Master Templates

Well, if you're anything like me, every now and again you just gotta get your best scratchy cough out and call into work so you can take the day off to build guitars in your back yard. I did that yesterday and, let me tell you, it's a hell of a good feeling. Not gonna let the man hold me down. (Who's w/ me!?) My task for the day was to get a couple templates done for a couple elements of my next guitar. Last time, I made the mistake of building all of these things into the template for the guitar. This is very convenient for one project but makes it a little more troublesome when you move onto the next shape and have to do everything all over again. This time, I'm made each element on a different piece of mdf for greater versatility.

The two pieces I made were for a humbucker rout and for a tele-style neck pocket. These will be common elements on guitars I make in the future so this will equal a lot of time saved. I made these on quarter inch mdf this time. Last time, I used three quarter inch and it was a beast to shape and very frustrating to get accurate.

The first step is to draw everything out very carefully w/ a straight edge and a carpeneters square. I got the measurements I needed from various places online. This took me about an hour and half. For the last project I didn't have this kind of patience but now that I know I can pull it off, it's easier to reach down into the depths of my psyche to find another five minutes of attention span to erase a line and redraw more accurately.

This is the neck pocket:


I made the top of it extend an inch longer than it had to be. Hopefully, this will give the router something better to rest on when I use it so I can better control it. There's lines drawn so I can get it in the right place.

Same deal w/ the humbucker routt:


Ultimately, it was a mistake to cut it out so small, at least before I had the middle cut out. It made it really hard to clamp down as I worked on it:


It was too small for me to use a jigsaw so I had to use a coping saw. As seen in the picture above, I drilled out the corners w/ a handbill so I could turn the blade. The initial cut was none to accurate:


But some time w/ a file got it in good shape pretty quickly (I actually filed it a bit more from this point and it looks very clean now):


Same deal w/ the neck pocket only this time I could use the jigsaw to save time (and I'm actually more accurate w/ that than a coping saw). It is nearly perfect:


This all came together a lot quicker and better than previous efforts so I'm pretty pleased. The only problem w/ using the quarter inch thick mdf is it's really too thin to use directly on a guitar so I will need this to make some thicker templates. It's worth the extra effort for the added accuracy.

Neck Holes, Bridge Holes and Jack Holes Too

I wanted to try one more thing w/ the neck pocket before going out back and re-leveling it w/ a router. The neck holes, as I originally drilled them, were a bit too small. I drilled them so that the screws bit into them a little bit, thinking this would add some stability to the neck joint. What it really did was make it so that the screws couldn't draw the neck to a snug fit because they couldn't turn freely. I redrilled them w/ a bit one size larger and now I'm satisfied w/ how snug the neck screw in:


W/ that taken care of, it was time to install the bridge--a task which I had been feeling considerable anxiety over. None of my pictures of the process of lining up the bridge didn't come out (the pencil lines I drew didn't stand out enough to make them worth posting) but basically, I measured and remeasured, squared and resquared until I was satisfied I had the sucker in the right place. Then I drilled the holes carefully w/ my hand drill. As far as I can tell, it is nice and straight:


The bridge is a top-loading strat-style fixed bridge. I went w/ it for a few reasons, not the least of which was I wasn't confident in my ability to drill the string-through ferrules (now I realize that it would be no problem). I also just plain think it's a pain in the ass to have to thread strings through the back of the guitar. (So I took the easy rout? Sue me.) I bought the cheapest one I could find off eBay and later found out the reason it's so cheap is it didn't come w/ the mounting screws. I went ahead and got some good wood screws from my local but not locally owned mega warehouse of supplies for the home and garden. I put some strings on it and it all lines up and seems sturdy so I will leave it at that for now.

For the jacks, I followed a pretty straightforward process. First, I found where I wanted them to go and drilled a pilot hole for each:


Then I used a wood boring bit to drill the holes.The bit is either an improved version of a spade bit or a half-ass auger bit depending on how you count. One way or the other, it's a rather vicious looking implement:


Of course, my crappy little drill did not like pushing that three-quarter inch bit through an inch of mahogany and it bound up:


Eventually, I managed to yank it out and drill the holes the rest of the way through. Naturally, there was no possible way they could've ended up straight and they didn't:


So I put a drum sander into my cheesy Dremel knock-off:


I had at it for about five minutes and eventually got things looking pretty straight (unfortunately, they are not so straight now that I've screwed them in):


Since I had the Dremel out anyway, I also cleaned up that ugly mistake I made in the control cavity:


Compared to the third picture in this post, it's much, much better even if it's not perfect. I think I've gotten it to where I can live w/ it--not that I have much of a choice. Anyway, that's pretty much it except for the body aside from cleaning up some mistakes, sanding and finishing.

Four Holes in the Neck

Drilling the holes for the neck was surprisingly easy. I'll walk you through it but I won't hold your hand.

I put some double stick tape on a thick piece of paper and stuck it to the base of the neck. I cut it to the shape of the neck heel and punch holes in it where the screws go w/ a ballpoint pen:


Then I stuck it in the neck pocket and used that same pen to mark where the holes needed to be drilled:

It looks really sloppy because of all the scribbles but those were just to help me find where the holes were. It's actually square. I double checked before I drilled the holes w/ my drill press, which I've been keeping in the kitchen for maximum humorous effect:


Ha! Funniest drill press you've ever seen, I bet. It didn't come out half bad:


Not half bad at all:


The neck pocket isn't perfect though so I'm going to have either re-level the pocket or add some shims, neither of which will be too hard:


See? There's some space in there, which sucks. Big time. Feels sturdy but I'm not gonna risk leaving it like that.

Routing--Stage Three

I turns out I should have been more careful drilling the holes for the screws to attach the template to the body; they were two small and one of the screws broke off when I tried to extract it. I had to bend the thing and unscrew it w/ a pair of pliers:


For the rest of this project I'm sticking the template to the body w/ carpet tape. It's almost too strong for the job. I was worried the tape would pull chunks of mahogany out of the body when I pulled the template off of it.

I finished up the neck pocket today. The first thing I did clear away as much wood as I could using a Forstner bit in my drill press to save wear and tear on my router and bits. I don't have a proper table built yet so I ended up clamping the template I wasn't using to it and supporting the body w/ that as I worked on it. It turns out that there is indeed a very fine line before clever and stupid:

Worked like a charm (somewhat to my surprise). A Forstner bit, by the way, is sort of an improved version of spade bit. It drills wide holes w/ a relatively flat bottom. It looks almost like a router bit:


I set the depth and drilled away until I had most of the wood cleared. The depth gauge on my drill press isn't too accurate so I did a few practice holes on scrap and double checked w/ a small ruler to make sure I didn't drill too much. When I was done, it ended up like this:


From here it was a simple job to clean it out w/ a three-eighth inch straight router bit and the template following guide. I worked very slowly and carefully and only ended up w/ a few minor mistakes that are (hopefully) mostly cosmetic and will covered up when the neck is attached anyway:

Ultimately, the neck fit in a little less tightly than I'd hoped but it does take a nice picture. Not too shabby for a first go at it, I say:


I realized another mistake I made which was not making sure the edges of the template were completely square w/ its top. There was a bulge along the in the middle of the template's edge that held the neck tightly but the template follower followed the top of the template rather than the middle so I routed out more than expected. It's close enough for rock and roll though. I'd imagine it's only marginally less stable than a standard tele neck pocket (which doesn't have support on both sides) and once I get some finish on there, it should fit in even better. If worse comest to worse, I will just insert shims on either side of the neck to keep it from going back and forth. The depth of the pocket and the very end of the heel are right on so there's no reason it shouldn't be stable in the direction the strings pull on it, provided I get the holes drilled properly.

Further Neck Pocketing

It rained here today so I figure I'd get some work done on my templates w/ a coping saw. I had intended to cut the neck pocket part of the template that way anyway, figuring I'd get greater accuracy w/ that than I did w/ the jigsaw. Turns out I was buck nuts. Behold! the inaccuracy of my coping saw cut:


I drilled holes of the same radius as the corners of a telecaster neck pocket so that I could get those pretty exact. I also needed them so I could turn the saw. The cut ended up pretty rough to say the least. Still, it only took an hour or so w/ a file to get it just about perfect. I continually used the butt of the neck to check its size. You can see here when it's pretty close:


It took quite a while but I'm pretty confident everything is correctly shaped. Once I was done, I clamped the templates together and, using the file again, shaped the template for the overall shape of the guitar to match the neck perfectly. It's at the point where it's not quite force fit but in there good and snug, which I understand is what you want. It's tight enough that the neck will stay in there w/ no support (not that I would want to set a pint of beer on it or anything):


The file was really awesome to work w/. In hindsight, it would have been the right tool for shaping the MDF rather than the power sanders I used. It worked both faster and more accurately. I used it a bit more on the template to iron out some of the asymmetries and have a feeling it will see heavy use fine tuning the actual body as well once I get it routed.

Neck Pocketing

One last picture of the baritone before I take it apart:


I figured I might as well pull the trigger now since I had to do it anyway. I wanted the neck so I could use it to help get the neck pocket just so. More importantly, I want to sell the body on eBay so I can use the money to buy more tools. It provides me an opportunity for a glimpse into the future of this guitar and how it will look w/ the neck on anyway:

Not too exciting but hopefully that will change. The body came out a little asymmetrical but rather than mess it up any more, I said what any good great guitar maker says when he makes a mistake, "I dunno... I kinda like it that way." Ultimately, I decided it looked better to have it reversed from how it is in the picture. The slight asymmetry and the fact that all my sanding narrowed the waist a little makes it looks a little more strat-like that I had planned. I dunno... I kinda like it that way.

Since I was doing some work anyway, I drew the outline of the neck pocket by using my carpenters square to draw some lines on there as a guide to keep it true and tracing the heel of the neck on there where it seemed like it should go:


Of course, I measured when I was done to make sure it was the proper dimensions. It just so happens I was dead on. I guess you do get lucky every now and again. When I get a chance I will take it out back use my jigsaw to cut it out. Probably at that point I will have the bridge placement and pickup routs figured out too but for now I'm still waiting for all of that too be delivered. I really don't need them to line it all up on the template since I have it all worked out on paper already but it gives me a little more confidence to be able to trace some things and to be working w/ them and the template correctly.

I should mention that I finished up shaping w/ a drum sander on my hand drill. Worked like a charm and hogged out the wood surprisingly fast. I didn't take any pictures because that part of the process is a secret.