Official Luthiers Forum!

Here is a triple O guitar we made for a real live cowboy last year. He is covered in tattoos, and he wanted his guitar to match his skin! I had my sister, who is a tattoo artist, design and paint the roses and pinup girl. If you look real close, the girl even has the customers name "billy" tattood on her thigh. The biggest decision we had to make on this one, was which type of boots she should wear.

The guitar is sitka spruce with wildly flamed imbuia back and sides, and a sapele neck. It was a fun time building this one.

_________________
Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

Hey Jordan, Great looking guitar!! I think it actually looks kinda classy, well done

Matt

I like that a lot. It is cool to be able to deliver just what the customer wants.

_________________
http://www.booneguitars.com
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Stephen-Boone-guitar-builder/488208541257210

OK, that is too sweet!

Hey folks, there goes the bar again, up she goes, where it stops, nobody knows.


Well done indeed. I'd love to know how you did the "tattoo's". Oh, and I really like the end of the fret board where you didn't cut through the rose inlay. Nice. I'd also love to see your truss rod adjustment at the headstock (honestly, I want to steal it ).

_________________
My Facebook Guitar Page

"There's really no wrong way, as long as the results are what's desired." Charles Fox

"We have to constantly remind ourselves what we're doing....No Luthier is putting a man on the moon!" Harry Fleishman

"Generosity is always different in the eye of the person who didn't receive anything, but who wanted some." Waddy Thomson

Very nice! This could be easily overdone, but you did a great job on the flow and design. I like it a lot. I wouldn't own it, but I like it. Rod, good catch on the fretboard, I missed that until I read your comment. Sweet!

Another masterpiece from the Aceto shop. That's a beautiful body shape (I mean the guitar's body, not the babe's). Beautiful bridge and headstock, too. And, yeah, that fretboard detail... the artistry of y'all's work is very inspiring. Take a bow.

_________________
Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

That is beautiful Jordan!
You just can't beat the curves on a 12 fret.
The body shape and the tattoo's, a modern vibe with old school character!

I love it,
Joe

Not exactly my style, but very nice work regardless!

Ken

_________________
http://www.casperguitar.com

Thought it would be ugly from the thread title... but that is Cool! Great stage guitar!

Very cool guitar Jordan!!!

indeed that's one sweet guitar! and I'd like to know too how you did the tattoos?

_________________
Olivier Gauthier
Montreal, QC

Me too! How are the tattoos done?

Thanks Jordan,
Joe

Pretty freaking sweet....

I wonder what it would look like if you actually used some derivation of a tattoo gun to actually inject pigment into the soft fibre of the wood...
might be worth a shot with some junk needle tips...

Stephen

_________________
www.ziegenfussguitars.com

Thanks everybody!

Since you want to know- my sister did the tattoos, she has a tattoo gun, but the hard winter growth of the spruce gave it problems, so she used hobby nerd paint, choosing colors that looked "tattooish" and went with the tats the customer already had on his body. We had to stress to her that the paint needed to be very thin, with no bumps, lumps or ridges. We did not want to have to build up a thick film of finish on the top to mask lumpy paint blobs. It worked out fine, without complication.

The rose inlay is based on an old vintage guitar, this guy is a cowboy strummer, so we knew he would not be using those frets anyways. The inlay came from de paulie (how the heck do you spell it) inlay supply.

Rod, the truss rod uses my top secret coverless access hole. It is just a brass tube which hugs the truss rod nut, it gets cut at the same angle as the headstock and makes a nice elipse. Sometimes i use matching elipse fretboard markers. I hate the idea of cutting a big hole in the upper transverse brace to make room for truss rod adjustment, it seems like that brace is there for a reason, and by drilling the hole, it is basicaly cut in half. I also hate truss rod covers most of the time, so i wanted the access to be at the headstock, with no cover, and still look cool. It was a tweaky couple of days coming up with the drilling jig for the brass tube.

_________________
Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

Thats very cool. I work in Imbuia a lot and I'd love to see pictures of the back of that guitar.

That is a really sweet guitar. I really love the inlay at the end of the fretboard and how you stopped the frets to accommodate it.

_________________
"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Wow, your sister's paint work is all the more impressive knowing she had to keep it so thin and level that you could finish over it. Without even really thinking about it, I had just assumed the paint was on top of the finish. Great job, sis! And I'm sure it looks a thousand times better, and much more tattoo-like, being under the finish.

_________________
Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

Amazing!

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Rod, here is the truss rod access on a different guitar. It strengthens the headstock nicely also.

_________________
Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

Jordan, that is beautiful.

thanks for the picture. Do you mind if I give it a try? I'll certainly credit you for it.

_________________
My Facebook Guitar Page

"There's really no wrong way, as long as the results are what's desired." Charles Fox

"We have to constantly remind ourselves what we're doing....No Luthier is putting a man on the moon!" Harry Fleishman

"Generosity is always different in the eye of the person who didn't receive anything, but who wanted some." Waddy Thomson

Go ahead, i'm sure it has been done before and it wasnt even my idea, we used to just drill a hole through the headplate as cleanly as possible, with no brass sleeve. At some guitar show a bunch of years ago Steve Klein saw it and said "you have to put some brass in there", so brass it is.

_________________
Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

polished aluminum would look good too.

_________________
My Facebook Guitar Page

"There's really no wrong way, as long as the results are what's desired." Charles Fox

"We have to constantly remind ourselves what we're doing....No Luthier is putting a man on the moon!" Harry Fleishman

"Generosity is always different in the eye of the person who didn't receive anything, but who wanted some." Waddy Thomson

Babe's not bad either

_________________
Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"