Tumbling block Tele body

[Peter Wilcox]

Thought I'd post this as an interesting (to me) take on a guitar body. It uses a quilting pattern called tumbling blocks (aka rhombille tiling in geometry). A woodworking friend in Oregon sent me a pic of a cutting board he made, and it turns out there's a fair amount of them doing this on the www.

I could only find one pic of the back of an acoustic guitar with a lamination made like this, so I thought I'd try a solid electric. Woods are white oak, alder and walnut - first cut and sanded into strips (mine are 1 7/8" (for guitar thickness) by an arbitrary dimension, then cut into diamond shape with 60 degree acute angle. I cut them on the band saw using the miter gauge and the fence to determine the angle and the size.

The arbitrary dimension determines how large the blocks are, but all have to be exactly uniform to fit together. First I laid them out to make sure the telecaster template would be covered, then glued.

[Peter Wilcox]

I saw some cutting board builders that glued them in groups of three, clamped with a rubber band, then glued the groups into the pattern. I didn't have enough rubber bands , so I glued them in strips across the width.

[Peter Wilcox]

I cut it to a rough shape on the band saw, then routed with the template, sanded to thickness, and routed the neck pocket, pickup and control cavities and the round over. I've wiped with naphtha to increase the contrast for the pics. Now just needs a neck and some finish.

[Bob Orr]

That looks gret!

[Paul Breen]

Nice! The illusion is full strength with the material choices and orientation. Makes me want to see little people going up those stairs.

[Peter Wilcox]

Makes me want to see little people going up those stairs.

Yes, I think Escher used this in some of his works.