Love your channel. You build amazing works of art. Going through almost your complete library of videos and I have never seen you build a 7 strings guitar. Is that something you might be doing in the future?
Has perfectly good bench and piles of suitable sacrificial wood around. Uses £10k block of unobtainium wood as a support to drill out the top. This is peak Ben.
Don't forget the thousand+ pound guitar being cannibalised for parts. I'd be bending over backwards to preserve every scrap of this wood not turning it to sawdust. I admire Ben's skills, but this project is a folly, a hyper expensive Fender tribute.
@@BoojayDeeth Coudln't agree more. Ugly design, total waste of the sheer physical heft of the wood. Utter silliness. If you want to build this shape out of that wood, do it in a sandwich fasion or just reserve this wood for the top.
That neck glue up - if I’d walked into the room while it was on tv I’d have thought it was The Great British Bake Off! And agree about waste of wood. Solid body - ok. Cut billet for tops and even backs - certainly. Hollow it out for an acousticaster - I don’t think so…
Love your work and creativity, but cannot for the life of me imagine why you are not cutting out a middle layer for the sides and sandwiching it between the front and the back. You could put some veneers between layers for pinstriping and save turning an appreciable amount of that ancient, precious wood into dust.
What could be done would be basically make a sandwich guitar and so you don't make sawdust but offcuts, which then you could reuse to make the most expensive tiny boxes or use on some inlays, etc. Makes everything a bit more fancy. But I get that you don't really want to resaw it yet once again because it would be a pain in the rear, but at least you'd use a scroll saw or coping saw to make it a bit more easily. That's really up to you, Ben
Yeah, I'd like to see the back done the same way as the front - recessed and everything. It hurts my heart to think about that much rare wood being turned into sawdust. That wood could then be used to make a slightly smaller and thinner solid body guitar.
@@HandlebarWorkshops And that also adds a little more to the watch inspiration. Maybe stain that back cover or find a way to turn it gray to contrast with the rest of the guitar to inspire the look of the back of a wrist watch, that could be nice
@@RocketPunkArt this isn't the watch inspired build. Admittedly they're both offsets and vids are going up in parallel, but they're different builds. Ggbo invitational - crimson kit, watch inspired Kauri - customer commission (x3?). 335 in the pipeline. The wood belongs to the client. While it's painful viewing to watch it turn into sawdust, I'm not sure the client is that concerned about maximising the yield or Ben can even use offcuts for himself. What would the owner do with a dozen kauri guitars. From their selfish perspective, you don't want everybody having one. Fewer guitars, more exclusivity. If you can afford the wood in the first place and a 7 year paperwork fight to get it imported, you're probably not desperate to save cash.
I would separate the back of the Body Blank in the same thickness as the Front Plate. Then Cut out the most of the Body as a whole piece with the Band Saw and glue the Back Plate back on. In this way you don't have to turn the most part of this beautiful wood into sawdust!
Why not cut a top and bottom off then the middle can be cut out and kept for other projects rather than saw dust. The cap and back joins can be hidden with binding if that's an issue and you get lots of expensive tool handles or headstock caps etc that you ordinarily would've lost?
Did anybody else nearly have kittens when Ben used the bottom blank to elevate the top, then proceeded to drill holes through and began sawing the top piece? What could possibly go wrong? Yes Ben, let’s use a vice.
Interesting. I am a builder and a kiwi, now in Canada. I have some excellent « white bait swimming in waves » ancient kauri (AK) from Northland that I’ve resawn for acoustics. I still have material for a few more. A couple of words from personal experience: AK stains very easily, so don’t use epoxy and especially not CA glues. AK doesn’t like edge tools, so don’t count on planes or chisels to work it, but sands quite easily. Good luck! Will be following.
If you cut 3 mm off the front and back cut out the shape you want with a band saw then glue it back together you would have enough to make a telecaster or sg without the mess or waste. Two for the price of one? Just a thought.
Adding my vote to slicing off the back and cutting a solid chunk out of the middle. Even small offcuts of Ancient Kauri are usable. I make wooden pens with Kauri blanks cut on a bias to the grain direction, and they can be really spectacular. Think of how many guitar picks you could make from that much wood, and how much you could charge for 'em! Also a warning - I used 3M blue tape to hold the binding on a Kauri top uke I'm building - the tape yanked off lots of surface fibers, and now my top is being sanded thinner than I planned. Don't do what I did.
Instead of routing all that away, why not resaw another piece for the back, then use a saw to cut out the middle? I used that technique for my GGBO21 build and it worked great. Just leave enough wood in the areas you want to do comfort carves.
I was thinking the same. Inset the back panel the same as the front panel. You'd still get a seamless figure ripple across the whole. Spoiler alert - there's already Instagram footage of the router in action, so I fear it's too late. I guess that's what the wealthy patron wanted.
It's mind blowing to think a tool made in 1995 is vintage. My Dad was so right when he said time Flys. Boy does it. Another cool video thanks for sharing.
You should do the BACK as you did the front (Trim a slice off then re-attach later) and cut NOT route the center of the main body out leaving you with a big chunk of wood that you could make a smaller guitar out of. (Can anyone say CHARITY AUCTION!) For the smaller chunk of wood you get out of the center you could WRAP it like the "COMPLICATION", Slice and expand it like the "SLICE" or zig-zag cut it and spread it out like "BOB1'
Similar to Robert Walker's comment - but make it thinner sheets of resin heavily loaded with 42,000 year old sawdust and then punch out fretboard markers/dots from it for sale. Could probably sell them for $1 each - recoup most of the value of the material. I'd love to have 42,000 year old dots on my guitars.
What you should do with the dust? You should make some Crimson logos (even just the guitar shape) with them. Mix it with resin and use it on select guitars.
Look at how bandsaw boxes are made Ben, you cut away the back (vertically) then cut out the inside (horizontally) and that way you're left with the cutaway wood to do as you please and not a pile of expensive dust. It's even easier with making a guitar body as you need to leave out an opening for the neck pocket anyway Please don't rout out the inside when there are other ways to maximise the yield of this very pretty chunk of wood.
Save all the dust to mix with resin/CA glue to make rods for fret marker dots, inlay sheet stock to make whatever inlays you want, control knobs, tuning key knobs, etc. Could be a Crimson signature feature/upgrade!
I see a lot of people saying to cut off the back and bandsaw out the middle to leave the wood in tact. Thats a cool idea if possible. If you do go the routing/sawdust route. Maybe it can be mixed with hide glue or some resin to make filler, fret markers, inlays, etc...
Could you not cut a slice from the back of the block and then remove the inner section with a jigsaw in a similar way to how you fit a cooker hob in a kitchen worktop, and then stick the slice back on to create an open box??? (if that makes sense!!!) That way you would end up with a full block of that wood instead of a pile of sawdust...
"I'm living my best life. Fight me." -Ben Crowe, 2022 Dude, you should do a TedTalk or something about how you went from a shed to your best life. As a long time watcher, I've been inspired by your story. Maybe you can inspire countless more to not be afraid to dream as well.
A suggestion for the sawdust.. Mix the sawdust with metal powder- copper, aluminum, brass, and maybe some other wood sawdust, like ebony or cherry, for contrast color. Then use resin to make as many blanks as you can. All of them will be unique. Can be used for the body or the neck. If done right you could also add strontium aluminate (small amounts) to make it glow.
New Crimson Guitar videos are one of the highlights of my week as are new videos from channels like Twoodfrd or Tips from a Shipright. I wonder how many people are watching the same channels as me? 🤔
Collect the dust, give it a colour and make a logo inlay with it in the headstock. Dots inlay on the neck With superglue or epoxy and shave it to a volume knob Take another body with cracks and fill them up with the dust Etc
Roll up sleeves Ben. Safety First.Would hate to see sleeves pull into one of those machines. Keep up the great work on this soon to be fabulous guitar.
Hi Ben , just love your channel, heres an idea for the sawdust. How about getting some acrylic blocks, routing out your Crimson guitar logo 40K kauri wood ,and backfilling the routed out cavity with the sawdust suspended in an appropriate bonding agent , then we can have a chance to own part of the build
Really enjoying this. If I were doing it though (highly unlikely to say the least), I would keep the single pickup, but mount a jazz style neck pickup and electronics thereby turning it into a compact, very cool, but very, very, expensive jazz box.
16:20 I'd be terrified to saw into the template. In my amateur projects I usually left a quarter inch shy without template, then add the template again and use a copy router bit. I guess this is where your experience pays off :)
GUITAR CASE: mix the dust with resin and make a "semi transparent case" for the guitar. pls try to only pour thin layers of resin each time and sprinkle the dust CAREFULLY, then let it react and do the next layer. you might even have the resin in translucent colors, red, orange, yellow, lime-green, dark green, pink, red, purple, blue. 5mm layers. (it looks amazing!!) and imbedded sprinkles of the saw dust. design a nice hard case that kind of reveals the guitar inside and fits like a glove.
I love this timber and it would be a travesty to waste the sawdust. As such, I think you should mix it with resin and pour a guitar body with it. No waste is good waste! Love your work.
Removing so much of that beautiful natural wood has gotta be scary! But you just know that despite removing all that beauty, something even better will come of it. Feel like theres a life metaphore in there somewhere lol.
Not sure if I would favour a gold can spray paint finish or a 'relicted punk guitar' finish, with matt black and stickers all over the place and have it reliced. I hope I don't have to state the obvious :)
Interesting to see so many plugs for Triton tools. Pity they can’t deliver! Been waiting two years for a Triton Contractor Saw for my TWX7 workbench. They are still advertised on their website but they don’t seem to exist in the UK!
@CrimsonCustomGuitars back when I was emailing with Tom about the marking knife, he mentioned the idea of doing some kind of collaboration if you had some special timber floating around. If this Ancient Kauri is on the table for that... 😃
Super expensive dust should be collected and reformed with glue and made into 18 inch turning blanks. Ben could then turn these 18 inch blanks on the lathe and make chisel handles. Collect the new dust created add more glue and reform into smaller blanks to make pens. Collect this dust add it more glue, bottle it and sell this as premixed wood and saw dust filler. Job done.
Use the leftover bits, make matchstick style panels, hollow body thing, as big as you can from what you have. Sawdust resin strips, even reinforced with carbon fiber? Even a concert ukulele with a hidden pickup?
I actually cut 2 section like u do for the top, cut in the band saw the shape of the body to have the sides , this ways u Haye 2 bodies and no waste the wood, sorry if don't got it but I don't speak English naturally I am a Spanish speaker
Sawdust: Kauri Potpourri? You should slow down with that keyhole saw. Make things a little less terrifying. ;) Should have set a couple of pins in the corners of the pickup cutout. That could have held it in place with the neck pin.
Cut thin top and bottom slices and then you can saw the hollow into the center block and glue the rim to the bottom. You will be left with a block to make an electric uke.
You ended your intro with what should we do with all that saw dust and then the it went to the usual beginning where you said "Burn it." LOL Love your stuff. Keep it coming.
A guitar with £10k worth of wood and electronics repurposed from a £1500 guitar? I'm hoping this turns out as good as Ben is promising, because it needs to!
Watching Ben cut into £10k piece of 42k year old lumber was mildly exiting. Not the terrifying, gut wrenching excitement of a few weeks ago when he bent thin strips of a £10 fence post but exiting none the less.
Ben, what to do with the 42,000 year old saw dust? 1. Put it in a tool handle mould, with superglue, and connect it to your favourite chisel. 2. Create a mould, put the 42,000 year old sawdust, mix the sawdust with glue and make guitar picks. Sell them for £10.00 per pick. I'd buy a few. 3. As its nearly Christmas, create cup coasters with the 42,000 year old sawdust with the Crimson logo (in gold). Obviously you will need glue. I can think of a few more if you need inspiration.
Usually I'm absolutely thrilled with your work, but this idea seems like hunting for rabbits with a nuclear missile: total overkill. I think it's an absolute waste of such a gorgeous piece of wood to turn all of that into dust, frankly. I don't doubt your skills, and I'm sure it'll be a great instrument in the end, but to use such rare and beautiful (not to mention astoundingly expensive) wood just to create a hollowbody?... Hollowbodies are usually pretty dense and homogeneous type woods, because the remaining material needs to support the string tension as well as resonate properly. This wood is curly all over, which admittedly looks *really* good, but does it sound good too + longevity? Personally I'd make this block into veneer / tops, and use other, common type, woods to get the 'tone-bones' of the guitar before fleshing it out further with these gorgeous woods on the outside. You could've gotten a nice range of instruments out of that one single block. But, again: you definitely know what you're doing, even if it always seems (to us 😉) somewhat random at the beginning of every guitar you build - it always comes out brilliantly.
Isn't there wire saws that could be used to extract the inner block? Route around and let the wire do the separation. If not we definitely need such a contraption. Could also be a special band saw with two tips for guiding the thin blade deep between two router grooves.
could you have used the cnc machine to make the pieces needed for the top and body? Just seems it would have been easier and less stressful. Although I do understand the joy you seem to have by making it by hand.
I'd use some for a Kool inlay on fretboard and keep the rest for like projects or maybe mix it with a color and fill in depressed desighs on any guitar be awaasome
While I'm not quite in the same camp as a lot of people regarding "this is a waste of wood..." etc., (I figure you've got the material and a client who knows what they want, what's the problem?), I actually found myself holding my breath when Ben was prying about £1200-worth of wood away from the masking tape & glue. At risk of offending or upsetting someone, to me - there are certain shots of that wood (especially the neck blank) that just makes it look like MDF... 😕 I'm also guessing all the offcuts (even the thin pieces from the top-piece) are, if not spoken for, then certainly being held back until something suitable crops up for them..? No chance of seeing a hand-sized sliver appear for sale on the website, hint hint...? 😉😉 Depending on the size of the sawdust, you could bag it up and offer it as inlay material of different grit size? You could even have someone sand down some of the larger offcuts with a fine grit to make extra-fine inlay powder. It might not look extremely aesthetically stunning, but it'd be cool to say "this guitar contains some 42k year old sawdust..." 😁
The tool you wanted to use to make the inside cuts would be a Scroll saw. Under tension (after fitting thru a hole) make a far faster, straighter cut in those places. Trim carpenter's secret weapon.
Why not make the back the Same way you make the top? This way you can saw out the sectio’s you are now routing out and make a second smaller body of at least 4000 Pounds worth of wood?
For the love of God, don't route out all that precious Kauri! Slice the wood into a multi-layer thing, cut out the insides of the middle layers, and use the cut-outs to make ukuleles or acoustic mini-guitars. Maximize the goodness that can be gotten out of that cool wood.
Encapsulat the dust in resin then make the resin and dust into fret file handles for the traditional file as a limited edition! Will look cool beans...
I don't understand why routing the center is the method for this. Why not cut the center out and make a back panel the same way as the front? Leave space for comfort carves and match the grain the same way as the front. The remaining portion could then be used for other things. Headstock veneer to match, knobs, tuning keys, a guitar pick box, or many other smaller projects. Considering the high dollar value it just seems a waste to turn it to dust. Unless there is a practical reason the have the back and sides as one piece?
13:06 better than a cup of coffee to wake you up? Sorry for the audio issues - editor
A little over 6000 years
If you keep all the dust you can make Eco Kauri
I could use another cup after reporting all the telegram scam replies on here RUclips should do more work towards this.
Love your channel. You build amazing works of art. Going through almost your complete library of videos and I have never seen you build a 7 strings guitar. Is that something you might be doing in the future?
I was wondering if you were going to notice you cut your locating tab off.
Has perfectly good bench and piles of suitable sacrificial wood around. Uses £10k block of unobtainium wood as a support to drill out the top. This is peak Ben.
Don't forget the thousand+ pound guitar being cannibalised for parts.
I'd be bending over backwards to preserve every scrap of this wood not turning it to sawdust.
I admire Ben's skills, but this project is a folly, a hyper expensive Fender tribute.
@@BoojayDeeth Coudln't agree more. Ugly design, total waste of the sheer physical heft of the wood. Utter silliness. If you want to build this shape out of that wood, do it in a sandwich fasion or just reserve this wood for the top.
I spotted that too. I winced the whole time the drilling was going on 😂
Yeah completely agree. Create a hollow body guitar using more traditional methods is the way to go.
That neck glue up - if I’d walked into the room while it was on tv I’d have thought it was The Great British Bake Off!
And agree about waste of wood. Solid body - ok. Cut billet for tops and even backs - certainly. Hollow it out for an acousticaster - I don’t think so…
Love your work and creativity, but cannot for the life of me imagine why you are not cutting out a middle layer for the sides and sandwiching it between the front and the back. You could put some veneers between layers for pinstriping and save turning an appreciable amount of that ancient, precious wood into dust.
Loose sleeves on the planer, Ben.... Health and safety.
Anyway, gorgeous wood, can't wait to see the process!
mix all the dust and shavings with resin to create a body blank
If there’s not enough to make a decent blank then maybe some really expensive wood crimson key chains and pick trays.
What about making pickup bobbins from the dust/resin mix?
I agree mix it
Yeah, haven’t seen that before. 😂
Damnit is metal workers don't have a clue.... Come on over to my world it was just a thought get it it feelings
What could be done would be basically make a sandwich guitar and so you don't make sawdust but offcuts, which then you could reuse to make the most expensive tiny boxes or use on some inlays, etc. Makes everything a bit more fancy. But I get that you don't really want to resaw it yet once again because it would be a pain in the rear, but at least you'd use a scroll saw or coping saw to make it a bit more easily. That's really up to you, Ben
Yeah, I'd like to see the back done the same way as the front - recessed and everything. It hurts my heart to think about that much rare wood being turned into sawdust. That wood could then be used to make a slightly smaller and thinner solid body guitar.
@@HandlebarWorkshops And that also adds a little more to the watch inspiration. Maybe stain that back cover or find a way to turn it gray to contrast with the rest of the guitar to inspire the look of the back of a wrist watch, that could be nice
@@RocketPunkArt this isn't the watch inspired build. Admittedly they're both offsets and vids are going up in parallel, but they're different builds.
Ggbo invitational - crimson kit, watch inspired
Kauri - customer commission (x3?). 335 in the pipeline. The wood belongs to the client. While it's painful viewing to watch it turn into sawdust, I'm not sure the client is that concerned about maximising the yield or Ben can even use offcuts for himself. What would the owner do with a dozen kauri guitars. From their selfish perspective, you don't want everybody having one. Fewer guitars, more exclusivity. If you can afford the wood in the first place and a 7 year paperwork fight to get it imported, you're probably not desperate to save cash.
I would separate the back of the Body Blank in the same thickness as the Front Plate. Then Cut out the most of the Body as a whole piece with the Band Saw and glue the Back Plate back on. In this way you don't have to turn the most part of this beautiful wood into sawdust!
Why not cut a top and bottom off then the middle can be cut out and kept for other projects rather than saw dust. The cap and back joins can be hidden with binding if that's an issue and you get lots of expensive tool handles or headstock caps etc that you ordinarily would've lost?
I was thinking the same thing.. and what dust is made could be used for inlays :)
Quite right. To do anything else would be madness. You could have a matching ukulele at the very least.
Or maybe the coolest looking Chiquita ever.
My first thought too!
More money than brains 😁🇦🇺
Did anybody else nearly have kittens when Ben used the bottom blank to elevate the top, then proceeded to drill holes through and began sawing the top piece? What could possibly go wrong? Yes Ben, let’s use a vice.
Interesting. I am a builder and a kiwi, now in Canada. I have some excellent « white bait swimming in waves » ancient kauri (AK) from Northland that I’ve resawn for acoustics. I still have material for a few more. A couple of words from personal experience: AK stains very easily, so don’t use epoxy and especially not CA glues. AK doesn’t like edge tools, so don’t count on planes or chisels to work it, but sands quite easily. Good luck! Will be following.
If you cut 3 mm off the front and back cut out the shape you want with a band saw then glue it back together you would have enough to make a telecaster or sg without the mess or waste. Two for the price of one? Just a thought.
Ben "What should be do with the dust" ~ queue intro ~ "Burn It!!" Cracked me up!
Adding my vote to slicing off the back and cutting a solid chunk out of the middle. Even small offcuts of Ancient Kauri are usable. I make wooden pens with Kauri blanks cut on a bias to the grain direction, and they can be really spectacular. Think of how many guitar picks you could make from that much wood, and how much you could charge for 'em! Also a warning - I used 3M blue tape to hold the binding on a Kauri top uke I'm building - the tape yanked off lots of surface fibers, and now my top is being sanded thinner than I planned. Don't do what I did.
Instead of routing all that away, why not resaw another piece for the back, then use a saw to cut out the middle? I used that technique for my GGBO21 build and it worked great. Just leave enough wood in the areas you want to do comfort carves.
I was thinking the same. Inset the back panel the same as the front panel. You'd still get a seamless figure ripple across the whole.
Spoiler alert - there's already Instagram footage of the router in action, so I fear it's too late. I guess that's what the wealthy patron wanted.
@@PaulCooksStuff Oh no! If so what a daft patron.
1000% what I thought as well.
What should we do with the dust? Burn it!! Quality editing as always
It's mind blowing to think a tool made in 1995 is vintage. My Dad was so right when he said time Flys. Boy does it. Another cool video thanks for sharing.
This is a perfect Example of "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should"
"From dust to dust" You are doing the right thing Ben. It is natural.
At least that is how I would justify my destructive behaviors.
"What should we do with the dust" ... "Burn it!"... epic Timing on the Intro haha
You should do the BACK as you did the front (Trim a slice off then re-attach later) and cut NOT route the center of the main body out leaving you with a big chunk of wood that you could make a smaller guitar out of. (Can anyone say CHARITY AUCTION!) For the smaller chunk of wood you get out of the center you could WRAP it like the "COMPLICATION", Slice and expand it like the "SLICE" or zig-zag cut it and spread it out like "BOB1'
Similar to Robert Walker's comment - but make it thinner sheets of resin heavily loaded with 42,000 year old sawdust and then punch out fretboard markers/dots from it for sale.
Could probably sell them for $1 each - recoup most of the value of the material.
I'd love to have 42,000 year old dots on my guitars.
Oh gosh. Shirt sleeves dancing around on the jointer/planer. Don’t get me wrong, I love these CG videos.
Dangly sleeves while working on the jointer Ben? Off to the naughty step for you 😋
What you should do with the dust? You should make some Crimson logos (even just the guitar shape) with them. Mix it with resin and use it on select guitars.
Look at how bandsaw boxes are made Ben, you cut away the back (vertically) then cut out the inside (horizontally) and that way you're left with the cutaway wood to do as you please and not a pile of expensive dust. It's even easier with making a guitar body as you need to leave out an opening for the neck pocket anyway Please don't rout out the inside when there are other ways to maximise the yield of this very pretty chunk of wood.
Save all the dust to mix with resin/CA glue to make rods for fret marker dots, inlay sheet stock to make whatever inlays you want, control knobs, tuning key knobs, etc. Could be a Crimson signature feature/upgrade!
The cut at 19:31 is hilarious. Threw me off in a good way
I see a lot of people saying to cut off the back and bandsaw out the middle to leave the wood in tact. Thats a cool idea if possible. If you do go the routing/sawdust route. Maybe it can be mixed with hide glue or some resin to make filler, fret markers, inlays, etc...
Don't listen to the haters bro. As a Maori from New Zealand, im just happy to see our native timber being used for things other than coffee tables🤣🤣
Could you not cut a slice from the back of the block and then remove the inner section with a jigsaw in a similar way to how you fit a cooker hob in a kitchen worktop, and then stick the slice back on to create an open box??? (if that makes sense!!!) That way you would end up with a full block of that wood instead of a pile of sawdust...
You had me screaming at the screen........ "Put it in the vice!!" .....😂😂
That wood is gorgeous! I love how the grain will line up when it gets assembled. Well done again, sir!
"I'm living my best life. Fight me." -Ben Crowe, 2022
Dude, you should do a TedTalk or something about how you went from a shed to your best life. As a long time watcher, I've been inspired by your story. Maybe you can inspire countless more to not be afraid to dream as well.
A suggestion for the sawdust..
Mix the sawdust with metal powder- copper, aluminum, brass, and maybe some other wood sawdust, like ebony or cherry, for contrast color. Then use resin to make as many blanks as you can. All of them will be unique. Can be used for the body or the neck. If done right you could also add strontium aluminate (small amounts) to make it glow.
New Crimson Guitar videos are one of the highlights of my week as are new videos from channels like Twoodfrd or Tips from a Shipright. I wonder how many people are watching the same channels as me? 🤔
Ben - sounds like first time you've planned out what you are doing in a build.
I’d love to see a neck through bass build
Your loose folded back sleeves bother the hell out of me when you're using machinery! Please roll them up further Ben!
Collect the dust, give it a colour and make a logo inlay with it in the headstock.
Dots inlay on the neck
With superglue or epoxy and shave it to a volume knob
Take another body with cracks and fill them up with the dust
Etc
To see you work on this wood got me more tense than watching Scream for the first time back in the day,.. this is the definition on courage.
Roll up sleeves Ben. Safety First.Would hate to see sleeves pull into one of those machines. Keep up the great work on this soon to be fabulous guitar.
Chuckled at the subtle "eish" 😆
Hi Ben , just love your channel, heres an idea for the sawdust. How about getting some acrylic blocks, routing out your Crimson guitar logo 40K kauri wood ,and backfilling the routed out cavity with the sawdust suspended in an appropriate bonding agent , then we can have a chance to own part of the build
Really enjoying this. If I were doing it though (highly unlikely to say the least), I would keep the single pickup, but mount a jazz style neck pickup and electronics thereby turning it into a compact, very cool, but very, very, expensive jazz box.
16:20 I'd be terrified to saw into the template. In my amateur projects I usually left a quarter inch shy without template, then add the template again and use a copy router bit. I guess this is where your experience pays off :)
GUITAR CASE:
mix the dust with resin and make a "semi transparent case" for the guitar.
pls try to only pour thin layers of resin each time and sprinkle the dust CAREFULLY, then let it react and do the next layer.
you might even have the resin in translucent colors, red, orange, yellow, lime-green, dark green, pink, red, purple, blue.
5mm layers. (it looks amazing!!) and imbedded sprinkles of the saw dust.
design a nice hard case that kind of reveals the guitar inside and fits like a glove.
Mix the sawdust with resin & any shavings then pour it into a mould. Instant body blank give or take curing time.
I love this timber and it would be a travesty to waste the sawdust. As such, I think you should mix it with resin and pour a guitar body with it. No waste is good waste! Love your work.
Mix the saw dust with sparkles and gold flakes in clear coat and use / sell it as an exclusive jet limited finish
8:13 the fancy wood looks like MDF here
If yet make the back as a veneer as well, you can save the wood in the middle.
Removing so much of that beautiful natural wood has gotta be scary! But you just know that despite removing all that beauty, something even better will come of it. Feel like theres a life metaphore in there somewhere lol.
Not sure if I would favour a gold can spray paint finish or a 'relicted punk guitar' finish, with matt black and stickers all over the place and have it reliced.
I hope I don't have to state the obvious :)
Interesting to see so many plugs for Triton tools. Pity they can’t deliver! Been waiting two years for a Triton Contractor Saw for my TWX7 workbench. They are still advertised on their website but they don’t seem to exist in the UK!
@CrimsonCustomGuitars back when I was emailing with Tom about the marking knife, he mentioned the idea of doing some kind of collaboration if you had some special timber floating around. If this Ancient Kauri is on the table for that... 😃
Use the sawdust for inlays and use some of that lovely crimson dye you got hanging around mate.
Someone mentioned using the sawdust as a the logo, that would be cool for select guitars. Either that or for engravings on the fingerboard.
Super expensive dust should be collected and reformed with glue and made into 18 inch turning blanks. Ben could then turn these 18 inch blanks on the lathe and make chisel handles. Collect the new dust created add more glue and reform into smaller blanks to make pens. Collect this dust add it more glue, bottle it and sell this as premixed wood and saw dust filler. Job done.
Gather the dust together, mix it with some sort of glue to make a coloured resin, and use it to make an inlay of the type of tree it came from.
Use the leftover bits, make matchstick style panels, hollow body thing, as big as you can from what you have. Sawdust resin strips, even reinforced with carbon fiber?
Even a concert ukulele with a hidden pickup?
If you're using Aotearoa kauri, then you'll need paua dots and inlays!
I actually cut 2 section like u do for the top, cut in the band saw the shape of the body to have the sides , this ways u Haye 2 bodies and no waste the wood, sorry if don't got it but I don't speak English naturally I am a Spanish speaker
If you *must* turn most of it to dust, you could use the dust with an epoxy to make a composite body.
Sawdust: Kauri Potpourri?
You should slow down with that keyhole saw. Make things a little less terrifying. ;)
Should have set a couple of pins in the corners of the pickup cutout. That could have held it in place with the neck pin.
Cut thin top and bottom slices and then you can saw the hollow into the center block and glue the rim to the bottom.
You will be left with a block to make an electric uke.
You ended your intro with what should we do with all that saw dust and then the it went to the usual beginning where you said "Burn it." LOL Love your stuff. Keep it coming.
Mix the dust in to a shallow pour of epoxy (say 6-7mm?) and make some unique looking tops!
A guitar with £10k worth of wood and electronics repurposed from a £1500 guitar?
I'm hoping this turns out as good as Ben is promising, because it needs to!
I'd be happy to make you some moulds so you can mix the dust with resin and make the most expensive mdf one piece guitar 😀
Watching Ben cut into £10k piece of 42k year old lumber was mildly exiting. Not the terrifying, gut wrenching excitement of a few weeks ago when he bent thin strips of a £10 fence post but exiting none the less.
Thank you, this made me smile.. and you're right, the experience of actually doing these things matches your experience of watching them
I miss the old home studio with the black wall. Was easy on the eyes.
That said, looking forward to this guitar!
Ben's dangling sleeve cuff near the planer gives me anxiety 😵💫
Ben, what to do with the 42,000 year old saw dust?
1. Put it in a tool handle mould, with superglue, and connect it to your favourite chisel.
2. Create a mould, put the 42,000 year old sawdust, mix the sawdust with glue and make guitar picks. Sell them for £10.00 per pick. I'd buy a few.
3. As its nearly Christmas, create cup coasters with the 42,000 year old sawdust with the Crimson logo (in gold). Obviously you will need glue.
I can think of a few more if you need inspiration.
Watching you on the band saw on that irreplaceable piece of beautiful wood, I can only think of the Balls of Steel you must have.
Watching you work, it's almost as if you know what you're doing. Almost. ;^)
Brilliant as always Ben !!!
Not on telegram. Messaged you on instagram.
I'd like to see Ben make an LP style axe with swamp kauri.
It deserves nothing less 🙂
I'm a Kiwi - so I should know ;-)
Mix the sawdust into a resin or compress it or something to make a solid body guitar
Usually I'm absolutely thrilled with your work, but this idea seems like hunting for rabbits with a nuclear missile: total overkill.
I think it's an absolute waste of such a gorgeous piece of wood to turn all of that into dust, frankly. I don't doubt your skills, and I'm sure it'll be a great instrument in the end, but to use such rare and beautiful (not to mention astoundingly expensive) wood just to create a hollowbody?...
Hollowbodies are usually pretty dense and homogeneous type woods, because the remaining material needs to support the string tension as well as resonate properly. This wood is curly all over, which admittedly looks *really* good, but does it sound good too + longevity?
Personally I'd make this block into veneer / tops, and use other, common type, woods to get the 'tone-bones' of the guitar before fleshing it out further with these gorgeous woods on the outside.
You could've gotten a nice range of instruments out of that one single block.
But, again: you definitely know what you're doing, even if it always seems (to us 😉) somewhat random at the beginning of every guitar you build - it always comes out brilliantly.
Isn't there wire saws that could be used to extract the inner block? Route around and let the wire do the separation. If not we definitely need such a contraption. Could also be a special band saw with two tips for guiding the thin blade deep between two router grooves.
Maybe make tuning paddles out of pressed sawdust and glue.
Excellent quality video production
could you have used the cnc machine to make the pieces needed for the top and body? Just seems it would have been easier and less stressful. Although I do understand the joy you seem to have by making it by hand.
I'd use some for a Kool inlay on fretboard and keep the rest for like projects or maybe mix it with a color and fill in depressed desighs on any guitar be awaasome
What to do with the dust: pile it all up, and stare at it while you think about what you’ve done. 😂😂
I want to see the hand tool build finished next lol
While I'm not quite in the same camp as a lot of people regarding "this is a waste of wood..." etc., (I figure you've got the material and a client who knows what they want, what's the problem?), I actually found myself holding my breath when Ben was prying about £1200-worth of wood away from the masking tape & glue.
At risk of offending or upsetting someone, to me - there are certain shots of that wood (especially the neck blank) that just makes it look like MDF... 😕
I'm also guessing all the offcuts (even the thin pieces from the top-piece) are, if not spoken for, then certainly being held back until something suitable crops up for them..? No chance of seeing a hand-sized sliver appear for sale on the website, hint hint...? 😉😉
Depending on the size of the sawdust, you could bag it up and offer it as inlay material of different grit size? You could even have someone sand down some of the larger offcuts with a fine grit to make extra-fine inlay powder. It might not look extremely aesthetically stunning, but it'd be cool to say "this guitar contains some 42k year old sawdust..." 😁
The tool you wanted to use to make the inside cuts would be a Scroll saw. Under tension (after fitting thru a hole) make a far faster, straighter cut in those places. Trim carpenter's secret weapon.
can't think why he didn't, i've seen him use a scroll saw on this channel before.
Ben, very seriously: "What should we do with the dust?" 🤔
Immediately after comes the answer: "Burn it!" 😅
Why not make the back the Same way you make the top? This way you can saw out the sectio’s you are now routing out and make a second smaller body of at least 4000 Pounds worth of wood?
Yep ! 10g's before you even unlock the workshop. Sphincter factor 9.5 I reckon.
Chisel or plane out the wood instead of routing so you have loads of curls, then do a resin guitar with them.
Good evening Crimson guitars Ben Crow
Wax paper is magical. It keeps your workbench free of random glue and nothing sticks to it.
Nice! The pucker factor must be high for Ben with this one I’m sure. It would be easy to end up with £10,000 firewood, at least if it were me 😅.
For the love of God, don't route out all that precious Kauri! Slice the wood into a multi-layer thing, cut out the insides of the middle layers, and use the cut-outs to make ukuleles or acoustic mini-guitars. Maximize the goodness that can be gotten out of that cool wood.
Agreed that the dust and shavings with resin would make a nice body. I know, I know...resin...but thats the only binder I can think of...
Beautiful. Just amazing.
Encapsulat the dust in resin then make the resin and dust into fret file handles for the traditional file as a limited edition! Will look cool beans...
I don't understand why routing the center is the method for this. Why not cut the center out and make a back panel the same way as the front? Leave space for comfort carves and match the grain the same way as the front. The remaining portion could then be used for other things. Headstock veneer to match, knobs, tuning keys, a guitar pick box, or many other smaller projects. Considering the high dollar value it just seems a waste to turn it to dust. Unless there is a practical reason the have the back and sides as one piece?
Beautiful work, "Lord Crimson"!