Prairie Custom Guitars

Another one on the go

While I was at my local woodstore,I noticed they had basswood

cutoffs on sale.I rooted through the pile and found one 40"

long and 8" wide,big enough to make a body blank.

I have never worked with basswood so I picked it up.

I found while planing it down,that one end had a twist in it.

I could not plane it out so I had to rip it down the center

and make a 3 piece blank.Not a big deal.Some Fenders are

up to 5 pieces.I did find however,basswood is nice to work with

but really plain,kind of ugly wood.You see why they paint it.

I have a bunch of maple sets here so I decided to plane it down even 

more and cap it front and back. Here is the result

Front

Back

 \

I found a critter home after I routed it.I cleaned it all out

and filled it.This will definitely need some type of dark

finish to cover so I am thinking a sunburst

It is all nice and smooth now,waiting for some sealer

Need to decide on the routing

A quick wipe to remove the dust shows the figure on the top 

This should make a beautiful burst

Just need to decide what color

Before I go any further I want to get some sanding sealer on this

 I managed to get the control cavity,bridge pickup route

String ferrule holes,neck pocket and output jack done tonight

I also did the amber stain for the center of the burst

I decided I am going to go with kind of a traditional burst

 This has a more golden color to it than the last one I did

I may try some browns on this one

After this is dry I will lay down a coat of clear just as a 

buffer.If I don't like the next step I can sand it off

and not hurt the middle color

 OK

To say I am unhappy with the dye job is an understatement 

It did not dry very even so........

Lets start over

I will leave the edges because they will get covered anyway

Now I will do it they way I normally do

Dampen down the maple to raise the grain

Sand it back with 320 grit,do it again

Now we will use tinted lacquer

Much better result

If I use the flash,you can see how the figuring looks

Next step,the edges,hmmm,brown or black

I decided not to use as much red in this burst and use more brown

Here are the results

The shop foreman,Alice

Was keeping a close eye on me

Don't worry,Alice is not allowed in the shop when I am spraying

 Here is a pic with the flash to show the figuring in the maple

You may notice this is no longer in the webstore

I have become my worst enemy

As good as this looked in the pictures I just was not happy

with it.Being maple I did not figure I would need to fill or

level the grain

WRONG

I guess I am just to picky,but it was not smooth enough

 It probably would have smoothed out with the lacquer but

still,lets do it right,right?

Here is how it looked close up

And I seem to have a mystery scratch

Again,probably would have leveled with lacquer but....

So what was once this

Is now this

I did not take the edges down to bare wood.I just sanded them

until they were super smooth.It will get a new

burst and will look better than ever,hopefully