Alex Spears

Engineering the Guitar

28 April 2017

Construction of the Electric Guitar

1. Chose a body, neck, and fretboard

2. Sand the sides

a. Use the disk sander to sand off CNC marks

b. Use the a spindle sander to sand the inside corners

i. Changing the diameter can help get into tight corners

c. Use the belt sander to sand the outside corners

d. Once you have your sides relatively flat, hand sand the sides going up to a 220

grit

3. Add a radius

a. Once you have you sides sanded

use a router with a roundover bit to add a radius to the front and back of the

guitar, make sure to try and go opposite of the direction the blade spins.
 i. Test different sizes or bit on a scrap piece of wood so you can see what it

looks like and get a feel for using the router

4. Once you have you radius you can start to work on the body of the guitar

a. This is the point where you should modify your body and you neck

b. After you are done with modifications sand your body

5. At this point you should be almost 100% done working on you body

6. Next we will start attaching the fretboard to the neck

a. Start by using one of the long bock sanders to sand your neck as flat as possible

i. Use a flat table or straightedge to check periodically

b. After you neck is straight, sand the back of you fretboard very slightly

i. You don't have to do a lot, the fretboard is fairly flexible and should

conform to you neck, but this helps get out any bumps.

c. Sand the bottom of your neck and fit it into the slot in you neck

d. Now we need to position the fretboard

i. First position your bridge in the appropriate place, this should be marked

with 5 holes that correspond with 5 holes in the back of the bridge

ii. Place your fretboard on you neck and measure from the bottom you your

nut shot to the saddle of your bridge.

iii. The distance from the nut to the bridge should be 2x you fret length (fret

length is the distance from the nut to the 12th fret of the

iv. Once in position mark the top of the neck where the top of the fretboard is
e. Once done we need to drill our fret dot holes, using a drill bit the same diameter

as the fret dots use the drill press drill 1 hole in the center of the 3rd 5th, 7th, 9th,

15th, 17th, 19th, and 21st fret, also drill 2 holes equal distance from each other in

the center of the 12th fret

f. Now we can attach the fretboard to the neck,

i. Reposition your fretboard on your neck using the line you drew in step

6.d.iv and using a small drill bit on the drill press drill 2 holes through the

fretboard and into the bridge 1 should be drilled through your 12th fret and

the other in your nut slot

 ii. After put pins through the holes and double check that you are still lined

up with you line

iii. Once you have checked and you are sure you are lined up with your line

put a thin line of wood glue on the top of you neck on both sides of the

slot in the middle

iv. Put your fretboard on the neck and put the pins in

v. Using a piece of scrap wood, attack 3 or so clamps to the neck, pressing

the fretboard to the neck, double check to see that you are lined up with

you line and the sides of the neck.

vi. Using 2 more smaller pieces of scrap wood add 2 clams to the front and

back of the fretboard

vii. After everything is positioned and clamped, use you truss rod to clean out

any glue in the slot where it goes.

viii. Now wait 45 minutes for the glue to dry

7. Now we can begin adding the radius to our fretboard

a. Once you have removed the clamps you can sand the back of you neck.

i. Use a metal card scraper to take out any of the milling marks and make the

fretboard even with the neck

ii. Then use sandpaper to finish sanding up to 220 grit

b. No we can glue in and cut our fret dots

i. Using super glue and an accelerator, glue the fret dot stick into your first

hole, then cut as close to the fretboard as possible. Do this for all of you

fret dots.
c. Once you fret dots are all in and cut, grab a radius sander and some 60 or 80 grit

sandpaper

i. Using some spray adhesive, attach the sandpaper to the aluminum radius

sander

d. Sand the radius into the top of your fret board tell your fret dots are even with

your fretboard, rotate the fret board 180 degrees every 20-30 strokes to keep it as

even as possible.

e. After you are done with the 60 or 80 grit, do the same with 120, and 150, if you

really want you can go up to 220.

8. Once the fretboard radius is nice and sanded we need to attach the fret wire

a. Using the fret bending tool, curve a piece of fret wire

b. After using some metal shears, cut out a piece of wire slightly bigger then each of

your fret slots.

c. Use a thin hand saw to lightly sand the fret slots, then use a triangle file to add a

slight V shape to the top of the fret slot

d. Place your

neck into a cork lined saddle and using a hard rubber mallet, hammer your fret

wire into the slots, you can also use the press for this.
 e. Once in place, cut any excess wire of of the sides of your neck

f. Using a file, file down the sides of the fret wire tell they are even with the neck

g. Then using a small file file around the edges of the fret wire, removing any snags.

h. Once done use the 4 sided straight edge and a hammer and fret file to make sure

all your frets are even

i. Measure about 3 frets at a time and check each one 3 times

9. Now we can start pre-drilling you holes

a. Anywhere there is a screw that attaches a part to the guitar need to be check and

pre-drilled
 b. The 4 holes that attack the neck to the body need to be drilled from the body into

the neck

i. Make sure your neck and body are lined up and as flush as possible, use a

smaller bit to drill a hole through the body and into the neck, then remove

the neck and drill through the body again with a bit slightly bigger then the

screws.

10. After all the holes have been pre-drilled we can start on the electronics.

a. 4 holes need to be drilled before we can add the electronics

 i. Use a spade bit to drill a hole in the electronics pocket from the side of

the guitar

ii. Use the long drill bit the drill a hole between the electronics pockets, the

back pocket is slightly lower than the front so angle you bit slightly

downward.

iii. Drill a hole inch from the 5th bridge hole into the electronics pocket

iv. Drill a hole from the back pickup pocket to the electronics pocket,

measure to make sure you avoid any other screw holes.

b. Now that we have the 4 holes drilled we can solder the electronics together

i. Using a box with pre-set holes, place the electronics using the sheet

provided.

ii. Cut all of you wires to length and strip the ends.

iii. Slightly sand the back of the potentiometers

iv. Clean with acetone

v. Make sure when you are soldering you are heating the wire not the solder

vi. Apply even heat when doing multiple wires

vii. Pre apply solder to wires and the back of the potentiometers

c. Once everything is soldered together it is time to begin finishing\

11. Once you have finished everything else you can begin finishing, I did a tobacco sunburst

pattern on mine.

a. I started out by taping of my fretboard

b. Then i added a light brown stain to everything

 c. The I did one layer of clear coat

d. Then added the black around the edges

e. Then i did 2 more clearcoats

f. Between every application of clear coat the guitar needed to be sanded with 400

grit and light steel wool

g. Once the last clear coat went on and i sanded it slightly i waked the guitar and

oiled the fretboard.

12. After that is done, finnish adding you electronics

a. Line the inside of the electronics pocket with copper tape

b. Solder the pickups to the rest of the electronics

c. Use a piece of metal and a amplifier to test the pickups

13. After that is done, attack all of the hardware

14. After the hardware is added, attack the strings

a. Adjust the bridge saddle if necessary

15. Then all you need to do is tune the guitar, clip the excess string wire, and you have a fully

functional guitar.