What's on your workbench right now?

Talk about modding or building your own guitar from scratch.
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Lost In Autumn
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by Lost In Autumn » Tue Sep 27, 2022 7:48 am

This '65 Jazzmaster is getting a long awaited refin for a forum member. I got caught up in wicked long work days in June after taking May off to recuperate and missed the spring window to shoot lacquer. Once summer hit, the relative humidity was just too much to avoid blushing. Now that sweater weather is upon us, it's nitro time!
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this jazz bass is going back into the booth for a few more coats, but it's coming along nicely. I don't generally like bursts, but I'm liking this one.

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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by seenoevil II » Fri Sep 30, 2022 12:41 pm

My brand new work bench is on... itself I suppose.
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I had been using a hard case on top of a keyboard stand. This was actually slightly ingenious as the longer tools lived inside the case. I think I'm going to be devoting more time to lutheiry, so I'm making a permanent work area.

Boy howdy, building materials got expensive.

But there it is. I'm not gonna make it pretty, cause it ain't gonna stay pretty. I need to burn some sage. Get it blessed.
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by JSett » Fri Sep 30, 2022 12:54 pm

seenoevil II wrote:
Fri Sep 30, 2022 12:41 pm
My brand new work bench is on... itself I suppose.
Image

I had been using a hard case on top of a keyboard stand. This was actually slightly ingenious as the longer tools lived inside the case. I think I'm going to be devoting more time to lutheiry, so I'm making a permanent work area.

Boy howdy, building materials got expensive.

But there it is. I'm not gonna make it pretty, cause it ain't gonna stay pretty. I need to burn some sage. Get it blessed.
That looks great!

I love a good DIY bench...something about building something yourself to facilitate building more things yourself is extremely satisfying. I have a bench in the garage, and a bench/desk and an extra desk for the wife in the house that I all made myself and I really appreciate them. They're not perfectly made but they're all the perfect height and size. Materials are hella expensive (and have always been) so I tend to use reclaimed and found timber for my builds.

I hope yours serves you well. It looks good and strong.
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by seenoevil II » Fri Sep 30, 2022 1:42 pm

johnnysomersett wrote:
Fri Sep 30, 2022 12:54 pm
seenoevil II wrote:
Fri Sep 30, 2022 12:41 pm
My brand new work bench is on... itself I suppose.
Image

I had been using a hard case on top of a keyboard stand. This was actually slightly ingenious as the longer tools lived inside the case. I think I'm going to be devoting more time to lutheiry, so I'm making a permanent work area.

Boy howdy, building materials got expensive.

But there it is. I'm not gonna make it pretty, cause it ain't gonna stay pretty. I need to burn some sage. Get it blessed.
That looks great!

I love a good DIY bench...something about building something yourself to facilitate building more things yourself is extremely satisfying. I have a bench in the garage, and a bench/desk and an extra desk for the wife in the house that I all made myself and I really appreciate them. They're not perfectly made but they're all the perfect height and size. Materials are hella expensive (and have always been) so I tend to use reclaimed and found timber for my builds.

I hope yours serves you well. It looks good and strong.
Hey thanks!

Yeah, it feels like a rite of passage. This was copied pretty hard off of a bench my grandfather had built. I should mention that hard case was something I had built myself for my VMJM. It's real beat up both from its duty as a case and a off-label table space. It just feels so so right. But now it can go back to protecting my jazzy and I can finally establish an orderly work space.
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by bodhi » Sun Oct 02, 2022 3:39 am

Image

Just finished wiring up a partscaster pickguard, using a Freeway blade switch and 500k tone pots. It's going to be interesting, as I haven't really bonded with strats previously, but have been collecting parts for one with time as I've come across them, hopefully ending up with something really good for comparatively litte cash. I think I'm in for just over 400€ all in all, with a WD neck with ebony fretboard, custom Q pickups, a tremol-no lockable trem, locking tuners, a brandless bridge (same manufacturer as Gotoh, I believe) drilled out with a Floyd Rose push in arm (a DIY Gotoh 510T-FE1 for half the price?) and the Freeway switch mentioned earlier. But I've been collecting parts probably more than a year...

Time to get the hair metal on, you'd think, but actually needed to throw this together quickly for covering Heart's Barracuda at a Christmas party in a couple of months, and the lead guitarist in the band only having access to hardtail guitars. I'm playing bass in this setup, but it's all good fun.

Still need to cut a nut and do all of the setup work, but I had accidentally drilled out one of the trem claw screw hole a size too large, so I have it glued up for now. The other one was in a good spot, but that's one of the minor hiccups of working with used gear...
Jazzmaster project (got a body, placeholder neck, some pickups and ideas)
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by ThePearDream » Thu Oct 06, 2022 12:21 pm

Picked up 8 necks worth of lightly figured maple today. Then UPS dropped off 5 bass sized Rosewood fretboard blanks. I'm going to make one of my Artemis builds a 28.625" baritone and make a batch of short scale baritone conversion necks (~27"), as time permits.

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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by seenoevil II » Tue Oct 11, 2022 7:51 am

Another meta post. I need a face vice for my bench. I plan on getting a real one but that's gonna take some real planning. So I came up with this little piece of red-neck engineering (or piney as the case may be)
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Yes, that's a harbor freight clamp. You can see how it passes through the two jaws. They run along two dowels. Not the smoothest action.
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To keep things from falling apart, I put in these two indexing holes with dowels to keep things flush with the top.
Image
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by Steadyriot. » Tue Oct 11, 2022 10:23 pm

That’s pretty smart! Add some candlewax to those dowels to make them run more smoothly.
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by seenoevil II » Thu Oct 13, 2022 8:39 am

Steadyriot. wrote:
Tue Oct 11, 2022 10:23 pm
That’s pretty smart! Add some candlewax to those dowels to make them run more smoothly.
Hey thanks! I'll try that.

Last one, promise.
Image
Coming together. Still need a good task lamp and a few more things, but I'd say I'm ready to get to getting!
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by Deed_Poll » Thu Oct 13, 2022 12:36 pm

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When I just KNOW a build is going to make me jealous!

Been working on a Yamaha SG3 - meets - Jazzmaster build with a customer and had the idea of including some of my Marauder switches, and the custom folded steel Marauder mounting brackets I get made!

Room for a mini HB in the middle, and it has the switching options to back that up!

The body is super lightweight roasted poplar, I just know it's going to be great!
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by repoman » Fri Oct 14, 2022 5:57 am

Deed_Poll wrote:
Thu Oct 13, 2022 12:36 pm
Image
Image

When I just KNOW a build is going to make me jealous!

Been working on a Yamaha SG3 - meets - Jazzmaster build with a customer and had the idea of including some of my Marauder switches, and the custom folded steel Marauder mounting brackets I get made!

Room for a mini HB in the middle, and it has the switching options to back that up!

The body is super lightweight roasted poplar, I just know it's going to be great!
Awesome!
How do you rout the holes for the switches to get square corners?

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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by Deed_Poll » Fri Oct 14, 2022 6:15 am

repoman wrote:
Fri Oct 14, 2022 5:57 am
Deed_Poll wrote:
Thu Oct 13, 2022 12:36 pm
Image
Image

When I just KNOW a build is going to make me jealous!

Been working on a Yamaha SG3 - meets - Jazzmaster build with a customer and had the idea of including some of my Marauder switches, and the custom folded steel Marauder mounting brackets I get made!

Room for a mini HB in the middle, and it has the switching options to back that up!

The body is super lightweight roasted poplar, I just know it's going to be great!
Awesome!
How do you rout the holes for the switches to get square corners?
Actually, I don't! I just use a fairly small tool (1/8" diameter).

If you want to get really anal about it, I used to do something where I programmed the bevel edge cutter (V-bit) to do a specially prohrammed 3D path, so that the corners would be absolutely sharp on the top surface before merging to the internal radius a millimetre or so under that (a bit like how the toolpaths come for engraved text). I would then use this top surface as a guide to file away the int radius underneath.

Then I realised I didn't really need the guide, and it was a lot more effort for not really any reason. Later still, I noticed that a lot of switchgear is designed with a small external radius anyway, and using a small tool was just as clean and efficient as filing the square.

To the point that even on the Marauder plates which are cut by laser and *could* have a perfectly square internal corner, I leave it at 1/16" radius and I think it looks better!

Image
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by repoman » Mon Oct 17, 2022 9:54 am

Finished this Bigsby guitar thingy

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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by Dr Tony Balls » Mon Oct 17, 2022 9:59 am

Well. If that aint fucking rad as hell. :?
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Re: What's on your workbench right now?

Post by marqueemoon » Mon Oct 17, 2022 10:03 am

repoman wrote:
Mon Oct 17, 2022 9:54 am
Finished this Bigsby guitar thingy

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Holy shit that’s awesome.

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