Headless Thunderbird

dadagoboi · March 11, 2011, 04:58:10 AM

After making the bird headless there's not much more you could do that's worse...seriously, why not? it will make it easier to play. Looking good.

drbassman · March 11, 2011, 07:07:57 AM

CHopping up TBs is not really sacrilage around here! Right Scott?

Highlander · March 11, 2011, 02:17:03 PM

Should I keep out of this one...?

drbassman · March 11, 2011, 02:35:43 PM

Quote from: Kenny's 51st State on March 11, 2011, 02:17:03 PM
Should I keep out of this one...?

Opps, I forgot Kenny's contributions too!

Highlander · March 11, 2011, 02:42:52 PM

With our cousin here that makes it SAW III...

drbassman · March 11, 2011, 02:55:57 PM

Quote from: Kenny's 51st State on March 11, 2011, 02:42:52 PM
With our cousin here that makes it SAW III...

The more the merrier!

godofthunder · March 11, 2011, 03:13:25 PM

Quote from: drbassman on March 11, 2011, 07:07:57 AM
CHopping up TBs is not really sacrilage around here! Right Scott?

As long as I live I'll never live it down!

Lightyear · March 11, 2011, 04:50:18 PM

There are now THREE Butcher Brothers!

Highlander · March 12, 2011, 10:44:02 AM

An (un) Holy Trinity...

Dave W · March 12, 2011, 12:30:43 PM

neepheid · March 14, 2011, 04:10:25 AM

Hmmm, some private jokes being passed around here

I think I've scored a neck so while I wait for it to arrive I've been removing the finish from the body. The black stuff isn't too bad but there's a sealer coat underneath that is proving a lot tougher to shift.

Highlander · March 14, 2011, 05:54:28 PM

Nothing private about thes jokes...

neepheid · August 03, 2011, 03:43:54 PM

Sorry for the lack of updates, I ran out of steam and there was stuff round the house to do (put up shelves, fit an extra front door lock because our neighbours keep dubious company, blinds to put up).

Anyway, I've got my second wind, so here we go

I got to work on attaching the neck to the body. Having never made a neck pocket in my life before (this neck is so different from the old one it's like making a new one) I was nervous about this. I was reading this very useful article which gave me the impetus to get off my backside:

http://buildyourguitar.com/resources/pocket/index.htm

However, I'm not quite ready to go straight to the body, so instead I made a template out of MDF marked with a centre line so I can place it on the (similarly marked) body. Using the same trick of clamping two lengths of wood to the sides of the neck then removing the neck I got this (with a router with a roller at the top of the cutter):

Applying this to a spare bit of MDF yielded this:

Which unfortunately was "70s Fender" tight

No worries though, I have a trick for this eventuality. I will apply an appropriate number of layers of electrical tape to the guide roller, pulling the cutter away from the template edge and making the hole a little smaller.

In other news I have decided to get some high end headless hardware to do a right good job of this project. I have gone with ABM stuff.

Eventually, I hope it's going to end up something like this:

Except that the pickguard will be black.

dc10bass · August 03, 2011, 03:59:59 PM

Quote from: Chris P. on February 11, 2011, 10:46:57 AM
I had to laugh very hard about the headless T-bird logo

+1

neepheid · August 08, 2011, 08:14:38 AM

Progress report:

Neck is now definitely headless

New neck pocket routed out (a little tight, but better that than too loose)

I am now stalled at the point of deciding what to do about dusty end access. As it stands all I've added is one even more difficult to get to fret onto a Thunderbird. I can't decide where to put the neck screws until I've worked this out.