HOME IS WHERE THE BUILD IS

Thanks for a great magazine – always full of varied topics! I doubt whether this well-gigged home-built guitar [pictured below] could ever win any prizes but it may still be of interest. The neck and compound radius fingerboard are carbon-fibre/epoxy-composite glued and screwed into the mahogany body. The 24-inch scale guitar has 24 frets, two EMG single coils with active tone controls and a slightly modified Schaller roller saddle bridge.

Meanwhile, the tuning system is my own design and required the use of a lathe, some 2BA machine screws and some aluminium rod. The black leather cloth hides the scars of mods needed for previous pickups! The other carbon-fibre headless guitars that I’ve made are a 30-inch scale through-neck ‘ultra baritone’ with stereo piezo/magnetic outputs for a wet/dry rig and a more conventional 25-inch scale through-neck design with a mostly hollow mahogany body and Bare Knuckle pickups. The main advantages of the carbon composite for me are the tuning stability and greater sustain.

John Cook, via email

Thanks, John. While we’ve loved seeing all our readers’ home‑builds based on classic electrics, it’s fascinating to see such an original and attractive guitar that’s been built at home, with so many progressive features. We doff our collective hats to you for designing and machining your own tuning system and also for the body shape and styling that is unusual yet elegant and organic. It reminds us a little of Klein guitars and to a degree the Ovation Breadwinner electric of many years ago – but really has its own distinct character. Interesting, too, that you elected to use a relatively short scale for this guitar – how does it feel to play? We’d love to hear it some time. Congratulations on an ambitious and well‑executed build.

Reader John Cook’s 24‑inch‑scale home‑build features a tuning system of his own devising