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Bailey custom one string bass-3/7- making the neck-2

by Caz | Mar 17, 2011 | !Bailey Guitars, Bass guitars, Custom, Custom guitars

…Work continues on the one string wonder…

: Individual string saddle with piezo pickup, acoustic preamp, and midi circuit

: The neck is now ready for inlays and frets

: Carving the neck

: Checking the shape with a 12″ radius gauge

: Perfecting the shape with a 12″ radius block

: Planing a rough radius onto the fretboard

The neck is almost finished after completing the headstock, radiusing the board and carving the neck- It feels great and its a lot of fun to make. I’m starting to really like this.

Although there is only one string right down the middle, the tuner is not located centrally to the neck as you might expect. To work out the position it is offset by half the width of the tuner post plus half the thickness off the string. This way the string will go straight through the nut to the tuner. This is sometimes called ‘straight string pull’

I drilled the tuner hole and checked that it fits ok. At this point all I have left to do is put the inlays and frets in and make and fit the nut. Then I can put a string on it and check how it reacts. I have not put a truss rod in this neck as there will be a lot less tension than the usual four, five, or six stringers. It is a very high quality piece of quartersawn maple and very stiff so i’m not worried but I’ll test it out anyway…Part 4

Custom Bailey for Skerryvore…Design Session

by Caz | Mar 16, 2011 | !Bailey Guitars, Artists, Custom guitars, Electric guitars

…Choosing the wood and making the blanks…

Alec is the front man (guitars and voice) for West coast band Skerryvore. He visited at the weekend to finalise the drawing and spec for his new Bailey Custom. He drew his own headstock shape it will be a unique one off custom and requested that the guitar have a ‘sustainer unit’ built in and probably EMG pickups (still to confirm).

After seeing Steve’s guitar made on our build your own guitar course, he has decided to have it sprayed with the same red wine burst so it will be a stunner.

Alec brought his favourite old guitar for me to copy the neck, so I took all the dimensions.

While he was here I got out the wood I had selected for him to check over. It will have a maple neck with a birds eye fretboard. The body is ash with a 4mm highly flamed maple ‘drop top’ cap. This means that the ‘elbow carve’ is cut into the ash body blank before the cap is bent and glued on top.

I took him back to the train station with some homework. He is going to work on an inlay design for the 12th fret and decide for sure which pickups he wants.

When I got back from dropping him off I got started straight away gluing up the body blank. I also made the fretboard, roughed out the neck, and glued the fretboard on before calling it a day. Next job is to put the truss rod in.

Custom Bailey for Skerryvore-truss rod

by Caz | Mar 16, 2011 | !Bailey Guitars, Artists, Custom guitars, Electric guitars

…Installing the truss rod…

I was asked recently how I install the truss rod. There are many types of rod design each suiting a different style of guitar. The method outlined below is for necks with ‘parallel’ headstocks only.

This is not the easiest type of rod to install. It fits into a curved slot in the back of the neck with a fillet of wood glued over it called the ‘Skunk stripe’- I chose a prize piece of snakewood which will look great when the neck has been carved and polished.

I designed a ‘truss rod slot’ jig for doing this which we always use for this type of neck (parallel headstock). We use the same method on the ‘build your own’ course- You can see it in action on our DVD.

There are easier ways to do this, but my method enables me to install a rod into a pre-shaped neck rather than needing a large ‘square’ piece of wood necessary to route it with an edge guide, which is more wasteful. Also If the truss rod should ever need to be removed I can just re-jig it and route out the fillet.

The method detailed below is not for the faint hearted- it relies on drilling holes which align perfectly with the curve of the slot, or the truss rod may not work. To make it easier you can make a drill guide to hold the drill at the correct angle, or get a friend to help ‘spot’ if you are drilling straight.

: Router, hammer, clamps, drills, truss rod jig. The neck is at the front with 2x10mm pins on top of it

: Materials for making the truss rod: A truss rod nut, 5mm round bar, and 8mm square bar

: 2x10mm location pins are used to fix the neck into the jig

: The truss rod jig is used to as a guide for the router to make the slot in the back of the neck

: The neck sits between two rails to help keep it in place

: The depth is carefully marked so the nut comes out above the surface of the headstock, but not too close to the top of the fretboard

: The location pins are tapped into place- the hole in the heel is drilled solely for this purpose. Another pin fits into the hole for the g-tuner

: The assembly is clamped ready for routing the truss rod slot

: The fretboard was already radiused so I used a block under the headstock to hold it flat

: The router copies the shape into the back of the neck

: You can see the curve in the jig -this is also copied into the neck

: Routing in progress- an extractor takes away the dust and chips

: The neck is removed to reveal the truss rod slot

: The headstock is routed to the correct thickness leaving a ‘step’ which is easy to drill into

: Holes must be drilled for the truss rod nut and the 5mm bar

: Drill and auger bits- 3/8″ for the nut and a 5mm for the round bar

: First a 3/8″ hole must be drilled for the truss rod nut- here I am marking the depth

: Then a 5mm hole is made to meet up with the truss rod slot

: A hole cutter is used to make the curve from the top of the headstock to the top of the fretboard

: I put the large drill back in just to show the angle needed to join up with the curved slot

: A short length of the 8mm bar is threaded onto end of the rod. The rod just pokes through and is then centrepunched to prevent it ever coimng loose

: A straw is placed over the rod to prevent any glue getting on it

: The other end of the rod is threaded so the nut can be adjusted

: A fillet of wood is glued over the rod and held in place with spring clamps

Bailey custom one string bass-2/7- making the neck-1

by Caz | Mar 14, 2011 | !Bailey Guitars, Bass guitars, Custom, Custom guitars

…Do not adjust your set…

Finally managed to slot this one in to the schedule. You may remember the design day when Andy visited to work out the spec….

The neck is now ready for fretting, inlays and carving, the body blank has been thicknessed so it is ready to work on.

There will be no magnetic pickup on this instrument – just a piezo built into the (one!) individual saddle/bridge which will sound like an acoustic bass and also have midi capability. The parts have all been ordered and should be with us in the next few days. I will post some pics when they arrive.

I thought this was going to be a really quick and easy build, obviously it is compared to some, but it has still had me scratching my head a few times, mainly with elements of the design.

How wide and thick is a one string bass neck? Will it need a truss rod? Are my eyes going funny?

Only one way to find out…watch this space…Part 3

The Original Superglue Corp Feature Bailey Guitars

by Caz | Feb 16, 2011 | !Bailey Guitars, News and Events, Repairs

The American President, a National Medal of Technology and Innovation winner, two legendary guitar players and Bailey Guitars, are stuck together with superglue….(and the Pope…)

Using superglue to repair a split in the end of the neck

It’s not often I can stick all that stuff into the conversation but here goes…..

The original superglue corp have featured one of my blogs to show how versatile their product is. Even more amazing they have also stuck it in their newsletter, right below another article about how the inventor of superglue was awarded a National Medal of Technology and Innovation for it, by no less than Obama the almighty.

The guitar I was working on is owned by Martin Taylor and had been signed by Chet Atkins.

I guess you are wondering where the Pope comes in….I just stuck him in for a laugh……well when I was a lot younger I once visited the Vatican and did have an idea to superglue myself to him ‘in protest’- They have so much gold and there is so much poverty in the world it really shocked me. Thankfully I never did it, and just carry it round with me as a funny image in my head, or I might be still stuck in jail…..or to the Pope – he died so it’s just as well- the last thing anyone wants is a dead Pope stuck to them. That would be taking ‘male bonding’ to disturbing levels.

Apologies if you were expecting a serious post about superglue – more sensibly:

Obviously we don’t use it for major structural jobs, but it has such a multitude of uses around the workshop I would be stuck without it.

I have now exhausted my weak supply of glue puns and will expect some better ones in the comments – just be sure to adhere to the rules….

Bailey Guitars on Second Life

by Caz | Feb 7, 2011 | !Bailey Guitars, News and Events

….is it me or is life getting weirder?

While you are saving for a real one why not get a virtual Bailey?. Great idea -I have to confess that I don’t understand most of this but a friend of ours has created an animated Bailey guitar on ‘second life’. This is him playing it in his band – he’s the one with the ‘lectrik blue’ guitar…..weird…. I should mention that he has already made several REAL guitars here at ‘Bailey world’ on our build your own course – but I think it has been harder and taken longer to make a virtual one! Thanks John….see below for details of how to get yours!

QUOTE

Hi gang
I enclose a picture of the wee shop I run on Second Life which is called “Metal’s Guitars”. It’s in a place called Wajo Hill on the south coast of the Jeogeot continent – Clicking on that SLURL will bring up a map and you can teleport you there if you’re in the game. (if not you are prompted to signup)

You’ll notice 4 boxes on the floor of my shop… well these are the guitars I make on here. I call them “Eagle” on here and I retail them on SL for L$500.. L$ is Second Life speak for “Linden Dollars” which is the game currency on here… Roughly L$400 equals £1 so basically my guitars retail for £1.25. Bargain eh… lol

I make 4 colours so far with a flame maple cap:
Lektrik Blue, Motor Red, Slash Black, Rock n Rolled Gold

In the video, I’m wearing an Eagle with a custom texture I call “Mad Blue”.

Each colour comes with 3 versions…
Chrome hardware no trem, Chrome hardware with trem, Black hardware with trem

Each of the boxes contains 1 of each version, which means L$500 gets 3 guitars, not just 1, in a particular colour.

For L$100 I can change the texture on the guitar body (ie replace the flame maple with a picture of their choice) if they supply the texture, although I will recolour the existing flame maple texture to any other colour for nothing.

Bit of SL speak now, each guitar is…
Full Prim…. Prim count is between 163 and 175 depending on the version,
Non animated, Non scripted, Non particle emitting, No music, Unmodifiable, Untransferable, Copyable

I hope to offer in the future a scripted resizing and colour changing option.
OK I hope to catch you guys soon….Oh by the way, my Second Life name is “Metal Bookmite”:

Custom Bailey for Skerryvore…

by Caz | Jan 20, 2011 | !Bailey Guitars, Artists, Custom guitars

…..Skerryvore frontman Alec will soon be playing a custom Bailey!

We are delighted to announce that Alec, the frontman for Skerryvore, has decided on a custom Bailey guitar for his next new instrument.

We first heard about them last year and they have cropped up several times since – everybody saying how brilliant it was when Skerryvore played a venue. Comments we heard ranged from “It was wild!” to “Everyone went mental!”.

It’s great to know that another one of our guitars will be going across the globe, entertaining thousands of music lovers.

You will be able to follow Alec’s custom build right here on the Bailey blog as it happens – starting right from our first meeting, to the finished guitar being played, wherever that might be.

Check out the band bio – Alec is the one in the middle.

Hear them play and download a PDF of their Winter 2010 Tour schedule poster which mentions us at the bottom..