Building a 7 String Tele Style Neck-Thru Baritone Guitar From Scratch - Part 1
Join me on this multi-part series where I build a 7 string Tele style baritone guitar.
This is my second-ish guitar build, the first being a new body for my old Ibanez that used the original neck.
In Part 1 of this series, I will quickly go over specs, materials, and provide some photos of the rough milling stage of the lumber.
Let’s begin!
Here is the design. The volume, tone knob and switch layout will change. I’m just not sure where yet. You can also see the headstock logo in there… sweeeeeet.
Specs
27.5” Scale length
24 Frets
10” Fretboard radius
Neck-thru construction
Reverse headstock
Graphtech nut
EMG 57-7H & 66-7H pickups
EMG switch, knobs, pots, etc.
Gold bridge, knobs, frets, tuners, string ferules, strap buttons
Gotoh SG381-07-MGT Locking Tuners
Materials
Book-matched curly maple top (Full thickness, not a veneer!)
Roasted maple body
Walnut / Padauk veneer / curly maple 5 pc neck
Curly maple cap on the headstock
Ebony fretboard
Step 1: Rough Milling
I forgot to take pictures of the wood before rough milling everything to the stage they’re at now, sorry. I milled these pieces back in October, and so theyve had a couple months to re-acclimate to their thinner, more svelte dimensions.
The bookmatched maple top was purchased as-is. It’s ready to be glued at any time.
Here’s the general layout - not pictured is the Padauk veneer
Some nice grain orientation
Some of the hardware placed lazily atop this monster
Some Thoughts
The roasted maple wings are very dense, and share a similar colour to mahogany - but since it’s maple it is closed grain, so it could prove interesting in terms of tone.
Not sure what to do yet about fretboard inlays. I do want to experiment with fibre optic side dots but I’m already biting off more than I can chew with this project.
Next up is to get the neck pieces to final thicknesses and to glue it up!
