Building a Les Paul

The Les Paul has been my fave axe for as long as I can remember. Not seeing any falling into my price range anytime soon I’ve been set for a long time on building one.

I do find my way through a workshop but I’m by no means a luthier (yeah, I had to look that up) so I thought I’d pick up a kit with all the critical steps already done. Also since this will be first attempt on “building” a guitar I didn’t want to spend too much cash.

Les Paul kitI finally settled for a 59 model Les paul style flamed top kit off eBay. It’s a set-neck construction, has a basswood body with a flamed maple top and a hard maple neck with a rosewood fingerboard (628 mm/24.75″, 22 frets). Mechanics, pick-ups etc I’ll have to get to later on.

First thing I started thinking about was the paint work of course. Crazy or classic? Crazy will look – just crazy. Classic on the other hand will look awesome, as long as I manage to pull it off.

Seeing I have the 3D printer to work on during summer it will be some time before I come back to this project, but I was too stoked as for not sharing this 😀

Yes, I’m a complete newb and I will make mistakes. But most of all I will appreciate every little bit of advice I can get on the way.

irisRemote 1.0

Remote control for a Panasonic HMC-41 video camera.

This was a commission project for a friend. I hadn’t been playing with electronics for quite a while before taking on this project. Even had to get a new soldering iron since my old one just didn’t want to fire up. And the multi meter also had seen better days – constantly off by 200 ohms (though accurate enough for the build).

The design is based on an HMC-150 DIY remote controller build by Chris Woodhouse. I didn’t do any major changes except for the cable. Chris originally used an Ethernet cable which he soldered permanently to his controller. I opted for a detachable VGA cable instead.

The major thing I learned from the process was plan ahead. I had to redo the soldering a couple of times due to bad planning. Also make sure your components works visually the way you want. In my case the knobs didn’t cover the nuts of the pots – not looking as good as I planned.

Another thing I probably would have done differently was the control layout. I followed Chris’ vertical layout with alternating positions of switches and knobs. I retrospect the controller would be more ergonomical with a horizontal layout with knobs on top and switches below.

Goodie boxSlaughtered VGA cableCable crimped and sleevedCamera connectorsTesting button layoutCutting holes
Pots and switches in placeCable connectorTesting button orientation and label layoutPot knobsKnobs in placeInside view
Label test printsWrong!Front viewSoldering 101Soldering 101 - againSoldering 101 - yet again
Inside doneirisRemote 1.0irisRemote 1.0

irisRemote 1.0, a set on Flickr.