While I very much enjoyed my first Warmoth tele, it was my first attempt at putting a partscaster together. Compared to some of my other guitars, it wasn’t holding up any more. I played the hell out of that guitar and felt pretty comfortable giving the neck & body away. I wanted a similar Nashville tele, but with a similar finish to the last one I built. I was so happy with the N4-ish Warmoth I put together, I wanted to see if I could recreate some of the magic with that guitar on a new one. I decided to hang on to the hardware and pick up a different neck & body.
I placed the order on Dec 18th and Warmoth turned it around really fast. It arrived Jan 7th
I’m a fan of all the common species for bodies, but I’m really into Alder right now. It’s a great sounding wood and incredibly easy to work with and finish. Oh and it looks awesome as it ages. Just look at Nuno’s guitar!This neck has a nice grain pattern on it. I love how snappy and responsive maple is. I also really like the Standard Thin profile. It’s thin, but not too thin like a Wizard neck. I opted for 6150 stainless frets and the default 10-16 compound radius.I wanted to move away from a pearloid pickguard. I debated going with a traditional black guard, but lately I’ve been intrigued by the idea of a wood pickguard. I found the perfect one from this Etsy seller and like how it overlayed w/ the warmoth picture of the body. It also was finished with tung oil and that sounded perfect. …..so I splurged and bought it. I also really wanted the same sculpted heel that I put on my last one. Unfortunately Warmoth won’t add this option once the body is off the CNC machine. I took measurements from my Tom Anderson’s joint and drew that on as a guide.From this angle, you get some idea of how much wood is going to come off. Doing this by hand takes a while, but it’s totally worth doing. Guitars w/o a contoured heel are fine, but I really enjoy not working around them.That’s the angle of progress! Starting to take shapeMore progressThere we go. Yes, I know it’s a little silly to have a lower horn carve on a tele, but it’s awesome so I don’t care.A quick shot w/ the plate.
At this point in the project, I was pretty happy with the progress and ready for the next phase.
