My first build: A big rustic 'Telemaster'

vaticancameos

Hello! So for ages, I've really wanted a Telemaster ever since I saw Kozo Kusumoto (from the band LITE - who are AWESOME, if you havent heard them) playing one, when I saw them at ArcTanGent a couple of years ago. I searched for ages for a company that makes them, in the end I thought - 'screw this, im gonna make one!'

My plans were as follows - 

• Alder body, preferably with some nice grain
• Dark almost walnut/oak-y stain, without grain filler, so it still feels nice and natural and organic
• Black pickguard
• Maple neck, with a rosewood board
• Nice tuners and hardware
• Eventually some super slick Oil City pickups

So, I had a friendly chap on ebay who usually makes tele/strat bodies, machine me one out of 2 pieces of Red Alder, and it just so happens it had awesome grain!

Here it is - 

I planned to have a really sort of rustic and antique-looking dark stain going on, reminiscent of a big old antique cupboard or wooden door or something, a piece with real character.

I bought a few bits and pieces from eBay (more sandpaper than I'll ever use, some dye, some stain, some Tru Oil, that kind of stuff) and then when it all arrived, I got going! (by the way, this light oak stain pictured below is TERRIBLE, never use it! but the yellow stuff, it was amazing and went on really easily and I only needed one coat over the oak stuff to make it look really nice!)

I spent hours watching youtube videos of people staining wood, guitars, doors, you name it. I read through a BUNCH of threads here, on TDPRI, loads of guitar forums, and once I was confident enough to start, I did!

Anyway, here's the guitar after a pretty liberal coating of the light oak stuff - 

Looked pretty nice, can't really comlain, except the dye was really thin, so the end grains absorbed an absolutely ridiculous amount (maybe I was putting it on too thick?) and it kinda went really blotchy, but I thought 'hey! I can fix that with some elbow grease and sandpaper and clever oiling later on!

vaticancameos

After that had dried, I sanded it back, from 600ish up to 1000, just so it was as smooth as possible (probably a bit over the top, but nevermind) and then hit it with some yellow!

This kind of darkened it up and got it to the stage I wanted it to be at previously, which was awesome! Just one coat of this stuff, let it dry for a few days, did a tiny bit of sanding, then started throwing on some tru oil!

This was the body after maybe 2 or 3 coats, nice and smooth, has a nice depth to the finish, but still has that wooden feel to it, kind of like a nice arm-rest on an antique chair!

I didn't take any photos of the back at this point, but heres one after maybe 5 or 6 coats (I got far too excited and put the bloody ferrules in before I finished, now I cant get them out and theyre making it difficult to sand, but hey, you live and learn)

Anyway, that's where I'm at at the moment. I've got a neck on order from a friend of the chap who made me the body, glossy maple with a nicely figured rosewood board, tele shaped headstock. I've also got the hardware, Wilkinson brass saddle bridge, a control plate I wired up myself, with some nice old braided wire, jack-plate, sockets etc etc.

So far I'm REALLY pleased with how it's turning out, I genuinely cant wait to finish it so I can play it!

I'll try and keep this updated as I progress!

jd0272

Use a soldering iron to pull the ferrules out.

Lookin good this far dude. Got one 'on the go' myself. Aged LPB is the plan.

usedtobe

Very nice.

mart

Yep, very nice indeed!

EricTheWeary

Looking good

vaticancameos

@jd0272 good tip! I'll give that a try, would be nice to be able to level and sand over all of it instead of around them!

thanks everyone! 

vaticancameos

The neck has arrived! 

Also I have finished the oiling process as well, the finish looks so good!

Yesterday I drilled the neck, bridge, strap pins and jack plate holes and mounted all of those.

I'll be posting some pics as soon as I'm home from work! 

Deijavoo

Who is the guy making the neck for you?

Skodadad

Will strings fit in reverse to pull ferrules out? Looks wicked well done

vaticancameos

Skodadad said:

Will strings fit in reverse to pull ferrules out? Looks wicked well done

@skodadad that's actually what I ended up doing when I couldnt get the soldering iron trick to work! 

Deijavoo said:

Who is the guy making the neck for you?

A friend of the guy who made the body! I dont think he has a company or anything, but he has a shop on eBay!

Deijavoo

You got a link mate? I'm maybe on the ratch so to speak.

vaticancameos

Update time!

I got the neck, it's pretty nice! Not amazing, but it barely cost me £80 so I'm really not complaining.

I've sanded/wire wool'd it until its at a nice satin-y finish. I also levelled the frets and gave the fretboard a condition.

Here's a few photos of the neck (pre satin-isation)

Here's a compilation photo of some of the work ive done to it over the last week, including fitting the strap pins, cleaning up and installing the bridge, installing a somewhat bulky-yet-solid input jack and fitting the Gotoh tuners. I also installed some copper shielding, but have since removed it as I didnt do a neat enough job.

I drilled the neck, made a sort of ghetto-jig to use on my friends really old drill press, the holes in the body are too tight as the screws do not pass through them they bite quite hard, so I'm going to drill those out when I get access to said drill-press again.

And finally, got some pickups. A Seymour Duncan lil' 59 for the bridge and an as of yet un-fitted Axes 'R' Us 'Heavy Heart' for the neck.

vaticancameos

So I drilled out the holes in the body for the neck, which made it a lot easier to align which was super handy. Got all the relevant screwholes drilled out, and now I have this!

You can see in the above photo that the finish is actually lighter than it looks in the previous posts, these photos are taken in a friends garage where the lighting is really nice. Im super proud of the finish!

I think because the neck is slightly too thick for the pocket thats been routed on the body, the bridge saddles have had to be adjusted REALLY high, to even get the action playable. There's still a lot of buzz around some frets, which I'm thinking may need a final levelling perhaps. It also desperately needs some string trees to increase the tension behind the nut.

Almost there!

Andyjr1515

vaticancameos said:

So I drilled out the holes in the body for the neck, which made it a lot easier to align which was super handy. Got all the relevant screwholes drilled out, and now I have this!

You can see in the above photo that the finish is actually lighter than it looks in the previous posts, these photos are taken in a friends garage where the lighting is really nice. Im super proud of the finish!

I think because the neck is slightly too thick for the pocket thats been routed on the body, the bridge saddles have had to be adjusted REALLY high, to even get the action playable. There's still a lot of buzz around some frets, which I'm thinking may need a final levelling perhaps. It also desperately needs some string trees to increase the tension behind the nut.

Almost there!

Looks really, really good, @vaticancameos  Not sure why I've missed the earlier posts!

If you pop a thin shim (something like the thickness of a credit card or probably even thinner) under the neck at the headstock side of the neck pocket, it will angle the neck slightly upwards and allow you to drop the saddles  

vaticancameos

Thanks @Andyjr1515 !

I was thinking of shimming the neck, but I decided against it, as it is totally playable as it is, just the saddles are as high as they can go!

Finally going to be able to test the wiring tonight, then fit the string-trees and the decal!

step_hent

Looks fantastic - lovely job on the finish! Can I ask where you got the pickguard? I'm building a telemaster too and haven't yet found a source for one.

vaticancameos

@step_hent I actually cut it myself from some old b/w/b stuff I had laying around, I can make a template for you if you like so you can get one made?

Skodadad

Very classy, well done!

step_hent

@vaticancameos that would be spectacular! Thank you!

Deadman

Sweet looking thing. Well done.