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Elias Graves

Elias Graves

Common misfit
It's underway. As with the last one, I'm in no hurry and will probably be a while in doing it, but here goes.

This one will have a three piece laminated neck; maple and (what else?) walnut.

The blanks I have selected to create the neck are these:

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The middle piece appears to be a quarter sawn silver/soft/big leaf maple of some sort. Right now it's 7/8" thick but will be 3/4" when I glue.
The others will be 1 3/8" wide each to fill out the blank.


I have been reading about bois d'arc (Maclura Pomifera, Osage Orange, hedge apple, horse apple, etc.) as a fretboard material. I can harvest one big enough to make some fingerboard blanks locally. Check it out.
But I'd have to cut the tree, saw the boards and dry them myself. A thin 1/2" fretboard piece will dry in a year.
That might be neat. I'd have 100% USA grown wood and a fretboard I milled myself. :grin:

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As for the plan, it's still kinda hazy. My front runner ideas are:
Dano inspired.

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And TeLEScaster inspired.
Or is that Les Tele?
Paul O Caster?
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Beyond that, I'm not sure yet.
It needs to be a good slide guitar and suited for finger picking and I'm trying to keep the budget as small as possible.

At present, I'm open to ideas. Feel free to tell me what to do and make me feel cheap and used.
 
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Similar to my old walnut tele, this guitar will have a nice bookmatch top. I found this piece that has some nice figuring under the knot. I'll cut the knot off and have a similar effect as on the tele.

The new board.

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The walnut tele.
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jelloman said:
Dano-Tele...think about it...
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I like the cut of your jib, sailor.
Thinking I might do a frame/back/top construction like a Dano, but use walnut instead of Masonite and use a tele bridge and control.
But I really dig the look of that Dano offset box thing.
Oh, and I'm thinking doing a top loading Esquire. Maybe a Duncan Broadcaster bridge pickup.


I found a real nice USA tele bridge that doesn't break the bank, too. From the same place I got the nickel P90 cover.


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This is some tight figuring on here that's beginning to show itself. It'll be subtle.
Man, the planer choked on that knot, didn't it? I'm glad I wasn't there when that happened. :eek:

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This info on the Osage Orange is cool.
Official name Maclura Pomifera.

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The fruit. The size of a grapefruit and hard as a hockey puck. Deadly weapons in the hands of rambunctious teenage boys. :embarrassed:
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The range is quite limited, as you can see. This isn't entirely accurate, as the trees I have access to are in the center of the northwest quadrant. Quite some ways off this map. In fact, they're quite common throughout the entire state.
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Interesting note on uses and hardness from Wikipedia.
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Two and a half times harder than oak. :eek:
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No mesquite fingerboard?

Edit: We have osage orange trees here in Michigan. I didn't know what they were called, but there is one right along the road about 3 miles down from my house, out in the country.

The local produce store, Horrocks, also sells the fruit around fall time as a 'spider repellent'.
 
Jbird said:
No mesquite fingerboard?

Edit: We have osage orange trees here in Michigan. I didn't know what they were called, but there is one right along the road about 3 miles down from my house, out in the country.
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Yep. My dad used to use them all the time to build outdoor structures at the family garden center. I don't think they're native, though. They were a popular hedge plant for edging fields and pastures, since they could be prodded to grow impenetrably thick, enough so to keep livestock in (or out),so i think we brought them in.
 
2112 said:
Giant Ground Sloth food! Be sure you don't deprive any ground sloths of their food before you harvest that tree! The wood should make a nice fretboard though.
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In a novel by Gene Wolfe ("Knight", not K'niggits) an early teens boy cutting an Osage branch sets the whole story in motion. Elias, if you do cut the tree down, plant at least 3 seeds.
 
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