The diary page will now be updated twice weekly.. doing it daily has proved to be too much of a drain on my time, and I really need to spend more time building the guitars..  The updates will be up on Wednesday's and Fridays from now on.. without fail!

Monday 14th April '08

Slow begining to the day..

followed by Chris picking up his lovely yellow beastie!!

...and he's a pretty shit hot player too!!

.. the Baritone.. she's had strings on for a few days now..

she needs a few custom pickup surrounds.. a multi-laminate of laminates..

custom wound Wizard pickup.. combined with a Sustainer.. and soon a hexaphonic MIDI pickup too..

Good old Roland GK system.. she needs to be recessed into the top..

and here she is.. I love low profile guitars!!

next up she gets a full set-up

the back plates are drilled and fitted..

and here she is..

we'll let her settle down for a while and then wire her for sound!!

we have a beautiful Rough Coated Collie puppy come to visit Bud and Jasper..

you just cannot beat a bit of cuteness

.. what can I say...

on with this Classical, built by a friend who lost his workshop..

these lazer cut bird inlays are a bugger to fit..

and after four I have to take a break.. this sort of work can really screw up your back..

this black beastie needs refinishing.. oh, and a fretboard!!!

as does the vine PAF here..

the perspex fingerboard is removed..., (one of the joys of the job is experimenting .. this was the first fretless guitar I built.. the next will be better!!) 

once the remaining scraps of perspex are scraped off it's planed perfectly flat in preperation for a new fretboard..

which is planed to the correct dimensions

prior to being glued in place.. since the neck is already shaped I've used cork backed sanding pads to protect the neck from the clamps..

next up I re-route the recess for the PAF's tunematic bridge.. it's amazing what a difference a couple of years makes in what passes through quality control!

the oil finish is stripped off

and bit's and pieces reshaped.. ie the neck is shape to come close to that of a Parker and the hard edges are rounded off a bit..

the final sanding process is one of the most time-consuming and critical jobs in a guitar build..

she is then stained black..

and red.. one of my favourite combinations!!

then throughout the rest of the day.. and doubtless at least the next few.. the final quick-drying wax finish is applied and polished repeatedly!

the fingerboard on the Descendant is now dry and the radius is planed on..

the frets are cut.. 24 of the little bastards in this case..

and aluminium rod is cut and used as the position markers..

while waiting for the inlays to dry the top is recarved a bit and rough-sanded

..after lunch the excess aluminium is filed off

and then the hollow centers filled with purple make-up poweder (I used to date a bio-chemist who tested make-ups etc for nasty substances!)

once dry the middle of the inlays looks almost black.. the medium stainless steel frets are then glued and hammered in place

and here is the end of the day.. the frets are left to dry overnight..

as is the black PAF.. more on these beasties later in the week..

VB, B

Crimson Guitars HQ