Words & Photos from Anna A.
As I’m writing this, my hands and shoulders are aching after sanding and staining my guitar’s body and neck. Making guitars is quite a high tier in the wood industry. By the end of this program you can go around and brag about your abilities and the things you have learnt and done in this awesome experiential program. Experiences such as guitar making can take you a long way with your future, you never know. Through hardships to the stars.
On the third and fourth day of guitar making, Trevor and Travis, taught us about how pickups and tones in electric guitars work with a physics crash course. Then we did the wiring of our pickup case and soldered each wire in cautiously. Afterwards we did a test fit to ensure that none of the wires prevented the case from fitting properly. Then we moved on to sanding the body which required good sharp eyes and natural light to find the scratches on the surface of our guitar’s body and neck. At the end of day 3, we were left with the question of what color we want our guitars to be. The next day we tested different shades and water based stains on two blocks of elder wood which is the same type of wood as each of our guitar bodies (our necks are maple which adds a really cool effect and texture to the neck). Here’s a quick lesson that will help you with future woodworking to the lovely people reading my blog right now: Staining and painting the wood are two separate things. Staining the wood leaves the beautiful natural textures of the wood but painting it adds a solid color and hides the wood prints. In my opinion staining the wood is way better and prettier since you’re not covering up nature's beauty and also end up having a very cool effect on the finished product. And a reminder that hard work pays off!
By the end of our 2 very awesome and productive days in our group, the room was filled with colourful spirits and different people expressing themselves through those colours on their guitars. I can’t wait to get back with our group again and to together finish up our work and learn more about it all. I'm very grateful for the experience. And hey, Ad Astra per Aspera. See you all in May!