shelf" area where the posts ultimately sit, and I don't have a picture of that. Trust me, it doesn't look that different than the previous setup and I'm probably boring most of you already anyway.






Moving right along to the pickup routes, the first template is in place here and you can see the placement of the neck pickup drawn in. The neck pickup template is a little tricky in a case like this since a portion of the underside of it has to be routed away to fit over the neck, but I've run into that before, so it's no problem.






All the routes are now complete and looking pretty solid, I think. I wonder how they'll look with hardware installed in them?






Kind of like that I guess! I probably should have waited to fit the controls until this step so I could get a picture of all of it together since I just didn't feel like remounting all that crap again right now. Oh well, it will all be together again some day soon, right?






By this point, I'm really getting into a groove with my router, so I figured I'd carve out the spring cavity too. All that's really left for the router should be making the recessed cavity covers for the back.






I've been looking forward to seeing how my new sander is going to work for shaping the body, so I thought I'd give it a try up in what would normally be a tricky area to shape.






Here's the same area about 15 minutes later.














And after a quick switch to a smaller diameter spindle, it's about 99% done. This sander is now officially my new favorite tool! I had a ton of extra mahogany in this area too and this thing tore through it quite happily. Sure, I'll go through a lot of sandpaper doing bodies this way, but it's totally worth it. It's way faster, easier and cleaner than using a router to do the same thing.


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## Pikka Bird (Mar 11, 2012)

Wow, super clean work. This is living up to its potential so far.


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## jarnozz (Mar 11, 2012)

great and fast progress! would die for those tools xD im stuck with an old router and hand tools xD


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## Levi79 (Mar 11, 2012)

Wow, this is coming along really awesome.


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 11, 2012)




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## crazygtr (Mar 11, 2012)

You'll soon find out that that sander (ROSS) is the best investment you've ever made (guitar building-wise)


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 21, 2012)




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## Just A Box (Mar 21, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


>



That guitar dispenses unfiltered awesomeness!


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## scherzo1928 (Mar 21, 2012)

djohns74 said:


>


 
Oh man, you made my day. I do that shit a lot, though I do it to make templates, and not the cavities themselves.


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## djohns74 (Mar 21, 2012)

scherzo1928 said:


> Oh man, you made my day. I do that shit a lot, though I do it to make templates, and not the cavities themselves.


Yeah, that's usually how I make templates too. For purely rectangular cavities, I find that lining up separate flat pieces and measuring them like 10 times to make sure they're perfect works just fine. I'm very comfortable with my router and the strength of Stew Mac's two-sided tape so making a one-time use template sometimes just feels like a waste of time.


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## iRaiseTheDead (Mar 21, 2012)

oh yes oh yes oh yes oh yes oh yes oh yes

Can't wait to see this thing painted!


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 21, 2012)

iRaiseTheDead said:


> oh yes oh yes oh yes oh yes oh yes oh yes
> 
> Can't wait to see this thing painted!



You and me both brother!


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 21, 2012)

So given the extreme shape of this bad boy, anyone wanna take a stab at what ilike to play?

Hint: Not metal (but I do like to use hot pups w slightly lower gain).


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## brynotherhino (Mar 21, 2012)

^ Alternative reggae fusion country?


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## canuck brian (Mar 21, 2012)

That looks super clean. Can't wait to see this thing finished!


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 21, 2012)

brynotherhino said:


> ^ Alternative reggae fusion country?



Close... Minus the country.


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## Konfyouzd (Mar 21, 2012)




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## Mattmc74 (Mar 21, 2012)

Very nice job! Looking great so far!


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## BIG ND SWEATY (Mar 21, 2012)

oh lawd this is gonna be killer


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## Purelojik (Mar 24, 2012)

damn thats what i need, a spindle sander, router and drill press. with those i can do this at this speed. 

amazing work dude, you seem to really be in the zone with this build. cant wait to see it finished.


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 1, 2012)




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## BlackMastodon (Apr 1, 2012)

You tease...


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## 7stringDemon (Apr 1, 2012)

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


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 2, 2012)

That's all I got, y'all!


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 12, 2012)

Bump... 

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


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## warhead78 (Apr 12, 2012)

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


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## djohns74 (Apr 13, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


> 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.


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## djohns74 (Apr 16, 2012)

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.


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## Pikka Bird (Apr 17, 2012)

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.


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 17, 2012)

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


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## Stealthdjentstic (Apr 17, 2012)

Looks legit to me


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 17, 2012)

^ I've almost finished my holoflash project too


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## MrGignac (Apr 17, 2012)

that orange looks really cool, epic build. subscribed


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 17, 2012)

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


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## djohns74 (Apr 17, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


> 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.


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## Levi79 (Apr 17, 2012)

droooooooool


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 18, 2012)

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


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## asher (Apr 18, 2012)

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


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## djohns74 (Apr 19, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


> 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.


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 19, 2012)

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.


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## djohns74 (Apr 19, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


> 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.


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## asher (Apr 19, 2012)

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.


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 19, 2012)

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?


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## asher (Apr 19, 2012)

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


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 19, 2012)

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...


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## djohns74 (Apr 19, 2012)

Yeah to be honest, I have no clue about the strap buttons. I kind of realized in the middle of spraying the sealer that I hadn't drilled the holes for them yet, but at the same time, it occurred to me that I have no real idea where to put them. I'd obviously like to get them drilled before the final clear coats go on, just haven't really thought about it yet, so any input on the matter would be appreciated.


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## djohns74 (Apr 22, 2012)

Okay, time for a completely blatant tease.


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## BlackMastodon (Apr 22, 2012)

Gonna start neg repping you for these tease pictures?  That orange came out awesome!


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 22, 2012)




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## djohns74 (Apr 22, 2012)

BlackMastodon said:


> Gonna start neg repping you for these tease pictures?  That orange came out awesome!


Sorry, I'm actually looking forward to getting the tape off and proceeding to clear coat as much as anyone!

I'm definitely happy with the color this time around, out in my garage I was concerned that after the third coat, it was starting to look a little red again, but the light out there was all weird at the time. Under more neutral lighting it's distinctly orange, almost leaning toward amber under a flash. The 3D effect of the quilt is pretty intense even without a clear coat, though of course, a still shot will never capture that.


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## HaMMerHeD (Apr 23, 2012)

No reason to worry about drilling holes for the strap buttons or pots until the finish is done. Just draw a reticle on some masking tape and stick it to where you want to drill. Mark the hole location with a punch and use a metal drill bit (non brad-point) to drill the hole, and go slow. The punch divot will keep the cone tip of the drill bit centered where you want the hole to be. The tape will keep the finish from being damaged.


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## djohns74 (Apr 23, 2012)

HaMMerHeD said:


> No reason to worry about drilling holes for the strap buttons or pots until the finish is done. Just draw a reticle on some masking tape and stick it to where you want to drill. Mark the hole location with a punch and use a metal drill bit (non brad-point) to drill the hole, and go slow. The punch divot will keep the cone tip of the drill bit centered where you want the hole to be. The tape will keep the finish from being damaged.


Thanks for the advice, and you can be sure I would do all of that on a finished instrument. However, if I have the opportunity to get it done before the final finish goes on, I don't see why I wouldn't do that.


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## djohns74 (Apr 24, 2012)

How about a little less of a tease tonight?











For what it's worth, the body shot was taken with with the flash on to try to get the figure to pop as much as possible. The headstock shot is a simple close-up (macro focus mode) with no flash. As far as I'm concerned, both pictures ended up representing the color quite well.

It's also worth noting that the paint has been lightly wet sanded with 2000 grit paper in these shots to smooth things out, especially the edges, so the finish is actually fairly dull right now, and yet the figure shows up quite nicely. Hopefully it will look pretty incredible under several layers of glossy, polished clear coat.


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## bob123 (Apr 24, 2012)

Cool!  What dye did you use?


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## asher (Apr 24, 2012)

Holy cow that looks awesome!


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## bouVIP (Apr 24, 2012)

OMG that's amazing! I love that orange and the top and everything about it!


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## djohns74 (Apr 24, 2012)

bob123 said:


> Cool!  What dye did you use?


Colortone Liquid Stains from StewMac, yellow and red in roughly a 3-to-1 ratio, mixed into Behlen Nitrocellulose Lacquer, also from StewMac, and sprayed in several coats with my cheapo touch-up spray gun. This is my first time with this lacquer and I'm loving it, it goes on just as easily as the waterbase stuff I was using for a while, but is a lot clearer and also seems substantially harder even after sitting for just a couple of days.


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## BlackMastodon (Apr 24, 2012)

That orange + that top + natural binding = HNNNNNNNGH!!


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 24, 2012)

This LITERALLY brought a tear to my eye. I'm fuckin amazed!


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 24, 2012)

djohns74 said:


> Colortone Liquid Stains from StewMac, yellow and red in roughly a 3-to-1 ratio, mixed into Behlen Nitrocellulose Lacquer, also from StewMac, and sprayed in several coats with my cheapo touch-up spray gun. This is my first time with this lacquer and I'm loving it, it goes on just as easily as the waterbase stuff I was using for a while, but is a lot clearer and also seems substantially harder even after sitting for just a couple of days.



Nitro is the stuff they use on nice strats isn't it? Whatever the case it's looking pretty sweet! Like orange soda... :-D


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## canuck brian (Apr 24, 2012)

Man that looks super clean. I've been checking on this thread every day so far for a week for pics...can't wait to see this thing strung up!


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 24, 2012)

Same here. I'm really amazed at just how close he got to that initial picture.


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## eddiewarlock (Apr 24, 2012)

wow! it´s amazing!


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## BlackMastodon (Apr 24, 2012)

Every time I look at it I get a large quantity of GAS for an orange quilted maple build with natural binding.


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 24, 2012)

Honestly, I took the idea from Mayones. All the Regiuses I see have a stained top, natural binding and mahogany back and I've been liking that look more and more lately. I've always been a fan of natural fancy woods but I also like the way color quilted tops look. They always look like a dyed swimming pool.


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## djpharoah (Apr 24, 2012)

Explorer??? That's a Jackson Kelly... and I love me some Kelly


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 24, 2012)

Am I allowed to call it that w/o getting Dave sued?


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## Andromalia (Apr 24, 2012)

That orange really came out well.


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## nojyeloot (Apr 24, 2012)

That looks OUT-STAND-ING!!!


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## All_¥our_Bass (Apr 24, 2012)

Guitboner activated.


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## Ironbird (Apr 25, 2012)

An ambitious project, no doubt, but one that is entirely in capable hands. 

I like where this is going!


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## JStraitiff (Apr 25, 2012)

What a loud looking guitar  I like it!


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## IB-studjent- (Apr 25, 2012)

nojyeloot said:


> That looks OUT-FUCKING STAND-ING!!!



That ^ is more like it


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## IB-studjent- (Apr 25, 2012)

Ironbird said:


> An ambitious project, no doubt, but one that is entirely in capable hands.
> 
> I like where this is going!



What's ambitious about it, the build quality is pretty spot on !


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## ApteraBassist (Apr 26, 2012)

wow... I gotta say that's one of the first times I've seen such a vibrant color turn out as planned from a rendering.


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## asilayamazing (Apr 27, 2012)

djohns74 said:


> Yeah to be honest, I have no clue about the strap buttons. I kind of realized in the middle of spraying the sealer that I hadn't drilled the holes for them yet, but at the same time, it occurred to me that I have no real idea where to put them. I'd obviously like to get them drilled before the final clear coats go on, just haven't really thought about it yet, so any input on the matter would be appreciated.


 strap on the back neck joint where it connects to the body? looks amazing whats the weight like though a v? or standard balance?


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## eddiewarlock (Apr 28, 2012)

amazing!


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## Aftermath1 (Apr 28, 2012)

Can't wait to see this! The orange is so damn awesome


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## Konfyouzd (May 29, 2012)




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## LetsMosey (May 29, 2012)

damnit, don't tease us!!!!


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## BlackMastodon (May 30, 2012)

Oh lawd. Djohns how did you get the edges of the dye so clean? It looks amazing.


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## Konfyouzd (May 30, 2012)

Masking tape and lacquer. He told me mixing the dye into a lacquer would be easier (less chance of bleed).


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## Konfyouzd (May 30, 2012)




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## K3V1N SHR3DZ (May 30, 2012)

^^
OH MY FUCKING FUCK


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## Konfyouzd (May 30, 2012)

How did I forget this one?


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## Empryrean (May 30, 2012)

Well Kj, count me officially envious as hell. Dmn that's so nice


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## Konfyouzd (May 30, 2012)

I'm pretty amazed at how this turned out considering how hesitant Dave seemed to do a neckthru project at first and even more hesitant to do a neckthru Kelly


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## JamesM (May 30, 2012)

I want a video.


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## Konfyouzd (May 30, 2012)

I don't have it yet. Those pics were taken at Dave's house. Still working out final payment/shipping arrangements.


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## JamesM (May 30, 2012)

I meant eventually.


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## Purelojik (May 30, 2012)

is....is this real? 






fucking fuck doesnt even touch it....i want to touch it... or it to touch me....


great job dude


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## nojyeloot (May 30, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


>


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## Nonservium (May 30, 2012)

Fucking glorious!


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## Konfyouzd (May 30, 2012)

Kinda looks like this


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## bouVIP (May 30, 2012)

This is like my guitar wet dream.....I love it


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## djohns74 (May 30, 2012)

Thanks for all the kind words everyone, overall I'm pretty happy with how it came out. I won't try to claim that it's perfect, but all things considered, I think it's very solid, definitely my best work so far.

As for the questions about the finish, it's not stained/dyed in the traditional sense, I actually sprayed it with a tinted lacquer that I mixed myself using StewMac's ColorTone stains (red and yellow). My testing suggested that this would yield a nice, deep glossy look and would certainly allow me to get those very clean edges on the bevels just by using painter's tape, which was a design criteria from the start.


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## ara_ (May 30, 2012)

Really awesome. Why don't you live in germany?
I loved the detailed documentation btw!


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## brynotherhino (May 30, 2012)

Oh my. Thats incredible!


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## guitarbuilder93 (May 30, 2012)

So. Fucking. Yes


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## BucketheadRules (Jun 1, 2012)

Konfyouzd said:


> How did I forget this one?



If anyone who works at Jackson is reading this...

Make this fucking guitar. Now.


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## LetsMosey (Jun 1, 2012)




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## Konfyouzd (Jun 1, 2012)




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## Hollowway (Jun 1, 2012)

What's that you say, Djohns? You're getting a lot of compliments and requests? And you've decided to do a run of these, in both 7 and 8 strings? Great!! Sign me up for an 8!!


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## Mr Violence (Jun 1, 2012)

What the actual fuck. This is one of the prettiest guitars I've ever seen.


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## Konfyouzd (Jun 12, 2012)

According to my tracking number this thing shows up some time tomorrow... 

I got a production 6 string Kelly coming in the mail as well (caught the Kelly fever).


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## mcd (Jul 18, 2012)

late post but GOD DAMN! thats all i have to say


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## 7stringDemon (Jul 21, 2012)

This is going to sound weird because I don't know you but. . . . 

I had a dream last night and this guitar was in it 0.o


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## Vicious7 (Jul 22, 2012)

I think this is *the* most beautiful Kell-Explorer I've ever seen. Seriously, orange with natural binding, 7 string?, baritone???!, maple fretboard?????!!!!

It looks so delicious...like a woody orange crush ice cream popsicle... 

I've got two customs on the way, but I would gladly shell out a deposit for something just like that....


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