Top On

The clamps came off today and I trimmed down the excess maple to be flush with the mahogany underneath. I ended up taking a little bit of the edge off the points of the wings, tail and ears. They were just too sharp. So now I guess its just a little hazardous rather then outright dangerous to hold. It really looks like its starting to come together.

Topped

The maple came out pretty good. I was able to cut it roughly to the shape of the bat and glue it on. I left a fair bit of extra wood hanging over the edge. I will wait for the glue to dry and trim it all off using the same sanding techniques that I used on the curved surfaces before.

I'm glad that portion is over, I was pretty nervous about screwing it all up.

I also had to route out channels in the mahogany so that the wires can travel through later on.

I started off the channel by drilling a hole with a flat bottom Forstner bit where the pickup selector will go.

I used a small handheld router for the channel. This one has a transparent base and led lights. It makes it easy to see where you're going.

After tracing the bat on the maple, I cut it out using the scroll saw, leaving lots of excess that can be trimmed later.

Dry fitting to be sure.

more glued and clamps. And now I wait.

Guitar Tools

I got a few guitar making tools today at Lee Valley, a fret saw and an inlay chisel. Which are for exactly what you might think, cutting fret slots and chiselling out inlay holes. Lee valley is not cheap but they sure have nice stuff. The saw blade is about 3/128ths of an inch wide.. or half of a millimeter. That's about 5 pieces of regular printer paper. pretty slim. The chisel is a little thicker.

Top

I finally got two nice pieces of maple to use for the top. They have matching opposite grain patterns, slopped slightly toward the back of the guitar. They're both planed down on both sides and nice and square on the edge that they'll be glued on. 

Here it is glued together, sandwiched between two flat surfaces and wax paper... and clamped.

First Set Back

I couldn't get 2 pieces of those maple slabs that matched when placed side by side.  Planing them down was harder then expected as well. They are so thin and the grain goes up and down all along each side. The planer complete ate one. The other 3 were just too miss matched to place side by side.

I headed back to KJP and picked up 6 more. Surely i can find a nice pair with these. The total bill for the new six was just over $ 29.

Mail Orders

I got some mail today from AllParts. All electronics that I will need aside from the pickups (Les Paul style), knobs, fret wire and a piece of ebony to make the fret board.  Not that I'm ready for any of these just yet. Total bill for what's seen below was $158.76 CAD plus another $27 for duty. Almost exactly 2 weeks for delivery.

I also made some more orders today. A Floyd Rose Original tremolo bridge from www.warmoth.com and a truss rod, truss rod cover, some mother of pearl blanks from http://www.stewmac.com/.  Warmoth shipped the Floyd Rose two hours after I ordered it which is nice. Both are coming from the US.

Barry at Ewart Guitars in Burnaby, BC was very helpful in helping me find the right bridge. Thanks Barry

Pickups

I picked up two really sweet pickups on Kijiji today. A Gibson 490R and 490T. They came out of an SG that was switched out with P90s. Thanks to Dave for supplying them for the great price of 90 bucks for the pair.

Creative Sanding

The preparation for final gluing of the body continues. I rigged up a table for my drill press and cut a hole for the sanding drum. Its long enough to be able to sand the entire depth. That sorted all the inside curves.

I also rigged up a table for my belt sander at 90 degrees to sand out the outside curves by clamping the sander itself to the bench. Inside the bat's head between the ears will be a manual job.

 

This square has been around the block a few times. Also, if anyone is in the market for a belt sander, this one by Ridged is great. It'll go all day long, doesn't get hot and is nice and light. It's also designed so that when you lock it turned on and flip it over it sits nice and flat so you can hold things against it. Turns out it sits perfectly square on its side too if you clamp it in place.

Headstock and Sanding Drums

The headstock came out pretty smooth. the inside corners were a little tricky given the angle of the head to the neck, it wouldn't sit flat on any power saws so I cut it manually using a coping saw. I also sanded out the rest of the neck and started sanding the main body. Sanding drums on the drill press made the inside curves really smooth.

In the background here, you can see my original drawing as well as my MS Paint sketch up. Notice the classic Michael Keaton style logo

Curly Maple Top

I found some thin slabs of curly maple that will work perfect for the top of this guitar (I hope). they're each about 8 inches wide and 20 inches long. they vary between about 3/16" and 3/8", I need 1/4" so hopefully i can find enough good pieces that will cover the guitar and look nice. They're pretty rough so they'll need a fair bit of planing. I only need two of these but i got 4 because they had 4 that were big enough. So I'll have a little contingency. They ranged in price from 3 to 7 bucks.

This is an example of what curly maple could look like when its finished. they can vary a fair bit so hopefully two of these are close enough to be used side by side on top of the guitar. My plan is to stain the top grey and do a black burst around the edge. The side and back will be all black. 

Looks like a Guitar

Today I got the top of the neck carved out and some extensions glued to the head stalk. I also cut out the body but haven't glued them. I'm going to wait until the neck is farther along since it's so much easier to manage on its own.

Back to the Neck

My new band saw blades arrived and after a lot of fuss with the old saw, it's up and running smooth and straight. I had to make some permanent modifications to get the tracking just right, but it looks like its all set now.

I cut the neck out with the band saw and then clamped it in the vise and started carving out the final neck shape.  I was a little nervous about this part. The bottom half came out alright. It's pretty late now so I'll take on the top half tomorrow.

It was exciting to see the neck look all neck shaped. It already works great for air guitar.. or wood guitar?

 

 

 

Here it is in the wood vise, ready to be attacked with the old rusty rasp laying there on the edge of the bench.

 

 

And finally after 20 minutes of scraping away the corner. There is probably a particular shape this is supposed to have. This guitar is one of a kind so with that in mind, I just stop and feel it out every minute or so. When it feels ready for face melting metal shreds, I'll stop :)

 

 

Extensions

I need to extend the body pieces to make room for the tail and ears (horns?) of the bat. I glued them on before cutting out the bat so that the cuts would be one continuous line. (and because my band saw blades still haven't been made).

I also got all the lines drawn on the neck that will need to be cut before the carving can begin.

 

 

New Old Saw

While in NS I inherited my Grandfather's band saw.  It's been my father's for the past 25 years or so and now it's mine. I used this saw to build my cub car when I was 7 or 8. They don't sell the right size blades any more but I found a place that will make custom blades here. I ordered 3.

It's a 10" Rockwell / Beaver. Made in Canada. Mostly cast iron from what I can tell. Here it is in it's new home.

Template

I completed the template that I will use for the Batman logo. Its not exactly the way I envisioned it. I was hoping to go with the Tim Burton/Michael Keaton 1989 logo, but it just wasn't conducive to a guitar body shape. It was a little too long. If I enlarged it enough to fit in the pickups and bridge, it would be almost as long as the neck.

I ended up just drawing it free hand on a piece of bristle board. Then cutting out half and tracing it so it would be symmetrical.

I also chiselled out the round hump that the jointer left in the neck. That went smooth too.



Here is the round cut left from the jointer with a little bit chiselled out.

And now nice and square

This is the logo I was thinking of using. But its just too narrow for guitar hardware. 

The one I eventually drew was squished with a wider center. It sort of looks like the symbol from the spotlight. So I can still say its the 1989 version :)

Making the Neck Blank

I got the laminated neck blank finished today. The two pieces sat glued over night. They were planed down to 2 3/16" by 1 7/8".  Then it was partially planed down to 1 1/2" to match the side pieces. 


I used the scraps from cutting the neck blanks down to size as a cushion against the clamps.

 

The partial plane down to 1 1/2" had to be done in one shot - taking off 3/8".  There was a high possibility of that screwing up and the whole thing going in the garbage. It worked out fine though. I did it on the jointer as there is no automatic feed, it could be stopped when I got to where the fret board will begin.

 

10,000 trips through the planer took off about 3/8" on each side of the freshly laminated neck blank.

This is the complete blank, ready to be carved into a neck and to cut out the head stock.

The two pieces came together pretty tight.

Here you can see the purpose of the partial plane. the fret board is raised from the main body. There will be a 1/4" maple top stuck on top of the main body later to be almost in line with the neck. The fret board will raise the neck up a little farther after that.

Planing and Jointing

I took the cut pieces of mahogany to my parents house in Nova Scotia. My father has a jointer and thickness planer which I don't have. This got the pieces down to the required thickness and also got out all the curves and warps. The neck piece was so curved that once it was cut straight it was too small. I ended up needing to plane down my spare neck piece and laminate them together. That's tomorrow's project.

We took almost half an inch off the thickness of the side pieces.

My father has a heavy duty jointer that took all the curve out of the wood. It left some nice square sides for gluing later.

Here is my  original neck piece being cut down to be laminated with my spare neck piece. (that saw is running in this picture. it caught the blades in motion. You can see the saw dust flying out the bottom)