bolt-t progress

I promised to follow the process of putting together the Carvin Bolt T kit. Frankly it has been frustrating. I waited longer for the kit than I expected but was very pleased with it when it finally arrived. The body



is very light weight (which generally is a good thing) and has pleasant grain for alder which isn't a fancy looking wood. The original plan was to dye it using bing cherry from Woodburst Dyes. I placed an order with them with the expectation that it would arrive in about a week... after three weeks of waiting I canceled the order.

In the meantime, I sanded the arm and belly cuts to be a little deeper than the original body and then decided just to use tung oil as a finish. So here is the body after the sanding and two coats of the finish.



Tung oil is a very easy finish to use and I like the look, the feel, and any effect that it might have on the tone of a solid body guitar. It darkens the alder nicely and brings out the grain. I added a third coat this morning and plan two or three more. More coats will give a little more gloss to the finish and will darken the wood a little more.

While I was waiting for the stain to come, I put 4 coats of tung oil on the back of the neck and the headstock. Notice that the oil doesn't darken the maple nearly as much as it does alder.



Here is the front of the neck. You don't add finish to the ebony fingerboard. I really like the little streak of lighter color in the grain.



I also changed the switch for selecting pickups while everything else was sitting.

Another little frustration presented itself yesterday. On the other partscasters that I've put together, I did a little logo on waterslide decal paper and applied it on the headstock. I had a small piece of decal paper left over from a previous build, put it in the printer, printed my logo and... the ink didn't stick to the paper. I guess there must be some kind of coating on the paper than didn't age well since its been sitting for about 2 years. So, either I wait to get more decal paper before putting the guitar together or go without my little decal. And I've not been able to find any of this paper locally. I'd have to purchase it via the web. ARGGGHHHH

So... I'm looking at final assembly in about 3 or 4 days without the decal, or waiting about a week or so if I choose to put the decal on.