Custom Walnut/Alder Fender Jazzmaster Body

 

Goal : Construct Fender Jazzmaster body with an alder core and walnut top

Specifications/Research :

    With a nice board of American walnut I picked up over the summer, the only thing left to do was decide what to do with it. First, I considered making an all-walnut solid-body guitar. Due to my walnut's hefty density (and price tag), I soon decided to split the wood into two guitar tops(clear/translucent finish!). After securing a clean DXF of a Fender Jazzmaster, I set off to work.

Progress log : 

• 7-22-23: For the core of this guitar, I bought a board of alder. I cut the one board into four parts; then joined and laminated them together.
• 7-24-23: Once dry, the alder blank was run through a planer and the walnut top halves were also joined and planed. The two were then laminated together.
• 7-28-23: While my first top lamination was mostly successful, I did have to go back and use epoxy to fill a small gap between the walnut top halves. Using the DXF, I laser-cut an outline template for the body. Using this template, I was able to rough cut the shape on a bandsaw and finalize it with a flush-cut router bit. 
  

  
  
  
  
• 7-31-23: After making a second template for the control cavity, I started by routing it about 3/4" deep. Using a rounded bit, I added a uniform fillet to the top and bottom of the body. By this point, my research in jazzmaster hardware led me to the conclusion that a two-piece tune-o-matic was a better solution. Not only was a greater selection of higher quality bridges more abundantly available, but I didn't really mind the idea of the guitar starting without a tremolo because I could always give it a Bigsby or Duesenberg later. 
  
  
  
  
• 8-2-23: After drawing the carves freehand, I used a Japanese saw, chisels, and a rasp for the belly carve and a belt-sander for the arm carve. Next, I used the router to carve the neck pocket and take the electronics cavities to their final depths. Finally, I started the arduous sanding process.
  
  
  
• 8-9-23: Once the sanding was finally finished, I applied a coat of grain filler. While initially happy with the results, I started to realize the sealers coverage was substandard. This was definitely my fault because the product cured via UV rays and I had unwittingly left the bottle too near a window for a couple days before using it. Up to this point, I had wanted to seal the grain and simply use a 2K clear coat. However, with the sealer's failure, I decided to simply sand it back and apply a tung oil finish.
  
  
  
• 8-16-23: A couple days of sanding later and the body was ready for its first coat of oil. During the oiling process, I also developed a custom electronics scheme and a custom pickguard to match. For the pickups, I used a set of Slick P-90's each running into a volume and tone (Gibson style). For the tone circuitry, I used 1M ohm slide pots and a simple three-way switch. I used the dimensions of my electronics along with the DXF to make a custom pickguard, which I was able to just laser cut once I had the file set up. Initially, I used an older version of my custom pickguard to wire the electronics up. I made some basic EMI shielding with super glue and aluminum foil (I wasn't going to be wasting the nice copper stuff until the pickguard was 100%) and wired it up.
  
  
  
  
• 8-18-23-->9-5-23: Over the next couple of weeks, I applied more coats of oil (around 5-7 in total). Were I to do it again, I certainly would have heeded advice to thin the oil with something like mineral spirits for the FIRST coats. Also, I would have made more sure the previous coats were cured before continuing because I was not wary of the fact the tung oil can take up to 1 WEEK to fully cure. All that being said, I am still fairly happy with the strength and overall look of my finish. 
  

  

  

  
  
  
• 9-15-23: When test fitting the neck and bridge (Squier strat neck/GFS brass bridge), I realized an angled shim would be necessary for a proper setup; apparently not uncommon for jazzmasters. To properly drill the bridge posts, I created a template in CAD that would line up with the scale and center lines in my guitar DXF. Even so, my hasty use of a hand drill caused the holes to drift and become misplaced. I filled my erroneous holes with dowels and tried again, but with the same results. I filled the holes a third and final time and changed strategies. This time, I attached the neck and used yarn to simulate the placement of the high and low e strings. I simply made sure the holes were over my scale line and the "strings" were centered on the neck; then used the bridge to guide my drill bit to the holes' centers. This worked but I certainly could have avoided implanting extra blonde dowels in my beautiful top if I had simply started with the string method and used properly sized center-punches to correctly mark the post locations from the start. Posts placed and shims in hand, I finally got it strung up and playing for the first time!
  
  
  
• 9-25-23: While playing pretty well, the guitar came apart for a final assembly. The final version of my custom pickguard was assembled and installed. I ended up taking one of the shims out of the neck pocket because the bridge pickup was previously unable to reach the correct height. After putting it together and setting the action/intonation, I was finally ready to play! I am extremely happy with how the guitar ended up looking, feeling, and sounding!
  

  

Conclusions:

All said and done, building this guitar body was a really fun way for me to converge two of my great passions: music and making stuff! It was, in a way, quite cathartic to invest myself into various woodworking methods and machines after a year of mostly circuits theory; and I know so much more than I did before this summer if I ever wanted to do it again!