#014 - Lou Shields Resophonic Adventure

Finished up the fretwork on this one too, and installed side markers.  Lou wanted something that he'd be able to see in the dark, so I came up with the idea of using steel nails.  They're pretty reflective in low light, so I think this will work well for him.

Lou opted not to do fretboard markers, just side dots.

#018 - Soprano Shitar

Finished up the fretwork and glued the board to my neck blank.  Probably won't get around to cutting the taper/headstock this weekend due to rain though.

#018 - Soprano Shitar

This one was Thia's idea.  She wanted me to throw together a shitar ukulele for her work's white elephant or whatever you wanna call it kinda as a ploy to get people to see my stuff and want to buy other things.  I had some scraps of birch leftover from Jake's chamber pot, so I fashioned them into a mini-shitar.  Gotta bevel the frets so I can attach the fretboard and go to work on the neck.  I'll probably do that once I finish fretting Lou's Resonator so I can knock off 2 birds with one stone.

When I first cut the profile, it was super sloppy, so I hacked off the heel and attached a new one.  This time it came out better.

#017 - KT's Kids Chamber Pot pic with the new owner

So the Liars Club benefit went great.  Great music, raised a shit ton of money, great turnout.  So the whole time I'm sitting there hoping that the winner wouldn't be someone who wouldn't be all that into it or something.  I knew there was some interest since I'd been spamming the shit out of facebook, but ya never know.

So the winner of the guitar (who referred to it as bloody brilliant), is Jake Burns of Stiff Little Fingers!!!  I couldn't be happier to have one of my instruments wind up in the hands of someone I grew up listening to.

Hopefully I'll get to hear some tunes on a future album with it, but maybe that's just wishful thinking...

#014 - Lou Shields Resonator Project

Finally got my lazy ass around to working on Lou's guitar.  Got the fretboard tapered, and half fretted.  (ran out of superglue for the frets).  Also cut the neck profile today.  Regan wasn't wanting to nap, so I wasn't able to get it sanded and slotted.  I'll do that tomorrow.  Until then, the pics aren't all that pretty.  Lol

#017 - KT's Kids Chamber Pot

Well, she's all done and ready to go on Sunday.  Managed to get it all set up this afternoon and took some pics.  But first the specs:

• Salvaged Birch plywood body
•  Salvaged pine neck reinforced with 1/2x1/8 steel bar
• 1/4x1/5" poplar body binding
• 8.25" brass jello mold speaker cone
• Birch bridge and stop tailpiece
• 25" scale rosewood fretboard
• 1.75" at nut, 2.125" at 12th fret
• Classical style tuning pegs
• Walnut headstock veneer
• Overall Length - 37"
• Width - 14.25" at its widest point

Now everyone get their asses to Liars Club (1665 w fullerton in chicago) this Sunday, December 8th to support a great cause and see some great music!  Also, visit ktskids.com for more info on the charity.

#017 - KT's Kids Chamber Pot

Well, I've got about 4 days to complete this before the benefit, and I'm almost done.  Painting, staining, and clearcoats are all done.  Pot/cone is bolted in.  Bridge and tailpiece are cut and stained.  Headstock has been branded.  Cut the nut, just need to shape it.  Other than that, I just need strings so I can score the bridge and its ready to rock.  I had to ditch the coverplate, when I went to bolt it in earlier, I realized that it was sitting too low and might deaden the vibrations on the pot.  Oh well, still looks badass to me.  Here's the progress pics, and please visit ktskids.com for info about sunday!

tape is just on there for reference for when I put the tailpiece on.

I cut the bridge 1/4-3/8" oversized in height, will take it down once i have strings on it to determine the height.

Frankenstrat pickguard replacement

A friend of mine recently picked up a frankenstrat at an estate sale that had an ugly ass fake diamond plated pickguard sticker on it.  He decided to throw me some business and let me change it out for him.  The guitar itself is actually really nice.  Has a higher end Wilkinson tremolo on it, and seymour duncan pickups that usually retail for almost what he paid for it.  The best I can tell is that the body and neck came from one of the licensed aftermarket retailers, allparts, warmoth, etc... and has a fender decal on the headstock.  The pickups were different than the single coils I'm used to, so rather than just buying an aftermarket pickguard, I cut it myself out of some 3 ply pearloid material I had.

It looks like someone just printed this out on decal paper, its really low resolution and flat looking.

I used the original as a template and traced it out on the new material.  As I suspected, the 2 "single coils" had been slightly widened to fit the mini humbuckers.

All finished and strung up.

#017 - KT's Kids Chamber Pot

Regan finally fell asleep, so I taped off and stained the top.  My goal was to make it look beat up and antique, even though the wood is relatively new.  I went with a dark walnut stain, and tried to give it the appearance of sitting out in the sun too long.  Once it dries, I'll shoot it, and tomorrow I'll tape it off the other way and paint the back/sides and neck.

#016 - The Kylecaster

Well, ended up not running into any problems with setting it up.  The bridge came shipped almost in the right position, just needed a few minor adjustments.  Got it strung up, tested it out, and everything was good, so here it is:

• 4 piece Alder body, green automotive paint
• 1 piece curly maple neck
• Rosewood 25.5" scale fretboard (not sure what specific species this is, it came with the neck blank already tapered and fretted)
• 1/4" mother of pearl position markers
• Fender style bridge/tremolo and tuners
• 3 single coil alnico pickups

#016 - The Kylecaster

Got the headstock shot and started assembling everything today.  Just needs a little wetsanding to smooth the neck where I took off the tape, possibly some touchups with the green stain, put on the tuners and string her up.  Got the wiring done as well, and it works, so maybe by tomorrow I'll have it ready for a test run.

#016 - The "Kylecaster"

Finally got the stupid decal that I've been waiting on and has been holding me up for a week or two.  Just applied it, and once its cured for a couple hours, I can shoot some nitro over it and assemble the guitar.

Since its a Stratocaster copy, and the soon to be new owner's name is Kyle, I'm calling this one the Kylecaster.  Any others I do will probably have a different name or just my name on the decal since the guy sent me 4 to make up for the delay and I can just remove the "Kylecaster" portion.

#017 - Chamber Pot for KT's Kids/Liars Club toy drive

Regan went down for a nap, so I decided to cut out the neck/headstock before joining her in sleep.  Went with a slightly less triangular headstock this time to cut down on stress on the strings.  I need a nap, so I'll shape it later or tomorrow or something and get it joined up.

#017 - Chamber Pot for KT's Kids/Liars club toy drive

got some more done in the past couple days.  put some 1/4" poplar bindings on the body.  Also, I had a spare fretboard in my wood closet from a project I started for myself but haven't finished, so I popped it off and will be using it on this.  Got the neck blank glued up, jointed/trued up, cut the profile, and put in the 1/2x1/8" steel reinforcement bar.  Now I've got the fretboard clamped and glued, as well as a walnut headstock veneer.  Also made a routing template for the mortise and tenon neck joint. 

Not sure what color to stain the top yet, the rest will be painted black.  Thinking a reddish brown.

#017 - Chamber Pot for KT's Kids benefit raffle

So every year since I turned 21 basically, I've been going to the annual toy drive at Liar's Club for KT's Kids charity benefiting the rehabilitation room at Schwab hospital.  (Forgive me if I messed up that info, I'll post the flyer anyways)

Last year I had donated a gift certificate, but either nobody won it, or nobody claimed it, so this year I decided that I'll just bring a shitar since i have so much wood laying around. 

All of the wood I'm using was salvaged from remodelling our entryway here in Chicago, birch plywood from wall panels, and select pine from door frames.  Using my standard brass jello mold pan for the cone and a steel cover plate I found at thrift stores in Oak Park.  I'm thinking about doing all black with a green top.

So come on out december 8th and support a great cause and try to win the chamber pot!

#016 - Stratocaster copy

Finished spraying the clearcoats today on the body and neck.  Starting to assemble it, and as soon as I get the decal, I can apply that and spray the headstock.

Love that flame on the neck.  Came out pretty good with the new dye, I just wish it had matched the color a little better, but I wasn't about to paint over that grain.