Ideas Needed

[FASTBACK340]

Slightly off-topic, but revelant to our hobby.

As discussed in another post about guitars, some of us play, we all dabble in plastic. I need the fabricate a small "pick guard " for one on my Bass's. My Warwick has a small area between the base of the neck and the forward pick up where I can get in to snap the G string when I slap. It also has a nature wood finish I'm ruining with my finger nail digging into the wood when I snap. No factory guard is offered. So I made a pattern approx. the size I need. My question :

Without having a standard material piece made from the usual sources, give me an idea for a unique material ? I was thinking aluminum, but it wouldn't match the rest of the Bass. I'd like to make it myself.

Fire away....

Edited May 27, 2012 by FASTBACK340

[1930fordpickup]

Look on line for a piece of formica or the local kitchen place could give you a place to buy it . You could get a different color standard pick guard. Just glue it to some copper , aluminum ,steel or stainless sheet.

[FASTBACK340]

This is the Bass in question. You can see the small area I mentioned...

[philo426]

You don't want alluminum (Fender tried it in the '50s)"because it will turn your hand black.You can use plexiglass or even stainless steel if you want metal.

[FASTBACK340]

Hmmm... Plexi-glass. Thin clear piece of Plexi-glass!

No worries about color coordinating or material. Hard to notice... Simple to work with and cheap.

DING-DING-DING! We have a winner! Will post results....

[jeff ewaskey]

I agree with Philo. Plexi would be an excellent choice. The stainless would be cool if you used a real thin piece and polished it to match the nickel hardware. Very cool bass by the way.

[rel14]

A piece of Lexan, stronger then plexaglass

[Danny Lectro]

A freind who works with plexi in his art projects made me a replacement pickguard for one of my basses. The stuff is available in many colors, even black. You could also go with clear, as you mentioned, kind of similar to some Danelectro instruments.

[FASTBACK340]

At first I was thinking of retro Tortoise shell, but now I'm thinking of maybe a bronze or brown smoke color Plexi-glass/Lexan.... which I can hopefully find locally. I want to complete this in the next day or so. Hopefully this will be a quickie project.

Thanks Jeff. I just recently traded in my Ibanez BTB 4 string towards the Warwick. It's the Corvette $$ (pronounced Double Buck) model and I love it. It's just the mechanics I'm working with now. The corner of the fret board and the close proximity of the pick up makes for a small target to slap & pop. Between my finger nails digging into my brand new guitar's body and me smacking my thumb against the corner of the fret board has me thinking of reaching for the Dremel too....

Updates to follow. Thanks for the interest!

Edited May 27, 2012 by FASTBACK340