Markku Nyytäjä's candy blue Tele

[Markku Nyytäjä]

This has been a productive summer for me. I finished one build before Midsummer, another one just over a week ago and now this third one last Thursday. I made the bound fretboard a long time ago, already knowing what I would make of it, but it wasn't until this spring I built the rest of the guitar. I'm hoping to get the guitar sold, but actually I built it just because I wanted to. And I'm glad I did.

The body is alder, the neck is maple and the fretboard walnut. The pickups are my own design and make, slightly overwound single coils with neodymium magnets. Their sound is somewhat darker than that of traditional AlNiCo Tele pickups. The specifications come here:


-body alder, colour candy blue, white pearl celluloid bindiing, white pearl pickguard, 2-componentr acrylic lacquer finish
-bolt-on neck maple fastened with 38 mm stainless steel screws and chrome ferrules, fretboard walnut with white pearl celluloid bindiing and 6 mm MOP position markers, 650 mm/25.5" scale, 21 medium jumbo frets, single action truss rod with chrome bullet head, 2-componentr acrylic lacquer finish
-Austin Powers Texas Blues style pickups: bridge pickup 7.5 kΩ, copper plated steel base plate, neodymium button magnets, forbon bobbin top & bottom, steel polepieces, neck 6.5 kΩ, neodymium button magnets, forbon bobbin top & bottom, steel polepieces, chrome cover. Pickups potted in in a mixture of paraffin (80%) and beeswax (20%).
-1 volume 500 kΩ, 1 volume 500 kΩ with 22nF capacitor, 3-way pickup selector switch, pickup cavities shielded, shielding grounded
-Modern Tele bridge with 6 saddles, Wilkinson sealed tuners with 19: turn ratio, chrome hardware

I took some studio portraits of the guitar the evening I finished it. Here they are:

Full frontal pose

The body

Close-up of the body

Full back pose

[Markku Nyytäjä]

The body back slightly sideways

The neck joint is done with with ferrules in stead of an attachment plate. The back edge is so round that the ferrules were the right way to do it. The body back is very comfortable and I like the look of it too.

Totally sideways

Headstock with logo

[Mario Proulx]

Beauty! Love the shade of blue. Where did you get it?

[Markku Nyytäjä]

The 19:1 ratio Wilkinson tuners are great. They have a smooth action and they keep the guitar in tune nicely. I found them at Gear4Music for £15 a couple of years ago. I bought 4 sets and I haven't found such a good deal since. Now i have one set left.

A close-up of the controls.

The back. The steel bar string retainer gives a good sustain. So no ferrules here.

The traditional cup style jack plate - out of the blue.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

This afternoon I also recorded some sound clips. They are MP3s, found behind these links:


http://maihinnousu.net/s/20339
http://maihinnousu.net/s/20340
http://maihinnousu.net/s/20341
http://maihinnousu.net/s/20342

There are dozens of work-in-process photos as well. I'll post them later.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

Thanks, Mario. The colour is a multi-layer job starting with primer. It's not all that difficult when you've got the hang of it. Always clean the spray guns meticulously after use, and then some more. Spray a little thinner through the spray gun before pouring the lacquer in. And practice on scrap first. Here I go like a teacher. But I am a photography teacher and believe in good instructions.

I use white Troton 2-component Acrylic Filler diluted with thinner in 1:1 ratio. It cures in a few hours and is a breeze to sand. I spray two coats of this and fill in any possible dents with 2-component putty of the same brand (and sand) between coats. Having sanded the second coat of primer really smooth with 800 grit paper I wipe off all the dust with a cotton cloth doused in naphta.

Then I make a blend of silver paint. I have previously used rattle cans, but they always let you down at some stage, spitting out big drops of solvent, no matter how you shake them. I mix 150 millitres of 2-component clear acrylic lacquer with the equal amount of thinner and then a tablespoon (15 millitres) of silver powder. I use a siphon cup spray gun with a 1.7 mm nozzle at a high (6 bar) pressure. I keep the paint container whirling laterally between spray bursts to keep the silver powder mixed in the lacquer. I use this spray gun for metal powders and flakes only and spray tints and clearcoats with different guns. I usually spray three coats of silver to get a an even silver basecoat, The silver paint is dry enough for another coat in 15 minutes. Let the last coat dry for 15-20 minutes.

The next step is to blend 10 millitres of Stewmac Color Tone transparent stain with a mixture of clear lacquer (25%) and thinner (75%). 200-300 millitres of this blend will usually do. Spray thin layers at normal pressure and let dry 15 minutes between layers - until you have the desired tone and transparency. The beauty of using the same clear the whole process through is, if you can avoid spraying too much at a time and causing run marks, that you can spray the first top coat of clear in just 15 minutes after the last coat of transparent tint. This particular build was topped with 6 coats of clear lacquer, wet sanded with 800 and 1200 grit papers between coats, with 800, 1200, 1500, 2000 and 2500 grit papers after the last coat. Finally it was buffed no less than 6 times.

I made a couple of candy flake finishes last year and two smooth shimmer candies this summer. I warmly recommend trying it. In no time your paint shop will be known for the coolest bike paint jobs of your neighbourhood.

[Peter Wilcox]

You make beautiful guitars, Markku. Thanks for the great explanations of your finishing steps.

But I am a photography teacher and believe in good instructions.

Well, that explains the superb photos. My hat's off to you.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

Thanks, Pete. I have received a lot of help and good advice at MIMF myself. I'm glad if I can share what I know.
I've used the professional studio at work to take the studio shots. I have a portable set of strobes at home too, but my day job is so close to my workshop that I usually photograph only small objects like pickups at home. It's so much quicker to work in a space intended for photography, rather than building up a temporary studio in my crammed-up living room. When you see the pictures, though, you can't tell where they have been taken, on my living room table or a real studio.

I've worked 30 years as a photographer and 19 years as a photography teacher, started out with black & white and have grown into the digital as it has taken over. A few years back I still had a black & white darkroom at home, but a divorce and moving to a smaller apartment swept that away. I can use the darkroom at work when I want, but building guitars pretty much fills my need of craft. I do enjoy photography, but that's still work. Building instruments doesn't feel like work the same way, even if I sometimes run into problems and have moments of frustration, just like in my day job. It's a necessary counterweight for work stress, it keeps me in my senses.

[Jason Rodgers]

Dang, that pearloid really pops off that blue. Did you use the same binding process as I asked about on the Alligatrix?

[Steve Senseney]

Nice work.

You sure are producing a lot of instruments!

Very consistent quality and nice design work.

[Warren May]

Very, very nice work. The blue and pearloid are really good together.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

Thank you, gentlemen.
Basically I used the same binding process with both the Tele and the Alligatrix. The Tele has a celluloid binding and the Alligatrix has ABS plastic binding. So I used different adhesives, CA glue with the Alligatrix and acetone with the Tele. When shaping the binding for tight spots like cutaways I softened the binding with a hot air gun prior to adding adhesive. The Tele was easier to bind, because the celluloid binding and acetone are easier to work with. I apply the acetone with a narrow brush and it goes where it's supposed to go. The CA glue sometimes feels like a bronco to break, but I'm sure I'll get there with patience.
I too love the combination of the deep blue and white pearl. Some colours just cry to be combined. As I told, the tint is just Stewmac's ColorTone liquid stain #5039 Blue mixed with thinner and 25% clear lacquer. The Color Tone stain is great stuff. It mixes with almost everything and always gives beautiful transparent results.The tone is defined by how many layers you spray. The glow comes from the silver paint beneath, as it reflects light back in certain angles. I got good instructions for a goldtop finish here at MIMF a few years ago (it bugs me that I can't remember from whom, I'd really like to thank him) and have been able to apply the same principles to sparkle flake and candy finishes. Now the procedure is pretty much tattooed in my brain. Flakes and powders of different sizes just need different gauges of spray gun nozzles. Otherwise the work process is about the same.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

The building process of this guitar has been documented from the start to the end. I use an old 7 Mpix Canon digital compact camera that works perfectly for this and I use this camera nowhere else. I always take the workshop photos the same way: I put the camera on a light tripod and set it up to take 4 exposures with self timer set on a 20 seconds' delay. Then I just get back to work and the camera takes the pictures. This way don't have much control over the decisive moment and quite little over the composition, but perfect artistic shots are not what I'm after. I just want to document how I work. Sometimes I take single shots of details, but mainly the camera is a fly on the wall. Here comes a batch of work-in-progress shots.

I started with making the fretboard. I bought a board of walnut and cut some fretboard blanks out of it, planed them and took one for this project. The first thing was to route the nut slot using a T-shaped guide I've made. It may look like there are two different guys building this guitar, because I've grown a beard since I started the project. The camera data says the picture was taken in April 2010, but i't calendar has been off by two years. This shot was taken a little over a year ago and the camera's date setting should be correct now.

Measuring fret distances from the nut, with a digital measuring tape and a steel ruler. I use a pdf-based freeware program called fretcalc to determine the distances. Fretcalc can be used both with inches and millimetres.

I cut the fret slots with a dozuki saw in a mitre box. After that I draw the outlines and cut the fretboard out from the blank with a bandsaw.

Radiusing the fretboard here. I've made 12", 16" and 20" radius sanding cauls for the job and most frequently use the 16" caul. They all have hook side velcro glued to the arch and I can use any sanding paper with velcro fastening with them.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

Drilling cavities for position markers. The markers are 6 mm diameter dots of real mother of pearl. I've purchased them from http://orders.mopsupplies.com/ where they cost 10 cents apiece and were swiftly delivered to Finland for an 8 € cargo. A guitar parts store in Helsinki charges 1.50€ for one dot. I'm not paying that.

Careful with that glue, man! Vinyl or nitrile gloves prevent my hands from turning into fins, especially the left one.

With the binding glued on I drilled holes for side markers. The marker material is a 2 mm diameter plastic stick, easy to cut. I use a drop of CA glue to fix it in its hole.

A plastic head hammer is a good tool to hammer in the frets, as it leaves no marks on the frets. Before I drive a fret into its slot I mask the fret slot edges with masking tape and flood the slot with CA glue.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

Here's the fretboard with binding. It took me a while to level the frets, but now they're good.

Cutting out the body with a bandsaw. I have purchased good plans of the Telecaster and made a plywood template for the body. Here's the new guy at work.

Trimming the body edge flush with the template using a table router.

Routing pickup cavities using the template.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

Routing a channel for the steel bar string retainer, using a 20 mm straight cut bit and a guide clamped to the body.

Rounding off the body back edge.

With all the body cavities routed I temporarily assembled the guitar to rule out any major glitches.

Levelling the frets was a time-consuming task, but the fretboard did turn out good, eventually.

Now i must run, but I'll be back tonight to post more pics. Bye!

[Mario Proulx]

Ah yes, you made your own "candy" by using translucent dye in a clear finish! I had completely forgotten about the classic "candy" technique, having not done it in nearly 30 years now. Thanks for the reminder!

[Mark Swanson]

Markku, you do great work, and your photos are always very good- you did mention that you teach photography. So if you feel like it, this is just a hint that I bet you could do a great tutorial on taking good instrument photos!

[Markku Nyytäjä]

Yes, Mario. There are lots of candy pastes to buy, but I decided to dot it this way. It works for me and I like the result.
Now I'll get back to the WIP photos. There are some of the paint process as well.

After levelling the frets I sanded them with 1200 and 2000 grit papers and polished them with polishing wax on a felt tip in a Dremel type grinder.

As the guitar now felt good and went to tune nicely, it was time to finish it - along with a couple of other projects on the line.

After the first layer of lacquer I attached the logo on the headstock, printed on a laser decal transfer sheet.

After spraying the second coat of primer and sanding the surface smooth I sprayed the body with silver paint until it was nice and even.

[Markku Nyytäjä]

The next step was spraying transparent blue tint on the silver paint until the tone and the transparency where what I was trying to achieve. After that I sprayed a coat of clear.

When the lacquer was dry I scraped off the excess lacquer from the binding channel and glued the binding in place using acetone as adhesive. I found it easiest to apply the acetone with a narrow brush.

Fixing the binding into its channel with masking tape until the adhesive has set.

Scraping the binding flush with the body.