Lefty Explorer build
Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2017 1:58 pm
First pic and I'm nearly done.
Yes, it's a lefty.
The body was Adrian's last from the workshop, made from white korina. Light as a feather and beautifully resonant and as always with AshCustomWorks stuff, beautifully made.
the neck is a 5 piece I made from mahogany/kwila/purpleheart/kwila/mahogany with an Indian rosewood fingerboard. Sanko fretwire (the biggest I can find), paua shell inlays front and side.
There was a thread I started here about the 'luthier' who carried out the routing of the body. It was deleted and not reinstated despite it being 100% factual. Anyway, the guy did a very average job and was largely unprofessional about the whole thing. Basically he made a big booboo routing the explorer from the back, despite it intended to be top routed. He didn't look at any pictures apparently, just cracked out the router and made it up on the fly. Awesome. He situated the neck somewhat crudely (lots of gaps around the join) but the pickup routs are pretty sweet, as is the rear cavity (if you know what I mean).
So, the channels were 'routed' by me at home with a forstner bit for the wiring channels which works but isn't the preferred choice. Since I have no router but do have a drill though, it was the only option. The pickguard will cover all that stuff up anyway.
The finish is a wipe on 'rustic walnut' poly stain and then 3 coats of thinned wipe on poly on top. So a poly finish, but very thin.
The pickups: I've got a set of custom made humbuckers (a5/16k bridge, a3/8k neck, zebra coil). The pickups will be splittable via a push/pull on the first volume pot for some versatile explorer action.
Hardware: some old tarnished gold gotoh hardware from the mid-80s and am going for a 3 knob tone/vol/vol setup using black speed knobs.
Next step. Finish the finish, dress the frets, wire, setup, play.
Watch this space!
Yes, it's a lefty.
The body was Adrian's last from the workshop, made from white korina. Light as a feather and beautifully resonant and as always with AshCustomWorks stuff, beautifully made.
the neck is a 5 piece I made from mahogany/kwila/purpleheart/kwila/mahogany with an Indian rosewood fingerboard. Sanko fretwire (the biggest I can find), paua shell inlays front and side.
There was a thread I started here about the 'luthier' who carried out the routing of the body. It was deleted and not reinstated despite it being 100% factual. Anyway, the guy did a very average job and was largely unprofessional about the whole thing. Basically he made a big booboo routing the explorer from the back, despite it intended to be top routed. He didn't look at any pictures apparently, just cracked out the router and made it up on the fly. Awesome. He situated the neck somewhat crudely (lots of gaps around the join) but the pickup routs are pretty sweet, as is the rear cavity (if you know what I mean).
So, the channels were 'routed' by me at home with a forstner bit for the wiring channels which works but isn't the preferred choice. Since I have no router but do have a drill though, it was the only option. The pickguard will cover all that stuff up anyway.
The finish is a wipe on 'rustic walnut' poly stain and then 3 coats of thinned wipe on poly on top. So a poly finish, but very thin.
The pickups: I've got a set of custom made humbuckers (a5/16k bridge, a3/8k neck, zebra coil). The pickups will be splittable via a push/pull on the first volume pot for some versatile explorer action.
Hardware: some old tarnished gold gotoh hardware from the mid-80s and am going for a 3 knob tone/vol/vol setup using black speed knobs.
Next step. Finish the finish, dress the frets, wire, setup, play.
Watch this space!