Do re mi, so far so good

[panther]

Very impressive build. Looks very professionally made. Love the color.
Dan

[Stefaan88]

Thank you for all the nice words! I really appreciate this.
This guitar got a few little mistakes but otherwise it plays and sounds great. The first 4 weeks the guitar was tuned lower and then i gradually tuned up and put normal tension on the neck. This tiny neck remains straight. That's fine. After a few weeks i'll level the frets and then it's ready. The strings are 11-49.
I'm a bit amazed of the progress i made over last year. Last year i could only just made a diddley Bow.
Now i'm thinking of building a bluesbender/brass rail inspired guitar. I have a piece of padouc for the fretboard ready with a flat brass bar in it. It's flat so inside the neck, a normal truss rod could be used. This will make small adjustments of the neck possible, while a brass bar is visible. The fret slots wont cut the brass bar completely, so it remains one piece. The neck wood will be two piece maple, to reduce the risk of warping. The body will be sipo mahogany, because alder or bassood is't easy to find here. Scott, could you measure,the thickness of your bluesbender for me. And if possible tell me it's weight. I would really appreciate this.
Last month i won a Celebrity body on Ebay. The body is in bad shape bit i'll try my best to build a new neck for it.

I think it would be nice to have these guitars all in the same kind of red colour as the first.
I gonna need a set of pickups for both the Celebrity and the bluesbender/brass rail project. I probably search for new pickups that would suit the guitar, instead of buying original 60s/70s pickups.
I could use some advice on this subject.
It's a bit strange, at the end of the year i might have 3 guitars that i made myself and that looks like Mosrites, but never seen a vintage Mosrite in real life!

I wish you all the very best for 2016!
Best regards,
Stefaan

[Stefaan88]

Hi to all!
It's been 6 months since my last update. Every now and then i worked on a Celebrity and built a brassrail style guitar form scratch.
Ed made the pickups for these projects.
I hope to post some pictures soon.
The Celebrity 'replica', is working fine, but the neck is still a bit too thick. Is the neckshape similar to the Ventures II model? The body could use some respray. Not sure about the color yet. I installed the pickups and now i can test it through an amp. It's an intersting instrument. The body got only a small piece of wood under the bridge, instead of a big piece through the body. It's loud when you play it unplugged.


The brassrail inspired guitar, well that's another story. I started with collecting info and pics. But it was impossible to build an accurate replica. So it's more a brassrail 'inspired' model. The neck got a very long heel and ends just before the bridge. For the body i used Sipo Mahogany. It got a nice colour, so it will probably get some clear paint. There is still quiet some work to do, but the neck fits nicely in the body. The neck got a thin piece of brass strip in the fretboard. There is also a truss rod in thenneck. I received the humbuckers last this week. That will give the project another boost.
Regards,
Stefaan

[dubtrub]

Keep us updated on your projects and yes please post pix.

[BRRanger]

I'm really interested in seeing your Brass Rail inspired project!
Scott

[Stefaan88]

The start of the Celebrity project. The body apear to be an unnumbered, unbinded (let's say unfinished) body that has once had a Celebrity III neck and control plate. The pickup cavities are the exact size for Mosrite pickups, so I presume it was one an odd looking but nice sounding Blue Mosrite.
It was once 'coverted to a lefthander' with a big hole on the left. I got this filled with a piece of solid maple and then curved using scrapers.



This is the first moment I fitted the neck. The heel is very narrow. But the neck fits nicely. Something I noticed much later: (all?) Celebrity neck have horizontal headstock, like the early Venture II model? I give mine a 7° tilted headstock, because I wasn't aware of this. The fretboard is padouc and has small pearl fretmarkers. The adjuster for the trussrod will be near the heel. It's a bit like an the older Venture necks but with a wider headstock. It looks not bad I guess. Another interesting remark: making a neck for an unknown body requires some reverse engineering to get the frets and nut position calculated correctly, acording to the bridge. Very interesting.



After installing the pickups and making the pickguard and scratch plate, things start to look good.
Now I can test the guitar. The pickups are really hot. Unplugged, a Celebrity is a loud guitar. A very interesting instrument.
I put a sticker on the fixed gap, but later on will give it a new layer of paint. Not sure what colour etc. I also wanna slimmer the neck profile a bit.
Now I can enjoy the sound!

[Stefaan88]

The start of the Brass Rail tribute. This guitar will have a more 'Les Paul' shape lower boud. But the upper boud and the German carve are very similar.
The painted Sipo Mahogany got some lovely gold flames running acros. So I think it will get only some clear paint to finish it.


The neck is a liminated 3 piece Maple/padouc/maple construction. The neck gets a dual truss rod, just like in the Celebrity and 'The Reef', with the adjustment at the heel. That will give some strenght near the nut/headstock I guess.


A 4mm thick brass bar is fitted in the fretboard. The frets will make contact with the brass bar I'm very curious if it will have a noticable effect on the sound. Wel it looks cool


Most of the components that I got are put together to get a first implession. I chose for a big black pickguard, just like similar to the brass rail prototype that Phill X tested for a Mosrite Special on Youtube. It also got a trem bar. I'll install one too I guess. The humbuckers, made by Edd, arrived this week.

Regards
Stefaan

[dubtrub]

Those are a couple of nice projects. Great job!

[BRRanger]

Beautiful! I agree, I'd go with a clear coat on the Brass Rail project, it looks great with that grain. I'd refin the Celebrity in the original color, I have one in Ink Blue and love the color. I remember that lefty conversion on ebay as I recall. Too much work for me but you seem to have resurrected the guitar...congratulations.
Scott

[Sarah93003]

Nicely done Stefaan. You've done some ambitious projects! The necks on the Celebrities are fairly "skinny". It looks like it's going to be a great guitar for you!