Yes WaffleDino, you shouldn't apologise, as you are doing all the hard, hard work :workhard: and you should have the liberty of getting it exactly right even if you could not post. The process appears to be really tedious but really, GOOD LUCK on painting the guitar just as Mami's HSS Fender Strat.

On a lighter note, i was thinking if you would know how i could get a guitar painted exactly like that by a custom shop in Sydney? No problem at all if you cannot reply! I understand

WOW O.o how do you know how to do all this stuff? .stars.

Mami FTW! wrote:Yes WaffleDino, you shouldn't apologise, as you are doing all the hard, hard work :workhard: and you should have the liberty of getting it exactly right even if you could not post. The process appears to be really tedious but really, GOOD LUCK on painting the guitar just as Mami's HSS Fender Strat.

On a lighter note, i was thinking if you would know how i could get a guitar painted exactly like that by a custom shop in Sydney? No problem at all if you cannot reply! I understand

Are you bringing a guitar in from Pakistan when you come to Australia? The two main reasons why I'm doing this myself is that:

• It's really hard to find somewhere that does custom art
  
• If you do manage to find someone, it'll cost a fortune, we're talking $500 at least.
  

It's also because most "painters" I guess are more experienced in painting stuff like car parts, machinery and stuff like buildings. So when it comes to painting a guitar, it's like a completely different animal, there are certain methods you NEED to follow to paint a guitar. Not many people know how to paint guitars.
I also think that customising a guitar is very fun and I feel that in the long run, this might be my favourite guitar, even more than the Ibanez .love.

sealion wrote:WOW O.o how do you know how to do all this stuff? .stars.

I spent a LOT of time reading forums and watching videos. I've also made many mistakes along the way. I really DON'T know all this stuff. I'm just really good at following procedures.

Hey everyone!

Can I say that I am SUPER, MEGA, EXTREMELY EXCITED?!

Mami swirls are under way! .clap.



I've printed out the templates and tried getting it as close to the original as possible. Then I taped down the large spots and very lightly glued the inside pieces and the tiny spots.

It was hard getting the right kind of red because the paint I bought was very close to a blood red while I was aiming for a dark red with a slight orange blend. The paint is actually very runny so I couldn't just simply get a blob of this, a blob of that, and smash it together.

I actually went to the kitchen and emptied one of my food colouring droppers and used that to mix the paint in a basin haha.

All in all, I mixed the red I needed, went off to paint and maybe gotten a little high from the fumes .stars.



Once again, I need to wait for it to dry so I can apply additional coats.

I think everyone, myself included, has been waiting for this part for a very long time and I'm very happy and proud to say that WE MADE IT GUYS!! .hora.

For me it's really like having colour television after living my whole life with black and white haha

Hey! Sorry about double (triple) posting but I have some pictures for you!


It was actually a LOT messier. Some of the paper got stuck to the guitar. Some areas of the glue pulled away the black paint, it was a nightmare. I fixed it up as best as I could.

A HUGE NOTE. DON'T STICK THE TEMPLATE TO THE GUITAR .fustrated.

I decided to stick on some hardware to see how the guitar would look. It's the old bridge and neck with the new pickguard.



It all looks nice in the photos but when you actually hold it and look at it, you'll notice all the mistakes. Hopefully the other swirls turn out well.

EDIT: Got some more photos!




I'm not particularly happy about how the red and yellow turned out but the GREEN was perfect!

iirc ... MAMI went to a surf shop or something. :/ Or I may have made that up.

Looking awesome~! (and I just realised that's what your signature says.)

Pretty good so far! Can you go back and fix the edges of the circles with a small brush or something?

GeoFreak wrote:Pretty good so far! Can you go back and fix the edges of the circles with a small brush or something?

Yeah, I've been working the edges with a small brush but it's still hard to get nice round edges.
At the same time I like how it isn't "perfect" because I guess it'll remind me that it's "mine"? I don't know haha.

I'M ALMOST DONE! .clap.



Still a bit messy. I want to get orange over and done with and then to a complete touch up with the black.

That's looking pretty awesome! Nearly there .clap.

Can't wait final result

Hey everyone!

Today holds a different kind of update. I can honestly say that the postman is one of my most favourite people. He just brings me presents all the time hehe.

I received a package this morning from the US. Because of this, I already knew what was going to be inside...


First thing that was inside were the tuners that I had ordered.
Gotoh 6-side chrome tuners.


BUT, what comes next is what really excites me.




GLORIOUS FENDER! .wow.

I mentioned before that I had this neck custom made and ordered so for the guitar enthusiasts, I'll put up the specs here and the reasons why I ordered what I did.

• The neck is made of Canadian Hard Rock Maple, or just Hard Maple. This is one of the most traditional Fender neck woods. Obviously I chose maple because it's the same material as the Mami Strat but the benefits of maple is that it is dense and strong. It provides a bright and glassy tone.
  
• The fretboard is also made of the same Hard Maple.
  
• The nut width is 1 5/8". I chose this because it is the smallest nut width. This nut width is very comfortable for players with small hands and for rhythm playing. Although I have "large" hands, I think having a small nut width will make playing even easier.
  
• A modern C neck profile. I chose this because I already own an Ibanez with a Wizard II neck, super thin. I played a U shape, aka the baseball bat neck and found it too chunky so I stepped it down and settled for the modern C. Modern C's are comfortably oval and works well for any playing style. It is also used on many Strats and Teles.
  
• A 9.5" radius. The radius of the neck determines how "round" the fretboard is. If you look closely, your guitar fretboard isn't 180 degrees flat, it's curved to accomodate the natural ergonomic shape of your fingers. The smaller the radius, the rounder the curve. The 9.5" radius is used on newer Fender necks. To give you an idea of radiuses, Gibson uses a 10-11" radius, Ibanez uses a 12" radius and Jacksons use a 16" radius, super flat!
  
• 22 frets. Self explanatory
  
• 6100 size frets, aka super jumbo! This is the kind of stuff they use on Ibanez necks. I chose this because my Ibanez neck has 6100 fret wire and I absolutely love it. I wouldn't have it any other way.
  
• Nitro satin finish.
  

Hey guys, Just a mock up for today to see how it all looks together. I'm still waiting for the Fender bridge to arrive so hopefully it won't be much longer. That is the body with the new neck and pickguard but old bridge.



From this point I need to do a few things.

• Touch up with black gloss
  
• Retouch the colours as best as I can
  
• Seal the body with gloss.
  

look at that hard work

Hey, I realised that in the few most recent posts, I haven't been keeping up with the parts and total costs.

Items purchased to date:

• Stratocaster body. $50.00
  
• 1L Septone paint stripper. $20.00
  
• Duct tape. $4.00
  
• Wet & Dry sandpaper x2. $2.60 ($1.30 each)
  
• Air Spray Gun. $35.00
  
• 125mL pot of Grey primer. $5.00
  
• 125mL pot of Black paint. $5.00
  
• 1L Mineral Turpentine. $4.90
  
• 3-ply BWB pickguard. $7.00
  
• Black pickup covers and knobs. $3.50
  
• Electronics. $15.00
  
• 5 colours of paint at $4.00 each. $20.00
  
• Black and white paint at $7.00 each. $14.00
  
• 3 paintbrush set. $5.00
  
• Custom made Fender licensed neck. $200.00
  
• Gotoh tuners. $50.00
  

Total cost to date:
$441.00

Good job
I wish I had a guitar like Mami's...
Yours is REALLY well done

Looking forward to the final result! I'm sure it's gonna be awesome! Good job~

bro... you make me cry .toj.
totally worth the hard work man...
worth every dollar too...
it's a really wonderful job you have done
and i'm waiting for the final result :D

now... i wish i could do something to my gibson / epiphone sg bass copy...

Spoiler:

Hey guys!

I'm very happy but also a little sad to say that this project is almost over. I just need to put a final gloss coat to seal in the Mami swirls and I'm pretty much finished.
At the same time I don't want this project to end because it's given me so much to do over this university break and I just "found myself at peace" working so intimately with a guitar and transforming it into something I really love.

At this point I've drilled the holes into the neck base so I can bolt it onto the body. I've done a final mock-up before I seal the body.

In the photo you'll see the body of course, the custom-made Fender neck, new scratchplate and knobs and the Fender Vintage Tremolo which arrived in the mail yesterday afternoon.
The parts missing in the photo are the machine heads, the strings and the pickups.

The black pickup covers actually DON'T fit on the old pickups so it looks like buying new pickups is necessary, preferably with black covers as well.

CruzeRBladE wrote:bro... you make me cry .toj.
totally worth the hard work man...
worth every dollar too...
it's a really wonderful job you have done
and i'm waiting for the final result :D

now... i wish i could do something to my gibson / epiphone sg bass copy...

Spoiler:

I can help you out when it comes to parts and maybe the painting process too. It's why I created this thread to sort of give people a view from the inside on how and what a guitar goes through when it's being customised.

For me at least, I think it's easier shown rather than explained in blocks of text. If you can see what is happening and "hear" from a "real" person on what you have to go through then I believe that way, it's a lot easier to understand. If you have any questions just ask away

i guess i'd just put it in a spoiler

Spoiler:

@off-topic
so i guess... i guess a lot. and if i earn a dollar for everytime i type or say the word guess... i guess i'm rich. .rich.

Great job Waffle!

Wow! It's really wonderful!

CruzeRBladE wrote:i guess i'd just put it in a spoiler

Spoiler:

@off-topic
so i guess... i guess a lot. and if i earn a dollar for everytime i type or say the word guess... i guess i'm rich. .rich.

When it comes to painting wooden furniture and painting a guitar, there will be some similarities between the two, the obvious one being they are both handling woods.
Honestly, that only really matters when you are applying the base coats for the paint (in my case, the black base coat for the Mami Strat). After you've finished your base coat it doesn't matter what paint you use on top of it. As long as you seal it all in the end, your paint will be protected.

Budget will always be an issue. To be honest, I could only afford all of this because I was working at a high-end department store (David Jones for you Australians) over this Christmas Holidays. They paid REALLY well there so the $500 or so Australian dollars spent on this project was no problem.

I think it is a good idea to know what you want to buy before you start anything. That way you can set yourself a budget and you can work smoothly through the project. It would suck to have to postpone your project because you can't afford more paints for example.

With all copy guitars, it is very likely that they will use parts which aren't the same size as official parts. For example, I have NEVER seen a Tune-o-matic/Gibson-style hardtail bridge on a bass, as shown in your picture. And the shape of that pickguard as well (not such a big deal). It is a lot harder to find parts like these compared to the official ones. If you remember one of my very early posts, something like on Page 1, I wanted a guitar EXACT like a Strat, not only so it looks like a real strat but also so that I could put brand new, easy to find parts on it.

And to answer your question (a legitimate question by the way), you could do this any way you want. It all comes together in the end anyway.
But I would say to have your parts ready before you paint. Many reasons:

• Your parts may not fit
  
• You'll be waiting for a while for your parts to come in after painting is done
  
• I think having the parts ready motivates you to finish the painting haha
  

For me, I purchased my parts first and I was painting while the parts were on their way to my house. So by the time I finished painting, the parts were at my doorstep.

EDIT: It turns out that there are lots of Tune-o-matic style bridges for bass, my apologies. I'm only experienced with Fender and Ibanez basses. If you're set on repainting and upgrading your bass it would be a good idea to bring your bass with you to a guitar shop and compare the parts between yours and the legit Gibson basses. That way you can see if the parts will fit or not and also to try them out if even like the parts or not.

That's one gorgeous guitar. Congratulations~!!!

Still my favourite guitar of MAMI's, second only to the White Falcon lol (for obvious reasons...)