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Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 10:20 pm
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Chicagoblue wrote:
A screw through the fingerboard would suck, but it wouldn't need a special Stew Max Tool to repair. Ceri could grind down some of that wood mix it with some special epoxy that he makes from snake oil and then sand it out like it was never there. Or he used the mistake to create an elaborate inlay of a Phoenix or some crazy sh*t like that. :lol: No, I think its something else. I just wish he would hurry because I'm in a hotel room in Orlando and my air card is slooooow.

In FL with bad air con? Man, that is bad. You should be up here in Idaho.....more rain on the way with 50 degree days....

But Mr. C...what could it be..... A special tool??? And there are only so many things one can mess up on at this step of the game. He has a few frets too high and he needs a special leveling device? Ummm.... or a truss rod section came out of the middle part? (Bi-flex truss rod, right?)...or....neck shims.....or....

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 4:14 am
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nikininja wrote:
I do indeed know he loves to torment us. He told me so!

Did I? That was tactless of me, wasn't it? :lol:

I've so enjoyed all the speculation. Mostly because it isn't any of those issues - thank goodness! Gotta say, it's something I never saw coming - which is how it happened.

Anyway. The tool in question arrived yesterday (Monday) but I couldn't get round to using it till today. So...

You are unlikely to remember that back on page 34 we drilled the holes for the bridge posts:

http://www.fender.com/community/forums/ ... &start=495

At that point I was planning to fit a Wilkinson VS100 bridge, one I've used a few times before and like. However, whilst drilling for it I discovered I'd bought the older VS50 by mistake. There are only a couple of small differences between that and the VS100 - but it narked me.

So I decided to take the opportunity to purchase the newer VS401 instead, which I've not used before. Took a surprising time for Gotoh to deliver one to WD Music, but I eventually got hold of it. Here is the VS50 beneath the "upgrade" VS401:
Image

The lockable saddles are the same. Most of the differences on top are cosmetic:
Image

Some modest functional differences below the waterline. Staggered e/E string holes, and a bigger block which incorporates the trem arm:
Image

None of that is vital, but another nice detail is that the trem pivot posts are lockable at the height you set them to.

So when it came time to fit the bridge I'd naturally put the old one away in a box and had all the parts of the new one in front of me. You may also notice from page 34 of the thread (above) that while the bushings have a 10 mm diameter Trev Wilkinson recommends drilling a 9.5 mm hole for them. That means they go in seriously tight!

I inserted my bushings, pressing very hard indeed to get them to descend into the wood. At which point my problem revealed itself:
Image

The bushings for the VS401 turn out to be deeper than the holes I'd so accurately drilled for the VS50. Measure twice, cut once - what a flippin' idiot!!! MUCH cursing was heard...

And more bad language, as I discovered I simply couldn't get the little feckers out in order to redrill. Much head scratching: how to get those bushings out without damaging the lacquer or timber? I could think of ways, but the problem was how to grip the bushing. I could insert the post and try to fix onto that, but it seemed iffy.

At the back of my mind was a tool Stew-Mac sell - and one for which I have always felt lofty scorn when I leaf past it in their catalog. Would you ever buy a Knob Remover? Get real!!! :lol:

Here it is (the wrench is not part of the kit):
Image

For removing knobs you are meant to use it like this - can you think of anything more silly?:
Image

However, the useful bit of the tool is that row of alternately threaded black bolts. Those are for inserting into various bridge bushings especially for the purpose of extracting them. Try as I might I couldn't find a threaded bolt to match the inside of my VS401 bushings, and that is the bit that has to justify the purchase of this tool - all the rest of which any of us could easily construct for ourselves. Stew-Mac charge $45 for it, plus trans-Atlantic DHL delivery. Will I ever use it again...? [Sigh.]

Kindly ignore the buffed lacquer and installed parts in the next photos. This is a bit out of the thread's sequence.

So. We screw in the appropriate threaded bolt, with a washer on to let the extractor tool get a grip on it:
Image

Attach the tool like this:
Image

And start turning the wingnut to gradually draw the bushing up out of the wood, hopefully without cracking the surrounding lacquer as it emerges:
Image

Job done:
Image

And here are the VS401 bushings on the left, with the older VS50 ones on the right for comparison. Any fool can see they are different depths...:
Image

Also, we can see that the posts have different threads, so we couldn't have used the older bushings with the new posts. And we want those new posts because of that tiny black screw emerging out of the center of the bottom of each post. We adjust that from above with an allen key to lock the post firmly, once we've set the height. A small but nice detail - and to get that is what this whole delay has been about.

Still feeling pretty stupid about it.

Anyone want to buy a knob remover...?

More later - C


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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:27 am
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If today doesnt go well for me, my missus may want to buy it. :oops:

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:27 am
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DOH! But thank god that was the only issue. If it had been the screw through the fretboard a fair bit more work would have been involved. don't take it to heart, to err is human :)

Loving the pics of the electronics in place Ceri. Can't wait to see this one finished :)

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:45 am
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Not as bad I as we all imagined... Just like the previous post, I can't wait to see the finished product. Especially the before and after...

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 8:59 am
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Phew!

That wasn't bad at all. I agree it could have been a lot worse if the lacquer had cracked during removal.

Now Ceri, you of all people should know that every job has a specific tool and every tool has a specific job. I would keep that tool, you never know when you'll need again. Although I am certain it will never be for removing Trem bushings again. Handy little tool. I could even see using it for it's original purpose, say trying to take 30 year old knobs off of a Vintage guitar without doing any damage.

Wow,

We're on the home stretch! I don't wan't it to end. But I Do!

Great work Ceri.

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 9:07 am
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Mr. C. If you could see how I remove the studs for the posts on a bridge, you would shutter! Don't beat yourself up too bad. So far Murphy has stayed a pretty long way away from you mate. So be happy! I have had to refinish bodies 3 times due to issues, so that is something to curse about! This is looking good man! :wink:

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 9:58 am
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Ceri wrote:
Also, we can see that the posts have different threads, so we couldn't have used the older bushings with the new posts. And we want those new posts because of that tiny black screw emerging out of the center of the bottom of each post. We adjust that from above with an allen key to lock the post firmly, once we've set the height. A small but nice detail - and to get that is what this whole delay has been about.

Still feeling pretty stupid about it.

Anyone want to buy a knob remover...?

More later - C


No worries mate! The entire thread has been brilliant, 100 perfect things can't be undone by one simple mistake. Considering the thousands of other things that could have gone wrong during the build (in much more spectacular and detrimental fashion) - this is a pittance.

Live and learn, soldier on!

ORCRiST


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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 1:05 pm
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Ceri wrote:
Anyone want to buy a knob remover...? More later - C

LOL. I have a really good one already. It is a bone handled 1960's handmade Ruana hunting knife (looks like the one below, but that is not my knife). I slip it under the knob and gentle pry up while rotating it around. Works great. If the knob is frozen on, I simply embed the knife in the face of the guitar. The knob does not come off but I feel a lot better.....:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
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Last edited by Xhefri on Tue Apr 27, 2010 1:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 1:25 pm
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Ouch, too much agressive build up?

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 2:40 pm
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To remove posts in the past i've put the screw in post back in the grommet thingy and yanked it up with a clawhammer. Get the claw into the pivot groove and you can get a great grip. :lol: Your pivot posts aren't a lot of use afterwards though.

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 3:11 pm
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nikininja wrote:
To remove posts in the past i've put the screw in post back in the grommet thingy and yanked it up with a clawhammer. Get the claw into the pivot groove and you can get a great grip. :lol: Your pivot posts aren't a lot of use afterwards though.

LOL..I do not feel too bad now. I put a screw in and then use a device called a Morgan Knocker....it is a slide hammer for autobody work. It has about a 2lbs slide on a pipe and one or two pulls and the grommet flys across the room with no damage to the body! :roll: :roll: Of course I have to have someone hold the body or it too will fly across the room... :oops:

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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 4:09 pm
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Hammered grommet thingys aside, Ceri this has been an amazing ride.

Thanks for the lessons,
John.E :shock:


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Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 4:44 pm
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John.E wrote:
Hammered grommet thingys aside, Ceri this has been an amazing ride. Thanks for the lessons, John.E :shock:

Hmmmmm.....David Gilmour meets Mark Knopfler..... 8)

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Posted: Wed Apr 28, 2010 5:39 am
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Hi people: you'll have noticed in the previous post that the guitar seems to have jumped ahead a stage or two. So I'll just do a quick instalment to catch us up on that.

Fitting and drilling the neck: here is a clamping caul I made many years ago. The wooden block is radiused - that was done by using an unfretted fingerboard as a sanding block and simply sanding the curve into this piece of wood. Then strips of cork stuck on so that it will sit comfortably over the upper frets:
Image

A cam-clamp then holds the neck in place. Easy to adjust the pressure on that clamp so that we can get the neck heel positioned exactly right, and then tighten the clamp to hold it in place:
Image

The clamp is also cork lined, which protects the back of the body (this was after I'd started sanding the lacquer):
Image

Different approaches: here I'm using the screws as their own awls, just driving them in till their points mark the correct positions to drill onto the neck. Screwing them in further risks splitting the wood of the neck heel - we don't want to do that!

If you remember, we made a contoured heel on this body, with individual screw ferrules rather than a neckplate. The result of that is that the screws all come through to different depths. We want to drill their holes in the heel neither too deep nor too shallow, so it is necessary to measure each one and work accordingly:
Image

Easy work with piloted drill bits. I drilled twice, with a smaller bit for the full depth and a larger one stopping a couple of mil short - for maximum snugness and therefore firmness of neck attachment:
Image

In principle it shouldn't be necessary, but I like to countersink the holes just a shade. Otherwise, even though the head of the screw isn't going in there, still the threads can just chew up that entry a little bit. A tiny over-the-top "handmade" touch:
Image

Done.

Next, buffing the lacquer. We've covered this before an no doubt will again, so we don't need to go into exhaustive detail. So just a quick canter through.

The body is sanded all over with wet-and-dry paper, soaked for a few hours and used wet, repeatedly declogged under the tap and resoaked in a bowl that has some detergent in it, which aids smooth sanding:
Image

This is after an initial sand over with P600 wet-and-dry. You can see I've missed a few bits so far, particularly between the control cover and the spring cavity. It is simply a waste of time going on to finer paper till we've hit every single spot, tempted though one is to progress. So I did another bout of sanding after this photo - and anyway, I hadn't got to the edges yet at this stage (by the look of it):
Image

Here's the front sanded to P600:
Image

Here it is sanded to P1000:
Image

Next, sanded to P1500:
Image

I don't happen to have any P2000 paper at the moment, so at that stage I then moved on to a nice mild cut metal polish:
Image

I also don't have a buffing wheel, so that is all done by hand. Very boring work!

You will notice in that last shot that without even trying I seem to have captured something of the grain coming through the lacquer, which is very clear to see when you are here in the room with the guitar. I absolutely do not want to reopen the subject of my photography woes, but it is painfully striking how in these next shots I have conspicuously failed to show the grain, much as I'd like to. So the previous pic lets you know that it really is there, even if I can't show it to you!!!:
Image

I think this next pic was taken after sanding but before polishing. It certainly looks much shinier than this now, and the sanding dust has since been removed from the cavities:
Image

Another failed attempt to reveal the grain:
Image

Perhaps direct sunlight would help? ...No:
Image

That picture merely betrays where I haven't removed the sanding dust from cavities and screw holes yet. Man, I hate it when manufacturers leave that lacquer dust in there!!! :lol: Still, the binding looks quite nice, do you think...?

Now then. There is history regarding this guitar's finish. When Nick first removed the original lacquer from this body he weighed it, before and after. He found he'd removed 197 grams / 6.95 ounces of MIM polyester paint - and that has become the benchmark figure.

When I sprayed a nitro finish on my Blue Strat last year ( http://www.fender.com/community/forums/ ... sc&start=0 ) I did the weighing and found my lacquer came in at 52 g / 1 7/8 oz. For those that think "thin skin" is an issue, that's not bad.

So back on page 35 of this thread I weighed this body, before getting going on the finishing. At that point it weighed 1934 g / 68.22 oz. And now we weigh it again, after all the finishing and buffing is done:
Image

Image

(And there's the grain showing through again, just when I'm not trying to capture it...)

2062 g / 72.73 oz. Subtract the unfinished weight and we get the weight of the lacquer as 128 g / 4.51 oz. Hmmm. Well, that's less than the original polyester finish, but much more than my simple solid color blue one on that other Strat. I guess that is accounted for by the complexity of this finish: many layers with all the different colors, especially on the back, and a fair amount of clear lacquer on top to get a smooth finish across the faux binding.

I plan a transparent finish on my next guitar too, but since that will be built from scratch the finishing will be much simpler. We'll keep score of these lacquer weights... :D

Last thing to deal with here: fittings. I ordered these EMG pickups in their "ivory" option. I like plastic parts to match reasonably closely, so here's what I have to choose from:
Image

On the left are knobs that were originally bright white when they arrived on a Squier about 20 years ago: in a drawer for the last decade. So that is natural aging you are seeing, including where the copper in the brass application on the letters/digits has turned green. People pay silly money for knobs that look like that! :lol:

In the middle is a set that WD Music sell as "antique white". On the right is another seller's "aged white".

I like the middles ones best and that is what I shall be using. At the bottom you also see some off-white strap buttons. Frankly, my days of leaping around with guitars are over so I don't feel an urgent need for locking strap buttons. I'll go with these white ones for the time being, unless they look too tarty...

We've covered the electronics before, but just as a reminder, here's the EMG SA set I built the pickup cavities to fit:
Image

You'll notice that set comes with much of the wiring already in place, and with those bits on the bottom of the pickups where their wires just slot into place. That's nice, because it saves me from the need to do too much soldering on this guitar. Which in turn is useful because I have absolutely no intention of stepping on Mr Xhefri's toes regarding super-neat soldering work. That gentleman is the master when it comes to posting photos of top grade soldering on this Forum: if you want to see it done at its best click on his link! :D

My soldering is OK too: we've seen it before and no doubt will again...

More later.

Cheers - C


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