7 String Black Limba Star Guitar Build

[Lemonbaby]

It looks like that worked. I'm currently filling in the gap on the side with some ziricote dust and CA glue. Hopefully that covers the wood glue, but if not I can figure something out.
[...]
I used a little bit of salt, some tape to hold it in place while I got it clamped, and then used my new kugihiki.

Great job for your first time... that's what she said. You could hide the glueline a little better with a mixture of dark Ziricote dust and Epoxy (or Superglue). Just deepen it a little first with a file or sandpaper folded over a sharp edge.

 

[JSil13]

Great job for your first time... that's what she said. You could hide the glueline a little better with a mixture of dark Ziricote dust and Epoxy (or Superglue). Just deepen it a little first with a file or sandpaper folded over a sharp edge.

I have some two part epoxy that I usually use to grain fill. I should have used that, but here it is after filling the gaps with dust and CA glue. Came out pretty nice

 

[JSil13]

Got the binding down to the top using a card scraper. This looks way better than I thought that it would. I still have a few gaps that I need to fill with some of the goop made with binding dissolved in acetone.

 

[JSil13]

I can live with this.

 

[Lemonbaby]

Absolutely brilliant! To be honest, the guitar also would have looked worse with the cut off fretboard. I always find it quite satisfying to fix screw-ups in my builds with some creative idea and a little patience... once I get over the first 30 minutes of aggresion where I just want to burn the whole fucking thing.

 

[JSil13]

Absolutely brilliant! To be honest, the guitar also would have looked worse with the cut off fretboard. I always find it quite satisfying to fix screw-ups in my builds with some creative idea and a little patience... once I get over the first 30 minutes of aggresion where I just want to burn the whole fucking thing.

Every build I've done so far is littered with little mistakes that I've had to somehow come up with ideas to fix. They've all also got drops of my blood on them. Thanks for the idea for the fretboard though. I never would have thought of that, and it's way easier than what I was thinking about doing.

 

[JSil13]

Got the neck pocket routed with only a minor binding catastrophe. Also a bunch of hardware came in. Going with some LP design ideas. Chrome hardware, witch hat knobs, pickup rings, as well as the maple/mahoganyish bound body. Don't think I'll be able to use the tall pickup ring so I'll need to find another flat short one somewhere.

 

[JimF]

This is stunning! Any likelihood of direct mount pickups? Then it would be absolutely perfect!
Also, nice Higonokami - I have a very similar one on my desk at work. It is insanely sharp.

 

[JSil13]

This is stunning! Any likelihood of direct mount pickups? Then it would be absolutely perfect!
Also, nice Higonokami - I have a very similar one on my desk at work. It is insanely sharp.

I've done the last few builds with no pick guards or pickup rings, but I wanted a different kind of look with this one. The original plan was to do a gold top with cream binding and black pickguard/pickup rings etc. Now it's essentially the same idea, but with a natural finished maple top. Probably no pickguard though.

I love my Higo. I have a few of them. I'm a chef and have quite a few Japanese knives and I actually bought Higonokamis for all my back of the house co workers. I sharpen mine on wet stones and can get it pretty damn sharp, but I still want to grind off the bolster so I can sharpen the heel part of the blade better.

 

[JSil13]

Got the bridge located, drilled, and drilled for the string ferrules. Also deepened the neck pocket a bit since this neck is a little thicker than the standard 1”.



Here’s my high tech rear contour template.

 

[JSil13]

Got the rear roundover done and the neck pickup routed. Going to put down the power tools til tomorrow and carve the rear contours now. Also working on a control cavity cover from a cut off of the top. I think I'll make a diamond shaped one for the 3 way switch to go in the Explorer position on the upper treble side horn.

 

[JSil13]

Need to clean up some file marks and even out the heel access contour a bit, but got the the contours carved out.

 

[JSil13]

Spent some time scraping excess CA glue off the fretboards of the 6 and 7 string necks. I'm not worried about the burn marks from the spindle sander since the headstocks aren't in their final shape yet. I love the look of this ziricote.

Routed both pickup cavities.


Then I drilled/routed the first control cavity. Felt like I was trying to get a pick out of an acoustic guitar every time I was trying to get the dust out. I used a tele control cavity template, and then a template I made for a tele control cover for the recess. Then I muffed the cover trying to make it fit by sanding/filing. I have enough maple for a few more tries, but I think that I'll make a template for it.

 

[JSil13]

So I ordered a one piece black limba body blank so that I could start the 7 string build without having to joint anything. Now I can figure out the jointing process later and have an extra Explorer sized blank. This one is surprisingly light which is nice. I've ordered a few blanks and some tops from this supplier so they sent me a few fretboard blanks for free. Quilted maple, roasted maple, birdseye maple, and roasted birdseye maple.


But ziricote just looks so good with black limba.

 

[JSil13]

Rough cut out this body. It is super light almost like basswood. If I had to guess I’d say somewhere between 3-4lbs. Luckily the Hipshot open gears are pretty light, but I’ll also put the strap button on the neck plate to make sure there’s no neck dive.

 

[JSil13]

Hit the body with the spindle sander.Still going to use the router on the straight parts and then need to thin the heel to the neck.

Anyway here are some gratuitous grain shots.

 

[JSil13]

Straight parts are routed and the heel is thinned to the neck. Doing some practice for the binding. Still haven’t figured out the correct bearing yet. The last one the binding say proud of the body a bit and this time it’s a little inside the body. At least this way I could sand to the binding without thinning it out.

 

[JSil13]

 

[JSil13]

I haven’t glued the binding in yet, but I have it all bent and taped in tight.

I also made a neck pocket template. It may be a bit too tight right now, but I’ll test it out on some scrap.

 

[Shawn]

Amazing work! Great job.