Made guitar cover plates

[FliesLikeABrick]

My brother was visiting this week, and brought down a project guitar of his that is missing a few covers. This was a skeleton he bought just as a body+neck, and pieced together with components that fit his style and preferences.

However, he had not yet tracked down a cover for the electronics/controls in the rear, and for the truss rod. He looked through my scraps of aluminum sheet metal and found some off-cuts of .050 and .063 that suited his needs.



For the rear cover, we took a tracing/rubbing of the cavity and taped this to the .050 scrap. Cut this down to approximate shape on the bandsaw, then fine-tuned the profile with an air belt sander.

This is when I started taking some pictures -- here is the rough blank dry fit in the rear cavity. It sits just below the plane of the rear of the guitar


We looked through the hardware I had on hand, and decided on some brass 6-32 screws I have. The holes in the back of the guitar (look at the first picture above) were spaced for 5 screws to be used, but we only had 4 and did not feel compelled to try and transfer the existing hole pattern to the part. I didn't have a great technique for doing that either - unless I made some little pins that could go in the holes and be used like transfer punches to carry the spots to the underside of the part?

We drilled through the plate to spot holes for the screws in both the cover and the body of the guitar, then completed drilling and tapping for 6-32.

I hit the surface with a paitn removal disk on the angle grinder to give some brushed texture/appearance.



Drilled the holes in the cover for clearance of the 6-32 screws, deburred both sides of the plate and holes with a file and zero-flute countersink bit, respectively. Hit with some clear spray paint to protect the texture/brushing from grime and diminishing appearance.





The other part he needed was a cover for the end of the truss rod. He sketched out the profile he wanted, since this did not need to fit in a recess.



Similar to the other cover, we cut the profile on the bandsaw and smoothed the curves with the air belt sander. He considered a few options for designs, including etching with a bit in a Dremel, wood burning directly in the head, and what is shown below - using some cold punches.

After punching, I sprayed with black spray paint and wiped it off the surface to add some contrast in the letters; then brushed the face clean with Scotch Brite; and hit it with some clear spray paint as well.



I am not a musician but am pretty happy with the outcome, and this was low-pressure since this is something of a grunge/garbage build of his from heavily-used parts (including some that previous owners had modified in strange ways and discarded)

Tools used:
- Beverly SS-3 shear bought at auction last year, just for cutting down the initial blanks - As I write this I realize I should have used this for more of the profiling instead of the bandsaw! Using this for sheet metal work is not something I remember to do yet.
- Enco 360 bandsaw
- Astro 3036 air belt sander
- Cheap set of 1/2" letter punches I bought second hand some years ago
- Green Scotch Brite
- Norsemen drill index
- Chicago-Latrobe tap/drill set
- Repaired/Salvaged Dewalt 4.5" angle grinder with some cheap paint removal disk

 

[Vasquezz]

Good job! I especially like the cover of the end of the truss rod.

 

[soniamann]

Well done! I like the craftsmanship, and the result is excellent! You don’t often see people make something with their hands nowadays.
I also have an old electric guitar that’s missing several covers, and this post inspired me to fix it finally. I played it when I was a teenager, but I have almost completely forgotten everything I knew. I could play Yngwie Malmsteen like nobody in my high school, but then I decided it was not for me, and I wasn’t good enough. Stupid decision, but I can do nothing about it now. At least I still have the collection of the coolest guitar picks.
Sometimes I want to return to the old hobby, but something stops me every time and tells me I will never be as good as I used to be and that it’s just a waste of time.