The Luthier Community

Grant,

My first read of this as well and all I can say is you are a master! I love watching your builds.

Tom

Grant, you are on a roll here. Thanks for sharing and reminding me to get out of the box. Can't wait to see the tuners?! Tim

Rolling your own! Very cool, Grant!

Pat

This is looking amazing! Awesome ideas coming together. Love the copper frets!

Well, I have been working on the neck and such. I already showed the fingerboard and the fret materials. The neck is just my normal one-piece mahogany cut for my usual adjustable neck joint. What I did with the fingerboard is fill the gaps with epoxy/maple dust mixture. Leaving them open would not work very well when fretting strings, so this levels out the surface.

For the position marker inlays, I am using the butterfly keys placed across the fills. They will be randomly spaced across the board to center on the gap fill. Here is how I routed the cutouts


I also routed the peghead, both for my logo and for some more butterfly keys, since the headstock overlay is just an extension of the fingerboard wood

Note that I have a few diviots yet to fill on the headstock. Also, the fill color is actually a warmer tan than these photos.

Another photo showing the fingerboard

I was careful to lay out the fingerboard so that there are 2 cracks at the 12th fret, allowing me to use 2 butterfly keys. The 7th fret marker also crosses 2 cracks and I have to lengthen it a slight bit so that the ends get into the ebony a bit. These are just the rough routes and I still have to clean up the corners and such

So, What do I use for the inlays?

Well, about 20 years or so ago, another archaeologist gave me some pieces of fossil whale bone that she had used in her graduate studies. It has been in a drawer in the back room all these years. it has a bit of a funkey look and should be just right.



So, that's where I am at the moment.

G

Grant,

I'm very tempted to say "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" and add "just roll with it and make it work". With so many makers trying to make things "art deco" without really understanding what it means it's great to see someone that understands mojo and nature in all it's forms and going with it. A really interesting project - hats off

Man, Grant! You really have your theme complete throughout. Funky and beautiful. If you sell it, don't do so before Stringfest, which is already on my 2013 calendar. You should then find someone who will understand what you have done and will thus treasure it and care for it.

Jim

Fantastic! A great theme well-executed!

Pat