‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

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mekalin
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‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by mekalin » Sat Mar 18, 2023 8:38 am

Hey, people!

Wanna build my dream Jazzmaster. Looking for a good quality body and neck that will fit all USA parts: Fender tremolo/bridge, pickguard, Kluson tuners etc.
I’m also on a budget side, so don’t have an unlimited money for this.
I have a Squier CV Jazzmaster for 10 years. Upgraded almost everything, but never liked the feel of the guitar. It’s a bit hard to play, strings feels strong under the fingers. I think i don’t like the neck.

Looking for your suggestions from your experience. Main concerns are body and neck. Which body and neck to buy? Paint and hardware is easier. Maybe also to paint if you know who can make it cool and not super expensive!?

So here are the specs for my perfect Jazzmaster.

Body and Neck.
Lake Placid Blue 'custom color 'Jazzmaster, weight ~ 8.0 lbs., a nut width of 1 5/8 inches and a scale length of 25 1/2 inches.
Solid alder body, one-piece maple neck 7.25 radius with a medium profile, C-shape. Veneer rosewood fretboard with 21 frets and unbound fingerboard with pearloid dots. Small, strat style headstock and default 2 3/16 Strat heel neck pocket.

Color.
Lake Placid Blue (little bit darker, more saturated), nitro paint over white prime, clear nitro.
Matching Lake Placid Blue maple headstock with decal with Fender "Spaghetti" logo.
Color is very important. I’ve refinished my CV Jazzmaster also LPB. Refin is nice, but the color is more modern Fender LPB: a little desaturated, tonally a bit off. I have to show exact pictures of LPB i wanna.

Hardware.
3-ply white (W-B-W) plastic pickguard, amp-style knobs (Witch hat), Kluson tuners, Staytrem bridge, SD Antiquity II, Fender USA tremolo.

I’m locating in Europe. Would be thankful for your suggestions! Thnx

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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by JVG » Sat Mar 18, 2023 11:02 pm

Hey there,

There are plenty of options available, mostly in the US. Everyone's idea of “on a budget” is different, so without knowing how much you are willing to spend here are a few options.

At the cheaper end, Allparts make excellent necks and bodies, but don’t have a big range of options.

At the next price point, Musikraft are great, and have a massive range of neck options. They are my preferred neck maker.

Other companies to check out include Warmoth, Guitar Mill, GuitarForm, GuitarBuild, ToneBomb, SoundGuitarWorks.

There are also some smaller builders who sell stuff via Reverb and Ebay.

Good luck with it.

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mekalin
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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by mekalin » Sun Mar 19, 2023 5:19 am

JVG wrote:
Sat Mar 18, 2023 11:02 pm
Hey there,

There are plenty of options available, mostly in the US. Everyone's idea of “on a budget” is different, so without knowing how much you are willing to spend here are a few options.

At the cheaper end, Allparts make excellent necks and bodies, but don’t have a big range of options.

At the next price point, Musikraft are great, and have a massive range of neck options. They are my preferred neck maker.

Other companies to check out include Warmoth, Guitar Mill, GuitarForm, GuitarBuild, ToneBomb, SoundGuitarWorks.

There are also some smaller builders who sell stuff via Reverb and Ebay.

Good luck with it.
Thanks for the info 🤜🏻🤛🏻

Do Allparts or Musikraft fit a USA pickguard? I really don’t wanna have problems with body route or kinda.

I think around 700-800$ is my budget for body and neck unfinished (would be nice painted, but it’s not realistic 🫠).

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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by andy_tchp » Sun Mar 19, 2023 7:17 pm

You can forget about Warmoth if you want to use a USA pickguard and not have to modify it/the body.
"I don't know why we asked him to join the band 'cause the rest of us don't like country music all that much; we just like Graham Lee."
David McComb, 1987.

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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by mekalin » Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:03 am

andy_tchp wrote:
Sun Mar 19, 2023 7:17 pm
You can forget about Warmoth if you want to use a USA pickguard and not have to modify it/the body.
Thnx!

And what about Allparts, Musikraft?
Is there a 3rd party company that makes body that matches USA Fender body?

Also i started to learn neck options at Musikraft — it’s just a lot of you can choose.
I’m looking towards 1 5/8” for nut width and medium-thin C-shape neck. I found my Squier CV has more like 1 11/16” nut width and something similar to D or C shape, with not enough back curve, for my hands. And a sticky polyester lacquer. I just don’t like it. I have a pretty small hands.
Veneer board is more expensive than a Slab one, but is it a reall difference? Truss rod adjustment at the heel or at the head of a neck? Just wanna here your opinions and arguments.

Thanks to everybody 😌

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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by glennleaguesny » Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:36 am

In my experience, I've really dug Guitar Mill bodies. They have an "already made" section that has stuff ready to ship. They list wood type, weight, and pictures of the actual body you'd be buying.

I've put together 2 Guitar Mill Jazzmasters so far and have not had any trouble fitting AVRI USA Jazzmaster parts. Granted, you'll have to drill out your pickguard screw holes and tremolo screw holes.

It wasn't clear in your post, but are you painting it yourself? Or were you looking for a company that also does the finish work? If so, Guitar Mill does finishing, but I've always just bought the unfinished bodies. You could also look for "MJT." If you're patient on Reverb or Ebay you could probably score a finished LPB body by them. Or just order it on their site and incur the wait time.

For your neck, Musikcraft or Warmoth is a nice mixture of quality with a decent price tag. They are more expensive than All Parts but I've noticed the quality may be a bit better, especially with Musikraft. Both companies also allow you to craft a neck to your specs (Musikraft lets you go a bit more in-depth). In my experience, both my Musikraft and Warmoth necks have paired with Guitar Mill bodies with no issue

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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by mekalin » Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:46 am

glennleaguesny wrote:
Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:36 am
In my experience, I've really dug Guitar Mill bodies. They have an "already made" section that has stuff ready to ship. They list wood type, weight, and pictures of the actual body you'd be buying.

I've put together 2 Guitar Mill Jazzmasters so far and have not had any trouble fitting AVRI USA Jazzmaster parts. Granted, you'll have to drill out your pickguard screw holes and tremolo screw holes.

It wasn't clear in your post, but are you painting it yourself? Or were you looking for a company that also does the finish work? If so, Guitar Mill does finishing, but I've always just bought the unfinished bodies. You could also look for "MJT." If you're patient on Reverb or Ebay you could probably score a finished LPB body by them. Or just order it on their site and incur the wait time.

For your neck, Musikcraft or Warmoth is a nice mixture of quality with a decent price tag. They are more expensive than All Parts but I've noticed the quality may be a bit better, especially with Musikraft. Both companies also allow you to craft a neck to your specs (Musikraft lets you go a bit more in-depth). In my experience, both my Musikraft and Warmoth necks have paired with Guitar Mill bodies with no issue
Great info! Thank you.

Do you think GuitaMill body will fit Musikraft neck without any issues?

No, I won’t do it myself. I have one master who could do it, but i also think about do it in US. I really wanna nail the LPB i like (i will specify pictures). One master repainted my CV Squier, and the job was nice (few imperfections), but the color was a little off. More warm tone of blue with violet or pinkish tone to it.I realized how different this color could be under different lighting conditions. But, I still can see how this modern Fender LPB is different to original.

Would you recommend MJT for paint?

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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by glennleaguesny » Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:59 am

mekalin wrote:
Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:46 am
glennleaguesny wrote:
Mon Mar 20, 2023 4:36 am
In my experience, I've really dug Guitar Mill bodies. They have an "already made" section that has stuff ready to ship. They list wood type, weight, and pictures of the actual body you'd be buying.

I've put together 2 Guitar Mill Jazzmasters so far and have not had any trouble fitting AVRI USA Jazzmaster parts. Granted, you'll have to drill out your pickguard screw holes and tremolo screw holes.

It wasn't clear in your post, but are you painting it yourself? Or were you looking for a company that also does the finish work? If so, Guitar Mill does finishing, but I've always just bought the unfinished bodies. You could also look for "MJT." If you're patient on Reverb or Ebay you could probably score a finished LPB body by them. Or just order it on their site and incur the wait time.

For your neck, Musikcraft or Warmoth is a nice mixture of quality with a decent price tag. They are more expensive than All Parts but I've noticed the quality may be a bit better, especially with Musikraft. Both companies also allow you to craft a neck to your specs (Musikraft lets you go a bit more in-depth). In my experience, both my Musikraft and Warmoth necks have paired with Guitar Mill bodies with no issue
Great info! Thank you.

Do you think GuitaMill body will fit Musikraft neck without any issues?

No, I won’t do it myself. I have one master who could do it, but i also think about do it in US. I really wanna nail the LPB i like (i will specify pictures). One master repainted my CV Squier, and the job was nice (few imperfections), but the color was a little off. More warm tone of blue with violet or pinkish tone to it.I realized how different this color could be under different lighting conditions. But, I still can see how this modern Fender LPB is different to original.

Would you recommend MJT for paint?
My Musikraft neck fit on my Guitar Mill body without any issue.

For paint, I've never had anything done by MJT. There's a member here, he goes by Copacetic Customs that does fantastic paint work. You can see his stuff a few posts below yours, as well as on Instagram. It's crazy cool. I bet you could ship him a neck and body directly and have everything painted at once.

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Re: ‘LPB’ Jazzmaster build. Body, neck, paint etc.

Post by daysleeperjeff » Fri Mar 31, 2023 6:16 pm

Doing a project myself now and I can confirm that My Musikraft Neck perfectly fit my Guitar Mill body as if they were made for each other.

The only problem I'm having is with the pickguard. I have been trying to get an anodized guard to fit and it does...but it's a little off. This is really going for perfection here but on the bottom horn there is more space to the right side of the pickguard (Where the bottom cutaway is) than there is on the bottom, under the pickguard. I have tried two other pickguards designed to fit 62 USA Jazzmasters but all of them do the same thing, leading me to believe the body was not sanded enough on the lower horn cut away.

I love a nice even, equally spaced line around the bottom horn. To be fair even some stock fenders/squiers have this uneven spacing but most upper end Jazzmasters do not.

I might have to sand it down a little myself or something because if I get this body painted and commit to it I'm sure it will always bother me.

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