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Andyjr1515

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Everything posted by Andyjr1515

  1. Yes - if you're not going varitone, then there's nothing to be lost to putting as many 4-conductor options as your switching allows. If you are limited, I agree with BigRedX, the series parallel is probably more useful than single coil options, although those can sometimes be useful to balance the tone when the switch is in the mid position
  2. [quote name='EliasMooseblaster' timestamp='1510047989' post='3403418'] Thought I might reheat this thread as I have an update and a question! Update: I've bought the DiMarzio. Hoping to get that wired up tonight in the most basic manner to test it out. Question: there are approximately ten million different ways I can wire it, for series/parallel, coil tap, and permutations of those. Unfortunately all the wiring diagrams in the manual assume I'm wiring to a three-way toggle switch. My options for switching are: swapping out the volume pot for a push-pull to enable a coil tap; or fiddling around with the rotary pickup switch to see if I can get more settings out of it. It currently clicks through three different positions, but I see it has a lot more terminals - is it possible to 'unlock' more positions and make use of these? [/quote] Having once built a guitar that had 125 sound options, I'm one to talk - BUT, if you are still going to rig up a varitone circuit, I would personally just go for standard series humbucking mode for the DiMarzio. You can always change it later if it really isn't giving you what you want.
  3. And here it is with its first coat of varnish:
  4. Hi, Wilco One will be in the post to you in the morning - paddle-type, dpdt, 2 sets of 3 terminals, on/on
  5. Hi, Wilco Is it the round 'stick' type or the paddle type? Pretty sure I've got something that would do fine you can have for free if you want to PM me your address. I'm pretty sure I've got at least one of each type new and unused.... Andy
  6. In the background, Mike and I have been discussing various details, the most important being which part of which bookmatched set would work best. This is what we've settled on : Reminds me of those wind tunnel shots of concorde
  7. [quote name='scrumpymike' timestamp='1509980110' post='3402987'] Hey Andy - good to see you've finally broken cover Just make sure you finish 'Rascal Mervyn Lyte' before you go (Merv was my late lamented woodcutter buddy btw - and he certainly WAS a rascal!). [/quote] We may have a name for the bass, then...
  8. [quote name='Rikki_Sixx' timestamp='1509904328' post='3402503'] Maybe Andy could do a very limited run of basses called 'The Missus', made from her table. Limited because she might get hold of Andy before he runs out of timber! [/quote] I'm more likely to end up as one of 'The Missing'!
  9. [quote name='SpondonBassed' timestamp='1509900651' post='3402452'] Seeing the cross section in the pick-up cavities is nice. [/quote] Hopefully, unless I've got the pickup measurements wrong, they won't be visible when it's finished!
  10. [quote name='TheGreek' timestamp='1509903075' post='3402485'] I don't think Mrs Andyjr will be happy if you take a guitar shaped chunk out of her dining room table..... A good way to get a black eye, if that's what you're after... [/quote] But it's SUCH a nice grain. Perfect, in fact. I'm sure she'll understand
  11. With the high tech gadgets consisting of pencil, calculator, set square and scissors, a face-on photo of a Lyte has been scaled up and cut out : Tomorrow, I will choose the best place to position the walnut for the best figuring and cut the two halves out
  12. The finishing is actually going remarkably quickly and well so far If I'd been going for satin, the finish would already be there! But glossing the body and headstock plate is going to make SUCH a difference to the figuring. It needs to sit for a few days for the tru-oil to fully harden before I do that. Can't wait
  13. [quote name='Pinball' timestamp='1509803286' post='3401760'] There is a good scrumpy mike bass in this I can feel it in my bones. [/quote]
  14. [quote name='Pinball' timestamp='1509802796' post='3401755'] Having thought long and hart about buying his Rascal I watch with interest [/quote] So it's YOUR fault!!
  15. [quote name='SpondonBassed' timestamp='1509802360' post='3401752'] It's great to see you're on this phase of he build. When you wet sand with the tru oil, do you wipe off the slurry often and freshen the tru oil? [/quote] Yes - light wipe off of the slurry after each initial application. Later, that will become wipe off and vigorously buff each time
  16. Now that the 6-string Alembicesque electric has got to the stage of 'apply finish, wait for a day, apply some more finish', I'm at last into catch-up time on some of the woefully late smaller jobs that have been piling up. The first and most overdue on the list is for scrumpymike Many of you know Mike - the South West Bash which Mike and his lovely wife, MrsScrumpy, organise is the stuff of legend! Now....many of my builds evolve as they go along. But this project has been evolving even before a pencil put its first mark on a bit of drafting paper So I'm going to summarise briefly:[list] [*]Mike has a lovely Fender Rascal: [/list] [list] [*]He loves the neck; he loves the sound; he loves the electrics and pickups. But: he doesn't like the weight; he doesn't like the 'sit' [*]So he has asked me to do a reversible re-body job, based on a Precision Lyte shape: [/list] [list] [*]Transferring the neck, hardware, pickups and electronics [/list] OK so far?[list] [*]We talked about matching the headstock paint on the new body. BUT - Mike had a good friend who was a real (yes, real) tree-felling axeman...from young man to retirement. And, indeed, Mike actually got a book published of said axeman's life story. [*]And this piece of walnut is part of the last tree he felled before retiring. And would it be possible, Mike asked, to incorporate that somewhere in the build: [/list] [list] [*]Yes, said I. [*]In fact, this then became a bookmatched-topped natural body project. And here is the resulting bookmatched walnut to make it out of : [/list] [list] [*]And that's exactly what I'm going to do next [/list]
  17. Final build task before starting the finishing is tidying up the neck profile. I will do one last tweak once the guitar is finished and all strung up but to get it pretty close, I go by feel and then, holding the guitar a bit like a back to front cello, I use a scraper - drawing up the neck length very lightly - to take away any lumps or bumps along the length or facets around the profile curve. And that's it! Basic build is complete and finishing has now started I use a variation of the tru-oil slurry-and-buff method as a combined sanding lubricant, grain filler and sealer. The body will actually be gloss varnished eventually, but I have found this method to be just as good as a gloss prep method as a finished method in its own right The only difference (if at all) is that I probably use coarser abrasive cloth at first - typically 120 grit but sometimes even 80 grit. This is the first application following the normal 'final sand': Five minutes later, I have this: And then fifteen minutes later I have this on the back and neck too: The slurry from the sapele, wenge and purpleheart will, if not wiped off, discolour the maple, so I always wipe off the wet tru-oil from the maple even before I start the actual slurry and buffing. When dry - this will look a bit naff - as the oil soaks in differentially. I will probably repeat with a coarse grit once more, once it has fully set, before starting the proper slurry and buffing Sunday/Monday-ish In the meantime, to MrsAndyjr1515's delight, there are a couple of small guitar and bass jobs that have been waiting a while that I'll be getting on with.
  18. Onto last build jobs. One of them is slimming down the internal control chamber top so that all of the controls poke through as they should. Because it is routing down to 4 or 5mm thickness, I always drill at least one hole first to give me the comfort that I'm not going to break through the top! To do that, I need to know at least where one of the holes is going to be. Someone asked me why the control chamber was so big...well, and this doesn't include yet the 3-way switch or the battery clip or the general connecting wires or a bit of P90 sitting in the chamber...: It's going to be quite busy! Also, the pre-wired cables can be a real, real problem with small chambers. By the way - while this was on and everything else temporarily fixed, I popped the stacked P90's on top and found some scales that I'm-sure-aren't-from-the-kitchen-despite-the-flour So, take away the control chamber extra rout, add back the cover, the strap buttons and finish (negligible weight) should leave us comfortably below 6 1/2 lbs
  19. Quick mock up to make sure it all fits. I've fitted the slightly wider nut to test 'worst case' - and it's fine The frets haven't been levelled, crowned and polished yet so there is a bit of tidying up to do at the fret-ends but the binding blends in nicely: The fret ends have been de-nibbed so the binding is fretslot-less
  20. [quote name='scrumpymike' timestamp='1509645857' post='3400595'] What's that comment about hindsight being the only 20/20 vision? [/quote] Indeed, Mike For more than a few reasons, I could now do with getting this one to the finishing stage (during which there is little time taken actually applying the finish but lots of spare time waiting for stuff to dry )! I'll string this up tomorrow to make absolutely sure, but this feels SO much better:
  21. [quote name='HowieBass' timestamp='1509642944' post='3400567'] That binding looks the dog's whatsits! I can imagine you bringing this in regularly for other builds now [/quote] Yes - probably...but preferably applied BEFORE the fretboard's been glued to the thru-neck!
  22. Too dark to take a photo, but all the frets are in I'm MUCH happier with the resulting width.
  23. [quote name='eude' timestamp='1509294012' post='3397856'] It's here, and it's absolutely incredible! Eude [/quote] One of the smartest looking basses I've ever seen. Superb.
  24. 14 frets done, 8 to go! It's a slow, slow job. With the ebony being so brittle, I need to avoid having to re-do any of these so I'm clamping a fret at a time until the glue pretty much sets. So far so good You can see the binding in this shot - adds a touch of class...should have done this in the first place!
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