The Maslowcaster, a custom electric guitar

Hi folks,

it’s been a while… I’ve been thinking about this project for quite some time now but I wasn’t sure whether I should go ahead with it or not.
A couple of days ago I finished the CAD drawings and decided to pull the trigger - hereby I give you:

The Maslowcaster, a custom electric guitar made on the Maslow CNC!

The first piece I cut today looks kinda sorta promising:

Be aware that this is still highly experimental. I am NOT a luthier and this whole thing might end up having the tonal qualities of a wet rag. Still, I’d like to find out how far my false bravado will get me (as always).

Stay tuned, this one might be interesting…

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Nice. Whats your sled made out of?

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That’s marine-grade plywood with a phenolic film on top and bottom. You often see it used on trailers for example.

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Cool, thats what it reminded me of but wasn’t sure.

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Cool project. Flood us with pictures and progress. :slight_smile:

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Thanks, I’ll be glad to :slight_smile:

So this is part number two: the bottom half of the body. It’s mirrored so that I can do a stepped-down cutout for the electronics compartment. (Not finished yet but the cover plate is meant to sit flush with the body.)

Initially I thought about doing the whole body in one piece, index it and flip it over but this seemed to be the more reasonable way to do it.
For this second piece I also slowed down the feedrate to 600 mm/min. Acacia seems to be a bit tougher than the plywood I’m used to… broke two router bits on part #1, none on the second (yet)

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Have you glued up the panel? Processed it? Let’s see some of that if we could :wink:! I’m about to attempt a glue up process and would appreciate your expertise!

To be honest - I cut that corner, I’m sorry! :wink:
This is a tabletop ‘blank’ if you will. They sell it at the local hardware store.
It was the closest I could get to actual tonewood without spending hundreds of bucks on a slab of korima or mahogany.

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No judgement here. As I said, I’m ABOUT to! Up until now I’ve always purchased pre glued up panels! Good for you!

This is where the lid of the electronics compartment will go:

As soon as the two panels are joined together I’ll use a hand router to deepen the pocket further.

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Are you doing a top mount hard tail bridge or using your palm router for a tremolo cutout?

Neither! :grin:
Yesterday marked the arrival of a Bigsby:

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Nice!

I’m working on files for a lefty hardtail strat. Hoping to start cutting next week.

Are you making your own neck too?

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Oooh, that sounds like something I’ll need to follow!

My plan is to rough out the shape of the neck on the Maslow and then round it by hand.
Either that or use the Maslow to cut out a router template. As the acacia is really tough to work with, this might be a more effective solution.

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Gluing together the top and bottom panel:

You’ll notice that I’m not using the piece I cut on the Maslow. I had to learn that the thickness of the wood threw off the calibration of my machine… both the neck pocket as well as the cutouts for the pickups were noticeably wider than what I had in my CAD files.
I’ll use a flush cutting bit to trim the edge.

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Aaand done:

Messy work but I’m quite happy with the result.
Time to start working on the neck…

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By the way - this build already led to the creation of two short videos as there is more tooling required than just the Maslow.
For your viewing pleasure I present:

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