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You are here: Home / Guitars / Have You Ever Built a Guitar?

Have You Ever Built a Guitar?

March 4, 2009 by Josh

I’ve always enjoyed working with my hands, and I’ve had an itch for a while to build my own guitar. A friend of mine built a fretless bass using exotic wood. It was beautiful! He built it from scratch and did an excellent job for his first try.

I don’t have the tools I would need to build a guitar from scratch, so I’d probably need to build one from a kit or from parts if I ever decided to build my own guitar. Several places offer kits and/or parts that you can build from. For example, Stewart-McDonald and Warmoth both offer guitar parts for the do-it-yourselfer. Even Martin offers guitar kits. It seems like building an electric guitar would be easier than building an acoustic guitar, although maybe it wouldn’t matter if you were using a kit.

Have you ever built a guitar, either from scratch or from a kit? If you have, please share your experience in the comments!

Filed Under: Guitars Tagged With: diy, Inspire

Comments

  1. Flameboy says

    March 5, 2009 at 3:53 am

    I never built a guitar, but I think that this can be a good experience in the life of a guitarist, that is why I would like to have comments about it too. 🙂

  2. John Miller says

    March 5, 2009 at 9:19 am

    I find that when people assemble their own guitars, the results are usually something very beautiful and a guitar that plays well. I have never built a guitar before, but my uncle who is an avid guitar player has his own business where he assembles guitars at his home and then sells them to people. I find that very fascinating and it seems like something that I would love to do in the future if I have any free time.

  3. Mark says

    March 5, 2009 at 12:35 pm

    I built a guitar as a woodwork project in school. Ran out of time to do the neck so was really just the body etc. I recall lots and lots of sanding to shape the body. Was a Les Paul-ish shape made from a teak like wood and a sycamore central strip.

    I bought an old Palm Bay guitar neck of a mate for £20 and combining all the electrics and components the grand total came to around £40 ;).

    It’s not a great by any means by was fun to do and at the time I only had one other electric guitar.

    It’s still kicking around somewhere in the cupboard :).

  4. Dennis Cox says

    March 5, 2009 at 7:17 pm

    I have built two guitars. The first an archtop, the second a solidbody telecaster style. If you really want to do, do it right and attend a class like Dale Unger’s up to Nazarth, PA. Home of Martin Guitars

    http://www.americanarchtop.com

  5. Rob says

    March 10, 2009 at 1:10 am

    I don’t have the patience to build something that requires so much precision, but I build a Marshall 18-watt combo amp a couple years ago, and it was a blast:

    http://www.heartwoodguitar.com/WordPressBlog/?p=52

  6. Guitar Today says

    March 13, 2009 at 3:47 pm

    I haven’t built one from scratch but I redid an old beater from someone’s closet and got it working again. It was quite a rush.

    Once I had figured out how to wire it properly I took it apart, sanded the wood and repainted it.. several times. Changed the shape dramatically and put it back together again.

    I haven’t done it since but I do have a copy of a Les Paul Jr. that will eventually be a Frankenstein guitar.

  7. Josh says

    March 18, 2009 at 8:07 am

    @Rob – Building an amp sounds fun, too! That’s also something on my “Would like to do some day” list.

  8. Josh says

    March 18, 2009 at 8:08 am

    @Guitar Today – Taking an old beater and working on that seems like a good starting point, and it may be the approach I take. I don’t have the room or tools to build one from scratch yet, but I could take a beater and build it up.

  9. Josh says

    March 18, 2009 at 8:09 am

    @Dennis – The guitar-building classes I’ve seen sound very interesting. Do you have personal experience with Dale Unger’s classes? They look like fun!

  10. Josh says

    March 18, 2009 at 8:10 am

    @Mark – Sounds like a lot of work! I don’t know if I’ll ever build a guitar from a plank of wood, but I think I could handle building one from a kit and work my way up.

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Hello, and welcome to the Guitar Lifestyle guitar blog! My name is Josh, and I thank you for visiting this site. I am a guitar player based in Nashville, TN, aka Music City, USA. Read More...

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