Here is an Explorer style kit from Bad Cat Instruments. The body and neck are mahogany, and I used the same blended Keda Wood Dye that I made up for my DIY #12 Strat style kit. The gold hardware really sets this off. It has a set neck, and was surprisingly easy to build. Being … Read more
I’ve played a 4-string bass since the 1970s, but this is my first 5-string bass ever. It is an ash body with a spalted maple top, finished in Tru Oil Gunstock Finish. The neck is maple and walnut also finished in Tru Oil Gunstock Finish, and it has a rosewood fingerboard. In early 2023, less … Read more
This is one of my favorites, a Stratocaster style kit from Coluber Cable, ordered from Walmart and shipped from Amazon. I know nothing about the company and haven’t seen any more kits from them. It has a mahogany body, maple neck and rosewood fingerboard. I used a custom blend of Keda Wood Dyes for the … Read more
I really wanted to try a hollow-body ES-335 style kit and found a very good selection at Pango. So, I picked one out, ordered it, and got pretty excited about it. Big mistake. DO NOT BUY ANYTHING FROM PANGO! To make a long story short, the flamed maple top had several issues, wrong parts were … Read more
After I swapped out the P-style neck for a J-style neck on my first DIY bass project, I used the left-over neck to start this build from parts. I ordered a Sycamore body from Walmart, similar to the Tele body used for DIY #8. These have a beautiful wood grain pattern, and the Minwax Tung … Read more
Here is another Muslady product, again ordered through Walmart. The description showed this to be a full-sized guitar, but when it arrived it was a short scale (20.75-inches, the same as a Rickenbacker 325). It also had a crack in the body. I complained to the manufacturer, received a partial refund, and did the best … Read more
My second build entirely from parts is this Telecaster style. I ordered the body from Walmart, a Muslady product advertised as Sycamore (I really don’t know what it is). This wood is very light, similar to the Paulownia in my DIY #7 P-style bass. The Canadian maple neck came from an eBay seller, and most … Read more
Here is my second bass guitar build, a P-style bass kit from Fistrock, ordered from Amazon. The body of this bass is made of Paulownia, a very lightweight hardwood with a beautiful, pronounced grain. I finished this one, body and neck, entirely in Minwax Tung Oil Finish. The headstock had to be shaped from a … Read more
This is a very nice Strat-style kit from Fistrock, available at Amazon. It has a basswood body. First I tried a green Keda Wood Dye, but the basswood did not have a pronounced grain and it came out very splotchy. So, I used a vibrant green acrylic spray paint, and finished it with a poly … Read more
Here is my first time building a guitar completely from parts and not from a kit. This came about because of the glue residue issue on the flamed maple top of DIY #4. The manufacturer sent me a replacement body, but it was actually worse than the original. So, I took that replacement body, ordered … Read more