I have recently come by some beautiful pieces of solid beech and other lovely pieces of wood. I have decided to make a few new things from them and one of the things I wish to make is a guitar. I have reasonable experience with working with wood but have never made a guitar. I know there are many help sites on the 'net to help me, but at this stage all I am looking for is a template I can print out at 1:1 to give me the shape of the finished guitar. (solid body electiric is the present plan).
Does anyone have one, or know where I could get one? I’m not ever bothered about the shape at the moment - a classic Stratocaster or Les Paul sort of shape would be excellent.
If not, anyone ever made their own guitar? Any specific tips you can share? Thanks all!
I have read through a lot of sites this morning on the ins and outs of building the guitar, but much of those are focusing on things further down the line. Lots of good info here, BTW.
I don’t think I’ll be making the fretboard, but will buy it in complete, as I 'm not quite tooled up to that level yet.
I did work out how to make my templates though, using straight-on photos of the guitars from the web and some Photoshop / AutoCAD manipulation - I now have a 1:1 template for a Classic and a Stratocaster printed out on an A1 sheet. Hurray.
Coincidently, a colleague at work had one of his Strats in his car, so I checked the scale and it looks like a spot-on match.
I made an Explorer (well Explorer shaped) guitar yonks ago. I went to an evening class. I don’t think I would’ve been able to do it without instruction, or the tools there (got a bandsaw at home?) I used Mahogany (body and neck) Ebony (fretboard) and a Rosewood verneer on the headstock.
Observations.
Making your own strat would be a bit odd, you can more or less get a kit of body/neck & hardware and bolt it all together.
A ‘real’ Les Paul is a big chunk of Mahogany with a Maple top, making one out of other woods would (ahem) sort of defeat the object. It would also be tricky - if you check out a Gibson (not a copy) there’s some neat joinery there. Getting the neck join right would be tricky -maybe use a jig of some sort? I cheated with my Explorer I had a long enough piece of Mahogany to make a through neck (look no joints).
It might be an idea to try a simpler body shape like a Les Paul Junior or SG. My Explorer’s body is basically a slab, no curves to screw up.
Tips? It was a long time ago… working with Ebony is tough use Rosewood for the fretboard. Measure twice cut once, but you knew that.
I do have access to one, but don’t have my own. I was hoping, though, to get away without needing one, instead doing the bulk of the cutting / shaping work with a hand-held jigsaw and a router. This is my sole indoor winter project, so I have no qualms about spending weeks with a tiny chisel and some fine sandpaper shaping the body and curves to perfection, if needed. It’s like therapy for me.
I don’t plan to exactly emulate any particualr guitar, except perhaps in general shape terms. I have solid blocks of beech, maghoney and pine, but I wanted to use the beech for the entire body as it has an absolutely lush finish when oiled up. I have no idea what the guitar will end up like, tonally. I guess I’ll find out, eventually.
I realise I do still have an awful lot of reading to do on this subject, and should probably buy myself a book too. Just not sure yet if this will be a one-off or become a lifelong hobby.
Go All out Aro, design your own shape, use a type of guitar you like already and tweak it a bit, more curves, round it out a bit. Personalise it if it is just for yourself.
Great little hobby/time waster!! Always wanted to make my own bass. I would always end up playing my others than building my own though.
Good luck
And if you do well, it’ll probably be a lifelong hobby, maybe i might end up buying one of your guitars in the future??
Here’s a link to a guy that reproduced the world’s most famous home-made guitar - Brian May’s “Red Special.” And everything was really handmade - tremelo system, pickups, the whole thing. Very interesting site.
I wanted to post a link to this Cafe Society thread from last week but then the board went weird . . . Anyway, pretty cool reading for those who didn’t see the thread and like guitars:
