The Luthier Community

With Olivia's guitar, I'm using a pre-shaped neck that was a reject from a major maker. I have several, but only one that had the shorter heel. Unfortunately, the holes were pre-drilled on this one so I won't be using my normal headstock shape.

Here I'm using my fancy-dancy headstock overlay remover jig... sometimes referred to as a clothes iron.




So that I could replace the EIR with Paduak




And then reshaped the headstock to something uniquely my own.


I drilled the holes in the headstock from the back (no picture) and fit the heel to body. You can see here the flaw that caused it to be rejected. Can't have character in a factory made guitar...




This one is ready for inlaying the headstock and then I'll move on to the fretboard...

Raymond

Raymond.....looking good my man.

A couple of questions.....one ...what did you use for bindings? (holly or white plastic or maple?)

Second.....when you put the paduak on the neck...did you put it on both the front and the back?

Tom

PS - the guitar I am building is paduak as well and has the reddish pinkish hue....I was thinking of using ebony on the bindings

Thanks Tom.

I struggled with whether or not to bind with a dark color or a light color, as I've been told that the Paduak gets darker as it ages. In the end... I already had maple binding ready to go so that is what I used. I think Ebony would look great.

I'm tempted to put a thin veneer on the back of the headstock, but the Paduak overlay is thicker than the EIR one that was on it, so if I do anything it will only be a thin veneer. I don't think it is necessary, but it looks nice on some of the ones others have posted.

Raymond

Haven't posted in awhile, but I have been doing something...

First part of the reason I haven't been in the shop building guitars much...


and just a few pictures of what I've been doing on this guitar
I inlaid the headstock (no picture) and inlaid the PRS style birds on the fretboard

The pickguard and bridge were from inlaidartist, but I did a lot of work to clean them up and size them to fit the parlor.




Their just sitting on the guitar in the pictures. I also fit the neck to the body and installed the paduak heelcap.

Meanwhile I've been working on Debbie's Maple Cutaway as well.

At least I had shown the inlay on the headstock... here is what it looks like with the second coat of epoxy... dry, but not yet sanded.
With a flash

And without




The color doesn't look right in the pictures... there is a definite Pink tint to the Padauk which is closer to the with flash picture but still not quite right.

Raymond

Looking good Raymond. Won't be long now.

Which epoxy are you using?

Lefty

Thanks Lefty. I'm using System 3. I put it on with a rag made up like a french polish tampon. Learned that from Steve Stevens.

Raymond

I hear ya Raymond,

That's how I did my uke and I am very happy with the results.

I have learned a lot on the forums and quite a bit of it from Steve.

Lefty