Not every week is going to be a good one, and this one certainly didn’t have much guitar building in it unfortunately, as I battled to get finished some contract work that’s grown in scope unexpectedly (and undesirably). Still, the point of these notes is to share the bad with the good. So what did I manage to fit in?

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The Recovery Offset guitar build hasn’t moved: it needs a week for the oil to cure anyway, so that’s expected at this point. I did a check of what hardware parts that it’ll need I already have in stock and what parts I need to order, and got some of those bits ordered (though not all of them, tsk). I’m not convinced this week is going to be any better than last as I try to get this bit of work landed, but fingers crossed I’ll get some time to spend on this.

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I spent a chunk of time over the weekend trying to do a simple design based loosely on the Mustang’s offset shape, but still being my own thing. This isn’t yet a very serious build, but someone mentioned they liked the Mustang’s offset vibe, but I’d rather do something better suited to my abilities/preferences in building if I were to make another one. There’s a bunch of things I’d change: for example, I really don’t like the control plate/cavity on the Mustang from a build practicality perspective. Here’s a work in progress picture:

It’s a bit more angular, has rear access panels for the control cavities, and has my preferred pickup combo. Let me know what you think of it.

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I did manage to make a test print of the pedal case in ABS as promised, and I lasered a new top to go with it. I was a bit worried about how the print would turn out, ABS is in general harder to work with than the PLA I used the first time, but this came out fine.

This time I sanded the wood for the lid before laser cutting it, as I do worry about the abuse those hinges can take. The first one I didn’t oil the wood or do any finishing as it’s a prototype just to check it hangs together, but it’s already showing dirt in the wood, so I’ll oil this one also, even if it is another prototype.

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I started going through the 1001 Guitars to Dream of Playing Before You Die book, just sticking a post-it note of all the guitars that have some design cues that I find interesting.

I did try reading the book starting at the front, but there’s just too much there: whilst I’ll do that slowly anyway, right now I need to be a bit more focussed on research, and this first pass was a nice way to whittle that number of pages to read down.

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This coming week it’s the Makespace 6th birthday party, so if you’re in Cambridge do come along. I hope to be there with some guitars and bits to play.

As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I had hoped to trial my new exhibit for Liverpool Makefest later in the year at the birthday party, but vexingly that’s just not going to be. Contract work has just kept me away from the workshop too much and rather than rush it and make myself stressed, I just resigned myself to not making the deadline. Frustrating, but the right choice I think.