Eastwood Sidejack Baritone & sitarized First Act Westerberg PW580

I got a First Act Westerberg signature guitar because its outline is brillant and it was very cheap, but to be honest the guitar was unplayable - neck too flat, terrible fretwork and very thin pickup. I had already change the pickup for a GFS P90, put an aluminium pickguard and a nut convertor to play slide but it was still accumulating dust, so I achieved its metamorphosis by putting a new neck and sitar saddles - the same I used for the Doppelcaster - and now I have a unique sitar guitar that I play regularly and hope will use on stage soon. It's still not perfect -  I have to adjust the alignment - but it works very well and  I will eventually upgrade the neck and the pickup again so it can be a reliable concert instrument...  

Next to it is the new Eastwood Sidejack Baritone guitar I got for my last birthday - I am very fond of my Danelectro Longhorn Baritone but its lipstick pickups have a narrow register, so I wanted to explore further the possibilities of baritones, and I'm not disappointed... I didn't like the white pickguard so I made a black one - first time I make one out of plastic, not as nice as metal but easier to do... Already used it for my last concert - photos and videos will come soon I hope.

 

 

more sketches

I've been working more on the last baritone model, curving the straight lines and now I'm getting really happy with it - the H drawing being the best one... I'm also quite sure with the pickup being in middle position - it's a Kent Armstrong double HB Motherbucker that I first thought I would put in neck position, though it's made for bridge... I've been also playing with the idea of having a piezo bridge - a tune-o-matic then because the other ones are only with trem - but a quick search shows that to have a serious one plus a pre-amp is roughly the price of the new Epiphone Nighthawk that I'd be happy to have too... Still I will check if the alu front can be used with a piezo for acoustic instruments - 10 times cheaper! 

more cardboard

more cardboard

more sketches

I'm very close to my baritone design now - but since last time I said this I created a alternative design with an upper horn, so now I have to choose between e & f...

Anyway, next month I can go back to the work-bench after months filled with performances and travels, and before a new performance series in autumn!

baritone project

Here it comes again, carried by a spring breeze, the recurent baritone project... This is what seems to be the proper design, but I said that before for other attempts... Anyway I let it macerate a couple of weeks, build a cardboard model and then we'll see!

Butcher Block Baritone Telecaster project

baritone project

So this is my new idea for the baritone - the cardboard model isn't very accurate but I had to adapt the shape to the block on mahogany I have to build it... the next one should be better.

more sketches

Yes I'm quite obsessionally drawing variations on the same idea again and again, because I feel that I'm about to reach the right design for my baritone, but it's not it yet... Very soon I guess! and then next week I will go back to the workbench.

more sketches for the baritone project

you probably noticed this long pause in the guitar making - hence the new series of sketches posts... I'm still working on a dance and music performance that will happen next week and then I can go back to the workbench - including a few days in Amsterdam to finish the crackle guitars.

anyway, that allows me to start to work again on the baritone project that is still in limbo... I want to decide the design and do the woodwork within the next two months, because where I work now I have access to pro tools and advice, so you can expect some concrete stuff soon!

more sketches for a baritone

Now that I almost finished my 7-string project, I have to admit that the long lower horn is a problem if I don't want to make it with a big open curve Mosrite style. I made a cardboard model of my baritone project without this horn and it doesn't work at all so I will drop the whole thing and make a completely different model - with no horn. Fortunatly I have many designs to choose from!

Baritone project sketches

Making my 7-string project, I realized that the long lower horn is a problem, and since I planed a similar one for the baritone project, I have to modify its design. And it looses its balance with a shorter horn so everything must reajust... First new sketches.

how they should look like...

a little bit of paint and alu foil and I have now a rough idea of how these guitars are going to look...

next step will be now to build the seven string (on the right) out of OSB.

you probably noticed that since the last post the 7-string has been reshaped, it's now more compact and closer to the original sketch ; still it's a quite special design, a good combination I think of ergonomic and aesthetic, with inputs from 'modern tradition' (Japanese style long lower horn, like the prodigious Tokai Humminbird reissued by Eastwood Guitars) and innovation.
the OSB model will show if this design is as comfortable as expected.

more cardboard

more cardboard guitars, on the left and down, the two models I've decided to build (with bridges and pickups), and on the right, two new models I intend to develop later: a 14 string (2 x 7) baritone with effects included (fuzz, trem, chorus) - my very own ultra deluxe model - and an experimental neckless guitar.

This one should be both cheap and easy to build as I just avoid to make a neck and can cut it out of a 100 x 30 planck. No idea if this is a complete dead-end (well it's upseting that it doesn't exist already and I can't imagine that nobody had the idea before) but the concept is to make it thin enough to keep it light, but that there is enough wood for good acoustic, to keep the work on the neck minimal (it will still be round - and it fits to my playing style since I studied first classical guitar and kept the thumb-behind technic since).
the only real difficullty is to fret the fingerboard (why don't they sell pre-fretted boards? - anyway I at least found some precut), then tuners, string-through-body bridge, one splitable humbercker, a push-pull knob, a jack-socket and that's it! I'll work on it when I'm finished with the first projects...