$100 local materials challenge, David Frassetto's lapsteel (Completed 4/13/12)

[Mark Swanson]

That looks real nice! You must be the first one done too.
I watched this with interest, I just built myself a lap steel too- and mine is blue also!

[Steve Senseney]

Nice work, and quickly done!

Could you show a close up of the acrylic fingerboard?

[Tristan Williams]

Cool! I'm a big fan of the fabric finish. I'd like to do that on a build someday, with some cheesy paisley or something

[Jason Rodgers]

That's super funky! And for around $60 plus time? That's the great stuff this challenge pulls out.

[david frassetto]

Jason,Tristan, Steve, and Mark, Thank you!

The fabric finishing is fun. Heres a tip. when you go to look at fabric take along a cutout of the shape of your body. you can then see how the pattern will look when reduced to its final shape. I've gotten some funny looks from salespeople as I stand there trying out different patterns, but sometimes something that looks great on the bolt doesn't look good when seen body size. Most of the patterens I've used came from the quilting fabric section. The patterns seem to be smaller and meant for a smaller area rather than for a garment.

Also I use a semi gloss polyurethane. I havent tried gloss yet because the fabric leaves a ruogh texture and I don't know how many coats I'd have to build up before I could start to level sand it. And on the lap steel it is a built in anti slip coating an the back.

I can't get any new pics til later but I enlarged some of the others

[Eddie McRae]

Nice job!

[Andrew Porter]

Very pretty. I like the Star Trekky Carpet finish. I would guess it would be more stable on your lap

> "After the adhesive dries I give it a good coat of Minwax water based polyurethane."
Did you coat the carpet too?

Edit: Never mind. After re-reading it all makes sense now. Don't know where the Carpet came from. Must have been one of those senior moments.

[Thomas Dooher]

wow..I think you are first to cross the finish line, no?

[Jason Rodgers]

Ellie would dig.

[david frassetto]

Jason, Thomas, Andrew, and Eddie, Thank you !

I wasn't trying to be the first to finish but as I said in the opening post, medical issues are keeping me home so I have too much time on my hands. Hopefully the neuro-opthamologist will clear me to return to work when I see her next week. After all, if I can build a guitar and not injure myself I should be able to run the machines at work!

I think Ellie would dig it too. Must be something in this Wisconsin water, or maybe our dairy air <G>.

[Andrew Porter]

David, I missed how you fixed the fingerboard to the guitar.

[david frassetto]

Andrew, I used #2x1/2 screws. These are the same size as the screws that are used on most tuning machines. I got them from my local guitar shop.

[Andrew Porter]

Thanks. Have you been playing it?

[david frassetto]

Quite a lot. The pickup is from one of those Tokai lawsuit guitars from the late 70's that I bought used a long time ago. It is 5.7k ohms and sounds real nice. The steel has a nice bark when pushed hard and cleans up nicely when you dial the volume down a little. The hollow body gives it a midrangey honk without too much of the ice pick in the ear high end that some steels have. All in all I'm very happy with the results.