30. Black Korina Stratocaster #4 (July 2011-?)
So after the hardtail single coil version of the korina strat I had won an actual Black Top Strat pickguard assembly on ebay and thought I should get a feel for the tone of Korina with heavy humbuckers. But for versatility I decided to build a strat in the theme of the Blacktop strats, with a flexible pick up arrangement in case I changed my mind.
Body was finished in Nitrocellulose lacquer and was built into a Blacktop Strat. Undecided if this one will stay in the collection.
Update: August 2012. This korina strat ended up being the best finished of all my korinas, as well as one of the better spalted ones. After getting a number of mahogany based guitars completed I decided that korina wasn't "my" tonewood, so I decided to sell off the korina based guitars. I did want to keep at least one so this one is now permanent. I also replaced the Fender Black Top pickups with a Seymour Duncan JB/59 combo.
29. 3 piece Black Korina Stratocaster #3 (July 2011-?)
In staying with the minimal waste, I had three boards of limba that were not wide enough with only two. I used a third piece to construct this project. Of all my builds it was probably the easiest and cleanest with no issues. The string thru ferrules were even the straightest I've seen. Amazed, yet not surprised, this body sold for the most I've ever made on ebay for a single guitar body @ $150 + s/h. Maybe I do have some skills...
Sold to Chester Carman in Tampa, Florida in Oct 2011.
28. Jon Cook Walnut/Alder telecaster (July 2011-?)
A lot of the time I sell bodies on Ebay, I usually have 2-3 people asking me to build something like I'm selling but different, or altogether different. I always send them my contact info and usually they end up disappearing off the face of the earth never to be heard from again. But this guy Jon Cook hits me up and asks me to build him one. He's got about 4 feet of walnut he wants to use but in discussing with him the dimensions it turns out its too skinny. We discussed options and it turns out that with a piece of flamed maple, we could build two tops - one for him, and one for me. I would contribute a thinline body that was destined for the fireplace due to a rough routing job of the humbucker routes. The humbucker routes were filled and body was shaved down to accept a 1/4" top as it would clear the slate for the pickup routes.
Jon's original walnut board.
Resawing one half of the boards.
The two bookmatched tops. Jon opted for the design on the right.
The original body, chambered and pickup routes filled.
The completed thinline (mineral spirits were added to show grain). Note the humbucker routes still visible in the P90 routes.
Shielding the pickup cavities with shielding paint hid any remnants of the original pickup snafu, with a beautiful walnut/maple top to show for it.
27. Black Korina "Charvel" Stratocaster (July 2011-?)
I had leftover korina and decided to build a strat in the theme of the Chavel strats. Everything came out awesome, except that I couldn't figure out a control cavity for it since it was top loading.
Originally I was in limbo with what to do..top route it or back route it. The humbuckers were slightly off compared to a H/H pickguard so it was either keep as is or put in the swimming pool route. I ended up finding a template for a backrouted cavity and routed it out and built a korina plate to cover it. When I posted it on ebay a buyer asked me to end the auction early and build it out as a Charvel Floyd Rose style guitar.
Sold to Thomas Igielski in Howell, Michigan in April 2012.
26. "Gretsch" Flamed maple/Mahogany Thinline Telecaster (July 2011-?)
So according to some of the photos this body may actually be #23 or 24 as the shaping of the back and chambering took place in May 2011, but It may have sat long enough for me to consider the sapele bunch as "started" before this one materialized.
My intention with this body was to mimic the Brian Setzer-style Gretsch 6120 but as a Tele Thinline. I had already seen this done by the Fender Custom shop as a carved top in white and Orange, but I wanted this one to look more Tele-ish than 6120-ish. Additionally my skill level could not compete as I didn't know how to do carved tops yet.
Then I saw a custom shop Gretsch Tele in green (for Bono), but it was a flat top. After seeing that model, I decided to build this thinline.
As of now I haven't been able to fund the rest of the build as I'm still determining pickups (TV Jones vs regular Gretsch Filtertrons) and bridges (standard bridge ala Cabronita or tuneomatic with bigsby), so the build sits on a hanger on the wall with the Allparts neck I bought attached to it -- in otherwords near the pile with the sapele/maple thinline, lacewood Thinline and Zebrawood body.
Project still in the works in 2012.
25. Sapele Maple Thinline (July 2011-?)
Out of my run with the sapele came two full width sapele bodies -- the 72 Custom and this body. It began as a beautifully grain solid body, but after #23 and #24 I opted to shave down the thickness, chamber it, and top it with some figured maple I had leftover.
I guess my learning curve needs a bit of resanding sometimes, as this one pulled a Houdini and somehow moved on me during glue up. The ofshift was 1/16" and it's minor as the top is shaped to the base. The strange thing is that my centering template matches the top, so somehow the base was shaped correctly off-center. As its somewhat unappealing to my-own-personal-eye, I plan on trying to confuse the sense by double binding the top and back and potentially recentering the back with a herringbone type of inlay (wishful thinking). This is a new adventure down this road, so I'm hoping I don't screw it up. Again.
Until I figure it out, it sits in the pile with the lacewood Thinline and Zebrawood body.
Project still in the works in 2012.
24. Sapele Mahogany Telecaster (July 2011 - Feb 2011)
After starting the Zebrawood/Sapele Tele and recognizing the design of the stripes, I decided to use more of the left over sapele and build one that had smaller, more centric stripes. The motif I saw with this body was reminiscent of the old surfboards with the darker sapele and the lighter Honduran mahogany.
This project took a detour as I had accidentally dropped it on rough concrete while spraying the lacquer on in my backyard. I did what I could to sand out the bumps of the bruise but they were there to stay. Towards the end of 2011 I decided I should finish off some of projects I had sitting around. As this was near completion I relacquered it and prepped it for parts.
More bad news arrived when I noticed a gap in the neck pocket. The neck fit fine but there was a small gap towards the heel section (ie. not the sides of the pocket). With a 22fret neck it wasn't noticeable but I knew it was there. Update: I feel quite stupid, but I was wrong. The "gap" was actually the difference between the round of the Strat heel and the squarer Tele heel. With a Tele neck the neck pocket fit perfectly. Derrr...
At the time of the original blog I was undecided if I'd keep this build. In April 2012 I opted to lighten the collection. Sold to Christopher Kulik in Hometown, Illinois.
23. Multi-Zebrawood/Sapelle Telecaster (May 2011)
I consider myself an advocate for recycling and a green earth. I believe in not being wasteful if at all possible. A lot of the boards I bought were wider than necessary, so I cut the boards so that it maintained a minimum length for the Tele shape and have been stockpiling these pieces to build racing stripes in bodies or to build a Les-claypool-esque body.
Below is Les Claypool's Carl Thompson "Rainbow" bass made up of walnut, curly maple, padauk, purple heart, ebony and cocobolo.
So with the Rainbow bass in mind, I set off to use some of my offcut material for the center of body. I had a chunk of zebrawood that was long enough for the Tele and a few pieces of sapele left over from the 72 Custom build. I diced them up evenly and glue up the board.
After shaping the body I realized I didn't like the juxtaposition of the stripes like this. I then decided to add some flare with a bookmatched zebra top. The zebrawood I had ended up being too thin, so I decided to re-cut a new top, but use the thin zebrawood as a back.
Body was cut for dual humbuckers (most versatile cut) and back routed. I custom shaped a lid to the control cavity and countersunk the lid into the body. The body was sealed, epoxied the pores shut, and clear-coated with Stew Mac Nitrocellulose lacquer.
I sold the body to ebay buyer Mike Naylor in Feb 2012.
22. Sapelle 72 Telecaster Custom (May 2011)
I had a growing interest in the 70's Fender teles wanted to build myself a 72 Custom/Deluxe with the widerange pickups. I won a Fender Roadworn body on ebay and built a template out of it. I had also just started using sapelle, which was a mahogany substitute. Sapelle is more dense that African mahogany and therefore heavier, so once this project was completed I opted to not keep it and sell it to a lucky bidder.
Michael Salmon in in Rocky Hill, Connecticut became the lucky owner in Oct 2011.
Below are pictures I took for the auction comparing the body I built to the Fender made (hence why it refers to the auction).
21. Hardtail Black Limba Stratocaster (Apr/May 2011)
After the successful build of the Mahogany Strat (and even the Mary Kaye white Strat), I decided I wanted to build a Strat out of Korina as I had favored the Strat body for some time and wanted to hear how a single coil tone was affected by the black korina tonewood. This is the first one I built out of a growing four or five black korina Strat bodies.
As all of my Strats were tremolo equipped I decided that I would make this on a hardtail. I used the Telecaster template to located the bridge location on the Strat based on the neck screw/pocket placement.
Currently this guitar is still in my collection.
The body was then paried with a trio of noise-cancelling Duncan Classic Stack pickups, Fender hardware, and a maple Mighty Might neck, that was later replaced with a birdseye maple Mighty Might neck. The pickup covers are now all matching white, and it is wired like a standard strat.
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