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The Guitar Builders Blog | 050312

Our new video blog has gone through a few changes over the past few weeks and I’ve arrived back at the original idea, a fast and easy single-take monologue with a few close ups edited in.. this is both much quicker to produce (and one thing I don’t have is lots of time to waste) and more candid.. this week as well as a quick run through of the current work on hand I have a good old rant about something very close to my heart.. steam punk guitars.. let me know what you think and don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel!

The stock(ish) range of Crimson Guitars is coming together rapidly now, the first batch of necks are fretted now.. As are a dozen or so bodies, each one entirely unique of course.
Canon!  Ironically the best camera for shooting video of the lot!!
The guitar side of the detachable twin neck guitar is in line for some inlay to match that of the bass side of the instrument..
seeing as the top into which I will be inlaying the alloy is carved the whole piece has to be bent in 3 dimensions.. much fun!!
The channel is scored into the top with a sharp scalpel and I begin recessing the cavity..
The inlay is finally installed with epoxy, takes a while to cure but works perfectly when bonding metal and wood!
One of the other myriad projects I’m trying to clear off the decks is Pauls PAF guitar.. a figured elm body and padouk neck will make for a great sound in the end.. final sanding begins!
The final stage of this process is rounding the edges over by hand…
and then the oiling process begins!!
Just one coat..
and we have a stunning stunning new custom guitar emerging from the dusty cocoon that is my workshop..
While that was happening a delivery arrived.. christmas is here
and I have some stunning new pieces of wood to play with courtesy of Lola Guitars check out their amazingly cool idea of what an acoustic should be!
The epoxy cures over night and with a special file for working with soft alloys I get to leveling it off.. the thing to remember here is to NOT get any part of the inlay too hot.. that would melt the glue and screw everything up!
And here they are side by side..
A little toy that is rather indispensable is my air brush.. from touch ups to creating sunbursts I couldn’t do without it!
Now, the stock necks are still lacking one small thing, a headstock… they are wedged on the bandsaw.
Before I get on with the necks I need a new headstock design.. we start with the nut width and straight string pull
and, after an hour of very hard work, we arrive at this, the new 6 aside Crimson Guitars headstock.
The design is glued onto a piece of mdf, incidentally the first time I have ever used a pritt stick in a guitar builders workshop!?
all in all I’m very happy with this result..
Next up I have headstock wings to create..
Using a few sharp hand planes the joints are jointed
and each headstock is clamped up..
I get a wonderful sense of achievement seeing this picture.. with a bit of help these guitars will actually be glued together soon!!
 What more can I say.
Now, as these custom guitars have hollowed headstocks there is little room for a logo up in the customary space.. here will do nicely I think.
The elm PAF is getting a coat of oil every day or so and should be strung up next week..
Back to cutting aluminium with a jewelers saw (read ‘I broke 6 damn blades’ into that sentence please!)
carefully the cavities are recessed..
and we are done.. more epoxy to cure
and on to another job that I’ve been putting off for months, having been building guitars for coming up on a decade now I have a few knocking around that have flaws, this beast had issues with the frets so a new board is in place and I make a start on an idea I’ve had for years..
bits are cut off the waste from a pre-slotted padouk fretboard and are glued in place.

giving us a minimalist fretboard and side ‘dot’ inlay combination.. despite my reservations throughout the process I’m rather pleased with this.. sometimes you just have to do these things and see if they work.. what do you think?  Sound off in the comments below or follow us on all the social media platforms..

All my best,

Ben

Crimson Guitars UK