I started playing guitar in my young days – and a few years ago I began to build my own electric guitars.
After thinking about building my own guitar for a while and some experience I had from repairing my old guitars and a first refret I decided to start with a guitar kit. It was a single cut model. I finished it in a classical Sunburst made with nitro cellulose rattle cans. I replaced all ingredients I didn’t like with better ones.
After so much fun with the guitar kit I bought a router and some additional tools and planned a guitar that is a mixture of a Les Paul and a Music Man EVH. I fretted it with stainless steel frets and made a fat neck, so I call it ‘Fat Ed’. I even made a hardshell case for it.
For my next guitar I wanted something special. It has the same shape but another top wood – Ovangkol. It has a zero fret and an unradiused fret board. I milled the brass bridge and wound the clear humbuckers.
I was thinking about getting a Flying V for a long time but wasn’t sure if this shape would suit my playing so I decided to buy a cheap 80s Hohner FV Devil. It was in bad shape and I planned to restore it in light blue and on a tight budget. I removed the finish and sprayed it with a graffiti colour named ‘Cool Candy’. The neck was oiled and refretted with stainless steel jumbo frets. After simulating the final look on the computer I added a layered scratch plate. I really like the result and think that it won’t be my last Flying V.
I always wanted to play a semi hollow and am a fan of the Yamaha CV820WB. So I planned my own interpretation of this guitar – my guitar is much smaller, made of mohogany and has a flamed maple top I stained green. I gave the guitar a complete oil finish and polished it.
At home I usually play guitar through my HX Stomp, sitting at the desk and the pedal is not within reach. Switching via the included HX Edit I find a bit cumbersome, I would like to have hotkeys.
While looking for a small, programmable desktop MIDI switch, I came across a MIDI JavaScript library that runs on the Chrome browser. I wrote myself a small script that can also access my connected HX Stomp via USB MIDI and is easily customizable to my own setup. I tested it only with my HX Stomp, but it can also send MIDI messages via other MIDI interfaces. Have fun with it!
