Weeks of December 13th - January 21st

Goals For These Weeks

● Finalize SolidWorks design
● Finish art design
● Begin testing art and laser machine on spare wood
● Meet Mr. Rydlund and begin putting the design on EnRoute

My Research and What I Learned

In these last few weeks, I carefully measured the dimensions of the
neck I bought to make sure that it would fit in a good place on the body. In
the end, I had to extend part of the body so that the neck had somewhere
to sit. This was also important because it would allow me to play with the
entire fretboard and also fit the scale length of the guitar.

In the image above, you can see how part of the neck cavity is extending
outwards unlike the design shown in the first journal. This was done so that
there is more surface area between the neck and the cavity where it will be
screwed into. I also made adjustments to the back pocket of the guitar,
where all the electronics will go.
 The back pocket is bigger than it previously was and is also in a
different position. I had to make these adjustments because the pickup I
am using, the EMG 85-7x, uses a 9 volt battery that needs to be replaced
every year or so (EMG Pickups). Most pickups do not use batteries but
since this one does, I needed to make sure that there was enough space to
fit the battery as well as all the electronics.
Here you can see that the outline for the back pocket does not extend
behind the pickup cavity which is very important. This was specifically
done because behind the pickup is where the bridge will go. The bridge I
will be using comes in two parts and requires a total of four bolts to be
placed in the body of a guitar. I moved the back pocket appropriately so
that these bolts would only go through solid wood and not through the
cavity I made.
Making these two adjustments to the body was vital to making sure
the guitar would actually be functional. I thoroughly measured the neck
cavity of my own guitars to determine a good dimension for the one on the
design. I also carefully measured the distance between the end of the neck
and the pickup as well as the distance between the pickup and the bridge.
I had to take precise notes of these values to make sure that the scale
length of the guitar would fit accordingly to the neck and position of the
bridge.
The next big step in the design process of this guitar was the artwork
I plan to laser engrave. Through CorelDRAW, I put an image of the outline of
my guitar’s body from SolidWorks so that I knew the exact size and shape I
was constrained to.

From there I began looking online for artworks of religious battles and
editing them together to form a diorama that I thought looked appealing
(cool).
I am not a religious person so to me, religion is very neutral and is better
suited for an artwork that can’t lose personal value. If I used an artwork of
something from the video game DOOM for example, who is to say that I
won’t care less for the franchise in the next several years?
Things were looking really great until I imported these same images
onto CorelDRAW and found that they looked very pixelated and blurry. I
wasn’t sure why this was happening then I realized that the images were
being blown up to scale next to the sketch that was already on Corel. Mr.
Combs had then told me that the best images to use in this case were ones
that were very high resolution. With that in mind I narrowed down my
searches for religious artworks to high resolution ones only and even
uploaded those images in a program that supposedly increased the
resolution further. But even after all of that, the images still appeared very
pixelated in Corel and I was not sure if having a laser engraved artwork at
such a high detail was going to work.
 So instead of looking up how to resolve this issue with the internet I
scoured most of Corel’s features to find out how I can edit the image which
led me to the line art tool.

Long story short, the line art tool simplified the image and kept most of the
big shapes while practically getting rid of all the smaller details around
them. This made it so that the artworks would ultimately be read more
easily when being lasered since there are less grays and only very dark
and light colors.
Currently, I am still testing out various artworks with different settings on
spare wood Mr. Combs has offered me. On these test runs, I am changing
the speed and power of the laser to see what looks good and what doesn’t.
I also plan to invert the colors of some artworks, such as the second image
above, to see if the results look better since the laser only activates over
grays and blacks.
The last major accomplishment I made in these last few weeks was
meeting my expert advisor Mr. Rydlund and putting the front face of the
guitar body on EnRoute. This process was extremely interesting, as I have
never used EnRoute before, and we were able to see a simulation of the
CNC milling machine cutting the body. Another thing Mr. Rydlund and I
discussed was the “flip” that we had to plan for when cutting the wood.
Essentially, after we lay down the wood for the machine to cut, we need to
precisely flip the wood over so that the machine can cut out the back
panel where all the electronics will go. Despite this challenge and the minor
complications that we resolved when putting the SolidWorks body onto
EnRoute, we are both confident that the body will be cut out perfectly and
we are also considering doing a trial run on spare wood as a test.

My Accomplishments
● I made sure the body was functional before cutting the wood
● I have a better understanding of the laser machine and
CorelDraw
 ● I am very close to finalizing the artwork and settings of the
laser machine
● I have the front of the guitar on EnRoute, so I can immediately
cut the wood with Mr. Rydlund when it arrives

Reflection on Goals and Timeline

Similar to the first journal report, I am still not following my timeline
very well but I am not behind at all, I would even argue I am ahead of where
I thought I’d be. Testing different artworks is a much more time consuming
process than what I initially thought it would be and I have run into many
complications in regard to it, so I am glad that I reserved all this time solely
for this purpose. When the block of wood arrives, I will be completely
prepared for the laser engraving step which is one of the most important
parts of this project to me. I also need to buy some more parts for the
guitar, specifically the volume knob and a piece for the input jack but
otherwise, I have everything I need. I accomplished more than what I had
planned to in the last few weeks and still feel very confident moving
forward.
 Works Cited

"85-7X." EMG, www.emgpickups.com/85-7x.html. Accessed 9 Dec. 2021.

Binyamini, Yoav. "All You Need to Know to Build Your First Electric Guitar." The Electric

Luthier, theelectricluthier.com/ all-you-need-to-know-to-build-your-first-electric-guitar/.

Accessed 31 Aug. 2021.

"INSTALLATION INFORMATION POWERING EMG'S / TIPS AND TRICKS." EMG

Pickups,

www.emgpickups.com/pub/media/Mageants/p/o/powertips_tricks_0230-0190c.pdf.

Accessed 20 Jan. 2022.

Owens, Jeff. "Intonation 101." Fender, www.fender.com/articles/tech-talk/intonation-101.

Accessed 9 Dec. 2021.

"Tune-O-Matic bridge and tailpiece 7-string black." TLC Guitar Goods,

tlcguitargoods.com/en/tune-o-matic-bridge-and-tailpiece-7-string-black.html. Accessed 9

Dec. 2021.

"Unfinished maple 24 frets rosewood fretsboard 7 strings electric guitar neck." ebay, Accessed 9

Dec. 2021.