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6 String License Plate Build

I'm building this rather different from the norm. I have a solid piece of Malaysian Rubberwood(Oak) from a chair seat that I had lying around. I've made guitar bodies out of this wood before with great results. My plan is to route out a cavity in the body under the plate and mount the Red Oak neck in a cavity pocket like most solid body guitars.

It will have a bridge position Humbucker(probably mounted towards the middle position) with a coil tap and wired to a 3-way switch that will also be wired to a piezo that I'll mount under the plate. Hoping that it will work well. I have corian for the nut and I'm going to make my own adjustable bridge.

The neck is done except for the nut. It's a 25" scale with 22 frets. Red Oak neck and fretboard with natural finish and Truoil. Used Blue colored pencils for the side markers and Blue plastic coat hangers for the fretboard markers. Jumbo fret wire and tuners from CBGitty. The headstock is painted and will match the body. Used a 3/8ths" steel rod for a non-adjustable trussrod.

I wanted a color(Ice Blue Metallic) that I couldn't find. I usually use Dupli-Color Perfect Match spray paint, so I went to the auto parts store and found some Light Blue Metallic that wasn't quite what I wanted. So I got some Silver to use as a base coat since most metallic paints are thin enough for the base/base coat to show through. I got just what I wanted. I might have a hard time matching the body to the headstock since the Red Oak is different from the body wood.

Here's a couple of pics of what I have so far.

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 14, 2015 at 11:54am

Got the nut cut, filed and installed. Just need some strings and a setup.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 18, 2015 at 1:00pm

String Rant: Ive bought a few pairs of cheaper strings with bad results. At least 1 string out of each set broke, some sets had 2 break. So I bought the same D'Addario I've use for a long time and put them on. High E string broke at the ball end. Frustrating but fixable. Remove the other string to make the string holes bigger in the stoptail piece and file any burrs. D string comes off looking like someone put in in a mixer, I just put it on and tightened it and removed without tuning. What gives? Are all strings now POS's?

Okay, The string height is good the intonation is good. Got fret buzz in a couple places so I have to go back over the fret levels. YAY.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 20, 2015 at 12:13pm

Left it strung up over a couple of days and some of the fret problems have disappeared. I think the problem is back bow of the neck instead of fret related. All the frets are seated well, so I'll put the neck in a vise and apply a little pressure to add more relief/less back bow since the trussrod is non-adjustable.

Plugged it in and played it with all pickup options with good results. Got the Piezo from Radio Shack. It was a buzzer type piezo in a plastic housing. I left it in the plastic housing and glued it to the underside of the plate and it has a very smooth tone to it wired to a 1meg volume and 3-way switch. It also sounds good with the Humbucker in HB mode or Single tapped coil mode. The HB sounds great by it's self or in coil tap mode as well. The vibration of the plate gives a nice resonator tone.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 21, 2015 at 10:24am

Picked up this contraption today and found that the tuning was a whole step down. So I tuned it up and discovered that now it can be fretted at the 4th fret without issue. So I'm going to keep doing this for a couple of weeks to see how far I get with it. Then decide whether or not to put in a vise. It may just fix itself.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 27, 2015 at 9:02am

I put together a little jig with a C clamp to put some relief in the neck.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on January 8, 2016 at 10:05am

The jig worked for a little while, so this going to have to be steamed. the bridge bolt was loose in the connectors and causing a little buzz so I poured a little superglue in each connector and fixed that.

The Humbucker sounds great in full mode or coil tapped mode with or without the piezo. The piezo is still very bright and needs to be tamed. I'll probably add 1 or more in parallel and change the pot to a lower value to darken the tone.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on January 17, 2016 at 9:19pm

Got around to steaming the neck while it was in the clamp/vise.

If this doesn't work, I'm going to put a tall aluminum nut on it and use it as a lap steel. Not going to take the neck apart to fix it, too much hassle and want to build a lap steel in the future anyway.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on January 18, 2016 at 9:25pm

After putting the neck in the vise/clamp, steaming it and letting it cool down in the vise. It went right back to having a backbow when I took it out of the vise. The only way to fix it is to take the fretboard off and dig out the trussrod. Not doing that.

I'm going to pull the frets, put zip ties in the slots and sand them down to the board. If I can play fretless and slide with the current nut, I'll enjoy it that way. If it still gives me a problem(not likely), I'll go with the taller nut.

Permalink Reply by David L. on January 19, 2016 at 12:24pm

have you thought of trying heavier gauge strings? (Assuming the tailpiece anchor screw can cope with the increased tension).

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on January 19, 2016 at 8:34pm

No I didn't. It has 10's on it. The last attempt to fix it, I tuned up a hole step and left it that way overnight.Still no good, so I put it in the vise and steamed it. left it in the vise overnight. Same problem. You could play all the way from 22nd fret to the 5th fret without a problem, 4 through 1 no go.

Took all the frets out and played it all the way up and down and was just okay at 1 to 4, but didn't get a chance to use the slide. I can raise the bridge height if I need to.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on January 20, 2016 at 10:12am

The tail piece is attached with 2 screws and might withstand some 12's like Shane uses. I'll probably switch over to those later.

Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on January 20, 2016 at 10:10am

After pulling the frets I raised the bridge an 1/8th" and tuned it open D (6D-5A-4D-3F#-2A-1D). Works and sounds great in my lap and playing with a slide. I'll get around to putting Black or Blue zip ties in the slots later(probably when it needs new strings). Right now it's playable and enjoyable.