Two mini-guitars, now finished

Kalimna

Greetings again folks,
Having handed over the two guitars to my two boys (piccy below), I thought I'd post some comments about how the build went, and a few afterthoughts too.

To start with, the specs. Apart from body shape and fingerboard timber, the two guitars are identical.

Body - horse chestnut (easy to work, lightweight, a bit soft in the spalty parts)
Neck - plain maple, scarf neck, 22 1/4" scale
Fingerboard - purpleheart on 'jag', ebony on 'strat'
Body-to-neck - glued in with neck-width-taper tenon
Pickups - Oil City 'Triple Blues' vintage output, http://www.oilcitypickups.co.uk/stratvintage.html
Single tone/volume 250k log, with a 47nF tropical fish cap (i like the colour!)
Bridge - El Cheapo fixed Fender-style
Tuners - Wilkinson Ez-style
Finish - PolyX oil  on neck, rattle-can nitro on body

Sebastian and Isaac during a moment of relative quiet on Christmas Day  

https://i.imgur.com/2kawwtw.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/5gWQqxk.jpg

I will take some better photo's tonight and get them posted up.

So, thoughts. Things that went well :
 - They work. The tone is superb through either a valve amp or Blackstar TVP. Good range of tone/volume with pots used.
 - The finish turned out better than I'd hoped, but managed to ding a couple of times prior to 'handover'
 - Neck shape nice, sits very comfortably and not too thin
 - Upper neck access good, with minor shaping of the join
 - String action reasonable, a little fretbuzz but can't really hear it through the amp
 - The boys love them
 - Pleased with overall aesthetics

Things that didn't go too well : 
 - The finish wasn't nearly thick enough. Whilst it isn't easily visible on the photo, I got colour bleed through at the polishing stage. Plus I didn't cover the silver basecoat completely on the edge around the jack socket
 - The finish is quite delicate, perhaps due to not being thick enough or poor adhesion to the horse chestnut.
 - Truss rod adjustment *very* tight. I think due to over-clamped 'packing strip'
 - Scratchplate making is a pain without a template.
 - Whilst tracks have been covered, the pickups in the scratchplate didn't match the body, so holes needed extending. More work and stress rather than major problems.
 - I elected not to copper foil screen, I may go back and change that.
 - Whilst overall aesthetics I'm pleased with, still not entirely happy with lower bout of 'jag' 'plate.
 - Pickup switch on 'strat' *right* in the way of strumming hand, a relatively easy fix for a later date.

So there you have it, thanks for all the assistance along the way and for putting up with my rather wordy and long posts.

As usual, any and all comments welcome, particularly critique of design and/or conststruction.

Cheers,
Adam

paulnb57

Proper job Adam, the boys look pleased and thats what counts

Teyeplayer

Coolest gifts ever, well done that man! 

AlexC

Two very cool guitars and two very happy boys. Great job.

Kalimna

Thanks chaps

Guess the pressure is now on for next year!

Sarge

Two very cool kids and two very happy guitars  

OilCityPickups

Glad to see my pickups in their new homes :-)

earwighoney

Getting a guitar for Christmas is a present I would be really pleased with. 

Getting a Henry vacuum cleaner less so. 

Great work though @Kalimna ;

Kalimna

Thanks Ash - they sound great. Through the new 633 DriveKing, they sortof nail the tone on Cliffs of Dover. My playing? Considerably less so!
Earwig - believe it or not, the Henry was a request for my 'workshop'

prowla

What are the tunings?

I had a kids guitar for my kid and trying for E was just all flappy.

Kalimna

The first strings i tried were light 9's (E Ball pinks 9-42), and they were fairly flappy. But putting 10's (Rotosound 10-46) on seemed a really good balance between ease of fretting, tuning and flappyness.
So, standard tuning and heavier gauge. Still easy to fret with those.
Thinking of their fingers, i had bought some 8's, but cant imagine they'd be anything other than awful.

Adam

BigMonka

That first photo is one of the cutest pics I’ve seen in ages, brilliant! Love the straps with their names on there too.
Hope they love them and play them lots.