Warmoth Jazzmaster body

[M29]

Hello,

Thought I would put up a Warmoth Jazzmaster swamp ash body that I am using in a build. I paid extra for one piece of wood and I am very happy with it. I was surprised at the finish, it is very smooth and consistant and will not take much to get it ready for paint. I slipped an extra Squier Strat neck I had setting around into the neck socket and it fit beautiful, nice and snug, although I will not be using this neck I thought I would give a try and check out the alignment of things. I am planning on using a Warmoth neck but that will take a while to get $$$ and I have to decide on a radius and all the other things that go along with that part of the guitar. I will be setting it up just like a Strat as far as controls and what not and will be in a SSH configuration.

Here is an image. The color is off from the camera it is a very light whitish color not the yellowish color in the picture.

M29

 

[marnold]

Boy, with grain that nice, I hope by "paint" you mean "stain." IMO, I'd want the wood to shine through, especially since you forked out the extra coin for a one-piece. It looks like it's routed for a vintage (aka Mexicaster) bridge. Is that correct?

 

[M29]

Hello marnold,

I am thinking about filling the grain with a dark filler and adding a medium rootbeer transparent shading around the edge. I am tring to decide if I want to make the body color darker like a honey with the rootbeer or keep the raw wood color with the rootbeer. I want to use a transparent rootbeer color so the grain don't get covered up on the edge, sometimes stain can darken the end grain and hide a lot of the nice grain. I really love the overall grain in this body and I thought early on that there might be too much grain pattern and look a to busy. A lot of it will be covered with a pickguard so it should look pretty good. They picked out a beaut for me though I think.

Yeah it is routed for a vintage trem. I just got a Willkinson trem that looks very nice.

For the life of me I cannot decide on a pickguard color to go with the finish I want to have. Probably white or black I guess, what do you guys think?

Thanks for the kind words marnold

M29

 

[Tim]

M29 - Keep the photos coming as you progress in the building of the guitar. It should be interesting to watch it become a sweet ax.

 

[Tinky-Winky]

Not only should the one piece body look good, but it should sound second to none. Wouldn't a tortoise shell pickguard look good with the brown centred colour theme?

 

[M29]

Hello,

I was playing around in photoshop with this.

Yeah I was thinking on a tortoise pickguard too. The image at Warmoth is shown with tortoise on a clear body with no tint or shading which looks pretty nice too.

http://www.warmoth.com/guitar/bodies/vintage.cfm?fuseaction=jmaster

M29

 

[SuperSwede]

looks good m29, but I´ll vote for lake placid blue

 

[Tinky-Winky]

I agree superswede, I think that the jazzmaster looks best in one solid colour, and lake placid blue is a classic jassmaster colour. But then again, I don't think many jazzmasters had one piece bodies...

 

[M29]

Hello All,

You know I think I may end up going with just a clear coat and no shading. The shading kind of breaks up the lines of the body but, the wood is so light in color I don't know if it would look that good, I may have to tint it just a little.

I went into this build to make this play or have the layout as close to a Strat as possible. I really like the Strat but I wanted something different and I always liked the Jazzmaster style. I figured someday I hope to get a nice Strat anyway so I thought I would build this with some versatility, which is why I went with the Humbucking. I never intended to copy a Jazzmaster or try to get that sound, I was after more of a Strat sound but would be happy with what ever it ends up sounding like, I am sure it will sound kind of... Fenderish once I am done.

This brings me to one issue I am trying to decide on and that is the switching of the Humbucking. Have you guys heard or have any bad experience with the new push button on the volume controls on the new Fat Strats which splits the coils on the Humbucking? I like the idea of (pushing) a button instead of (pulling up) on a button for this action. I am concerned about the reliability of this type button.

Also I want to add a jack to the bottom of the body sort of like the Squier '51's I want to keep the controls like a Strat so I need all the room up top for that. I like the football oval type jack plate but the square plate looks like it would be more durable. Any thoughts on this?

Thank you all for your time and help.

M29

 

[tremoloman]

OMG! That's very close to the Jazzmaster style hybrid I've been working on. I took a 25.5" scale Jagmaster body, an American Deluxe neck, and have a DiMarzio HB in the bridge with 2 Tele neck pickups for the middle and neck. It's going to look a little bizarre but that's just routine for me.

I wanted to order a custom body but opted to do the cheap route first to see if I like how it comes out.

Looks awesome! Keep the updates coming!

 

[oldguy]

No experience w/ the button switch, but would love to see this with a three color tobacco sunburst!
Glenn

 

[M29]

Hello Glenn,

Ya know I keep going back to a burst of some sort. I have painted custom Harley motorcycles and other custom paint jobs and it just feels right to put some sort of custom paint on this. I do want to fill the grain and accent it no matter what I go with in the end and that will keep me busy for a while. I do need to finish sand the body although it is very very nice as it came from Warmoth and I will get it sealed and maybe by then I will know what I want to do with the finish.

I was at Guitar Center to day and picked up a Lynyrd Skynyrd instructional DVD by Greg Koch which is excellent, I think Greg is a great teacher I have a couple DVD's of his now. But looking at (some not all) of the new Gibson Les Pauls I was very disappointed in some of the finishes. Even (some not all) of the SG's had orange peel, waves and dull gloss in their finishes. It just strikes me odd because I remember back in the late sixties and early seventies the finishes were not like that they were very good.

Well I am somewhat stalled at this point while I decide what type of finish I want but I am collecting parts and starting to polish out my Squier Strat that I have left to dry for about a month now. http://www.qix.net/~lmjbo/ssmod1.jpg

Once I get it polished out and get the steel trem block finished I can start putting it back together.

Thanks for the visit Glenn.

M29

 

[tremoloman]

Go with shell pink! Now that would look sharp! Take it from me!

 

[M29]

Hello tremoloman,

Yeah shell pink is cool! I have been polishing out my surf green Squier Strat and really like the pastel look.

Keep on strumin!

M29