Building a Strat for myself...

Wound_Up

Wound_Up

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Been working on this for a few weeks here and there. I picked up a paulownia Strat body a few weeks ago because I've been wanting to finish a guitar ever since I repaired my Epiphone. So I ordered that body.

Next up was a neck. I attempted to use the neck from my blue Silvertone because I really like it and it fit the pocket perfectly. So I mark the holes to be drilled and drill them out. Turns out that I didn't drill them straight so the screws were binding up and getting HOT. So hot, in fact, that I snapped the head off of one and the rest was stuck in the neck.

My plan was to dig it out and plug the hole like I saw Ted Woodford do to Adam Savage's 70s semi-hollow 335-type guitar. Well I had to order new neck screws and I didn't know what size so I just ordered some from Fender.

The vid of Ted fixing Adams guitar:


Turns out the Silvertone screws are a size or two larger than Fenders. So when the Fender screws got here, I figured "let me try one of these screws in the blocked hole and see what happens". So I drop it in and start turning and THE THING GRABBED AND STARTED TIGHTENING....with 85% of the broken screw still stuck in the neck.

Best I can figure is that since the new screw wasnt as big diameter-wise as the previous one, it had enough movement in the hole that it found fresh wood. I'm guessing it went in at a slight angle and missed the broken screw completely. Whatever the case, the Silvertone is back together and plays GREAT so it's not coming back apart again. Ever. Lol

So then I decide I'll buy a neck. I had a bunch of credit on Amazon so I looked there and found what appeared to be a nice looking baked maple neck with rosewood fretboard, stainless frets, a bone nut, and a Modern D shape, iirc.

The first one they sent looked GREAT! Nice dark rosewood. Flamed maple all up and down the neck. Other than that, it was terrible. The fret ends cut up my hands BAD. There was such a back bow that the notched straightedge looked like a seesaw. The truss rod almost got it flat so I returned it for a replacement.

The 2nd neck is great! 100% usable. Still has flame. Stainless frets. No bone nut. Fret ends are 1000x better. It'll be fantastic once I get done with it.

Most of my pics are too big to post so heres a couple showing flame on the neck and the belly contour that I was working on.

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Currently working on the last bit of grain filling the body today. Then I'll seal it with nitro sanding sealer. Once that's done, it'll be getting Sonic Blue nitro paint and then clear. I still have to order the paint and clearcoat. I have sanding sealer already.

I'm just wondering if I should be doing paint on the same day I do sealer? Or do I wait a week and let the sealer harden/cure/whatever, then come back and paint it afterwards?


Anyway. It ought to turn out pretty good. I had run across a few people saying they had issues with the grain filler I'm using. They seem to think it gets dissolved by nitro lacquer but that's not what I'm seeing. I did a test piece yesterday with filler and sealer and everything is exactly where it was before sealing.

The difference being that everybody that's having issues with it seems to have sprayed sealer first, then tried to fill the grain after sealer, which doesn't sound like the right way to do things to me. Logic says fill the grain, then seal it.

That's what I did and I had zero issues while everybody that sealed it first complained about it disappearing and the grain not being filled after shooting the first coat of nitro over it. I guess I don't understand why anyone would seal it first. You're filing the grain up with sealer. No, wonder the grain filler didn't work. It's not made to fill sealer. It's made to fill wood <shrug>

Anyway. I'll update this as I do stuff.
 
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Wound_Up said:
The difference being that everybody that's having issues with it seems to have sprayed sealer first, then tried to fill the grain after sealer, which doesn't sound like the right way to do things to me. Logic says fill the grain, then seal it.
Click to expand...
seems silly to seal before filling, but what do i know?

I think the biggest issue you face is humidity.
But...I would let things set a spell before painting if it was me doing it. Regardless.
And I have ...
Done it.
mary-kaye``.jpg
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In the end, the only thing that matters is how much fun you have in the doing. You're assembling an instrument from parts...it will never be anything more than a physical manifestation of the joy you experience in the doing.

Might as well enjoy it while ya can...
 
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Is it difficult to convert a 6 point trem to a 2 point?

Is it as simple as filling the 6 screw holes and drilling 2 larger holes for the 2 posts? I figure as long as I line up the saddles so they're in the right place, I can just mount the posts wherever it is they land after positioning the bridge.

Is it really that simple?
 
rolandson said:
seems silly to seal before filling, but what do i know?

I think the biggest issue you face is humidity.
But...I would let things set a spell before painting if it was me doing it. Regardless.
And I have ...
Done it.
View attachment 2327
View attachment 2329
In the end, the only thing that matters is how much fun you have in the doing. You're assembling an instrument from parts...it will never be anything more than a physical manifestation of the joy you experience in the doing.

Might as well enjoy it while ya can...
Click to expand...

Id love for mine to look like that first guitar. Looks a lot like Kenny Wayne Shepherds recent signature guitar, which I'd LOVE to own. His has a custom Sonic Blue, called "faded transparent Sonic Blue". Only ever used on his signature guitars. Edit: that's a Mary Kaye? Whoa. NICE. 😍

Honestly though, I doubt I'll get any grain showing through without it being somewhat transparent like on his GUITARS or that Mary Kaye. For that, I'd need a setup like Believer uses with paint guns and all so that I could thin out the Sonic Blue and make it more transparent.

Can't do that with spray cans AFAIK. If it just takes doing very thin coats, that might be something I could pull off but otherwise, I doubt I'll get that look.
 
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Well I've got 3 coats of nitro sanding sealer on the body so far. Still might do a 4th depending on how it looks after this coat flashes off. I bought some aftermarket spray tips for the cans and they're stellar.

The fan pattern from these fan tips are around twice as tall as the Stewmac fan tips. Much closer to an actual spray gun. They've made this a cinch to get done. I'm really glad I bought them, tbh.

Once I'm done, I'll let it sit for 24 hrs. Then I'll probably do the Sonic Blue nitro tomorrow afternoon. I might wait 2 or 3 days to do clear coat just to make sure there won't be any solvent pop. And that way I can start in the morning and hopefully get all the coats done that day.

Is there a limit on how many coats of nitro I should do per day? Like could I do 8 coats of clear in 1 day? Or would that be better split up into 2 days?

I can already tell this is just the first of many I'll paint & assemble lol
 
Well it turns out I have a couple of drips to fix. Round high spots were it dripped straight down. No runs. Maybe 1 slight sag around the top of the neck pocket. So I'm going to wait a week or more and let it harden or whatever it does. Then I'll shave those down and possibly do a final coat to seal it all up. Then it's on to color.

Booooo!
 
That's done. Shaved those drips down until they were gone. Then hit the area with some 400 and 320 grit to blend it all in. I also had a place I had to use some grain filler after sealing yesterday.

A chunk of wood came out when I was drilling one of the neck mounting holes. So I filled that and then sprayed another coat of sealer on the back to amalgamate it all together since nitro burns into the previous coats.

At this rate, I'm going to try and spray Sonic Blue tomorrow, Tuesday, the 18th of March. Thankfully I bought those spray tips because the fan tip provided by Stewmac leaves A LOT to be desired.

I'll add a pic of the stock fan pattern vs the aftermarket tip in a few minutes. Along with the universal handle thing, you almost wouldn't know you were using a spray can. Heating the can up like they recommended really helped, also. It made the sealer atomizer much, much better.
 
Wound_Up said:
Honestly though, I doubt I'll get any grain showing through without it being somewhat transparent like on his GUITARS or that Mary Kaye. For that, I'd need a setup like Believer uses with paint guns and all so that I could thin out the Sonic Blue and make it more transparent.
Click to expand...
I did it with grain filler, transparent dyes, rattle cans, and wet sanding. A lot of wet sanding.
 
3 coats of Sonic Blue done. This is before the 3rd coat. Done with color. Moving on to clear tomorrow.

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Did some pre-fitting. I still have to shoot clear coat. It was a little too cool today. Supposed to be in the 70s tomorrow so I'll get started tomorrow.

This thing is going to be SICK! I ordered Aged White pickup covers and knobs to go with the aged white pickguard. Same company makes both so I hope they're close to similar. Pickups are Fender Texas Specials. Got Fender 250k pots and a CRL 5-way on the way tomorrow. Other parts will be here Saturday.

Tried to install the new Gotoh 6 in a line tuners today and that didn't happen. They're NICE tuners. The 10mm conversion bushings are too big for the holes, though. The holes are like 10.2mm while the bushings are like 10.26mm. So I ordered a 10.3mm straight flute reamer to ream the holes.

I have a 10.5mm reamer and Stewmac has 10.5mm bushings. That's how I got the reamer. My last guitar had oversized holes, larger than 10.2mm, so I reamed them to 10.5mm and bought the Stewmac bushings.

The 10.3mm reamer is half the price of those bushings so I went for the cheaper option. If it doesn't work, I can always open it up to 10.5mm and get those bushings if I need to.

The waiting is definitely the hardest part 🤣

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Oh yeah. I had ordered a bridge and some different pickups for it previously. It was a Wilkinson 6 point trem with pop-in arm. WOV09 was the model. Turns out it's a 'Wilkinson M-Series' part, which isn't what I wanted. M-Series are from their Chinese plant. I was looking for Japan or wherever else they make parts. Korea? I don't recall.

On 98% of the M-Series parts, they clearly say that's what they are in the advertisement. This one didn't say it anywhere. So back it went. It also had a short trem block on it for thin bodied guitars.

Pretty sure I'm just going to order a Fender MIM big block trem. Sent back The Revival pickups I ordered, also. Ordered the Texas Specials instead. I'm almost certain I'll be happy with these where I wasn't so sure about the others.
 
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Wired the pickguard temporarily. It has a 250k volume, 1 500k No load and 1 500k standard tone pot. That's all I had in stock until the 250k's I ordered get here. Tone pots wired to middle and bridge.

I need to install tuners, wire the jack and claw ground, and install the claw, bridge and springs. I have to do all of that so I can set the neck up where it's going to permanently live, transfer punch it for screw holes, and drill said screw holes so I can mount it in the neck pocket.

It ought to be ready to play at that point. I have knobs on the way so I'll probably use some Les Paul speed knobs on it until they get here.

Also...should I paint the headstock?

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