Well, the Wedgetail is now happily in the hands of its new owner, who seems very pleased with it. He got in touch after he’d been playing it for a while with the following message:

‘It’s now been a few weeks since I got my hands on the completed guitar. As you would probably expect, I love it!
I think the looks of the guitar are great (although obviously this is a subjective thing). What I noticed about the guitar that doesn’t come through in the pictures are the small details, or should I say attention to detail that Andy has crafted with the guitar. The neck in particular has been beautifully made.  Surprisingly, despite the finish of the guitar being impeccable, there is still a feeling of the hand-made…..something you don’t get with laser-cut, factory-made guitars.
What’s probably of more interest is how it plays and sound. In a nutshell…….Amazing!
The guitar is a lead monster. The neck and action are slick. Once you pick it up, you just want to shred and as it’s ergos are perfect (for me), you want to play it for hours.
I’m also very happy with the hardware selected, especially the P90 pick-ups from Mick Brierley. Such amazing tone.
Thanks Andy for producing this guitar for me. I am truly delighted to own it. I will cherish it forever.’

We’re very happy when the customer is happy! Hoping to get a poolside photo shoot organised for this beauty soon.

We’re going with our favourite Mick Brierley pickups on this build. As the client said: ‘The pups were an easy choice after playing/hearing several of your guitars back to back. To my ear, they are very expressive and versatile pick-ups. I can’t wait until it all comes together!’
We agree, here at ATC! They’re great Aussie made pickups and a number one choice in the Andy Taylor Customs workshop.

Shaping the neck too, getting it to its final stages

Time for a mockup to see how it’s going to look… Coming together nicely, I think.

The Aussie timber looking beautiful on its own, though as per the client’s request, is destined to go green.

I’m in contact with the client all the way through, making sure it’s shaping up how he envisions it. For example, he asked for a bit less carve on the horns, so I flattened it out a small amount. He also commented: ‘I love the grain in the silky oak cap. It has movement in it, as though it’s already seen plenty of strumming.’ And hopefully destined for a lot more.

And then it’s time to go greeeeeeen.

The back is just a few coats of nitro, staying natural.

So, the Wedgecaster will have a carved top. Or at least as carved as the 9mm cap will allow. It’ll slowly unfold and surprise me along the way – I’ll just keep carving it away until there’s no more to carve.

I should be making a move on getting ready for the pickups tomorrow and probably the switch & control cavities.  The top carve will be completed when the cap is finally glued down to the body.

I’ve channeled out a little recess for the bridge to sit in – I like to keep things low on the body.

Perfect setup – the action is great, the intonation is great (even if only with a rough little tuner for the moment ) and the Bigsby is behaving beautifully. Neck still a little chunky, but I’ll sort that soon.

Moving on now that I know we have everything in the right place.

First step is to do a bit of work on the neck, getting a protective build up on it before I start shaping it. The customer went with the Burdekin Plum fretboard, which was the darker, richer colour of the three. All were beautiful options, but I think he made a good choice for this build, it’s going to come up looking nice.

The next step is to position the controls and get everything measured out and in place. It’s nice to see it all starting to come together.

The Bigsby roller bridge will need to be lowered from where it is now. It’ll be a low sitting neck with a 3 degree neck angle. Plays some good slide guitar at the moment though. It’s looking quite Viking with those two horns…

I did a mock up of what it’s going to look like while I waited for all the hardware to turn up. Getting an idea in my head of how it’s all going to come together.

The original Wedgetail design is by Maton, an Australian guitar company based in Melbourne, who started making guitars back in 1946. I get a lot of commissions for guitars based on the Fender shapes, and they are all such classics. But it’s nice for a change to get someone with an eye for something slightly different. And building this guitar out of all Australian woods just makes sense. Of course, I put my own spin on these well-loved basic shapes, whether that’s bringing in a carved top, like will be the case for this one, or changing the depth or contour of the body, doing my own little flairs like f-holes and the headstock… The beauty of a custom made guitar is that the customer gets to have whatever they want in order to match to their own favourite features for playability; different scale lengths, wider or slimmer necks, different types of pickups in builds that they might not usually be found in, but make sense once it’s all together. There are no right or wrong answers, it’s all just a beautiful process of discovery, and creates some pretty unique guitars.

Though it can be a bit overwhelming at first for a customer to know all the details they want, especially without knowing what it’s like all put together. So that’s where I can help with some guidance as to what might work and what might not. But it’s a process that we work together on, and the end result is always pretty great.

All the bits and pieces are starting to arrive now. The wood is all Australian of course, as are the pickups, and some other bits and pieces, but the Bigsby has come in from the US.

So the wood has turned up from my order with Australian Guitar Timbers.

We’ve got the Bunya Pine one piece body:

The Southern Silky Oak cap:

The Silver Quandong Neck blank:

As for the fretboard, that will be the customer’s choice, but these are the options:
Aussie Rosewood, Lacewood, or Burdekin Plum.

Looking forward to getting into it.

Well, another commission has come in, this time based on a Wedgetail design. Bit of a different shape and style from the ones I’ve built before, but I’m always up for a new challenge.

It’s going to be another all Australian build, so far I’m thinking with the following components:

• Southern Silky Oak cap
• Bunya Pine body.
• Either Burdekin Plum, Australia Rosewood, or  Lacewood for the Fret Board.
• Silver Quandong Neck.

Other specs I’m planing on:

• 6 in line Tuners
• Tusq nut.
• Fret wire to be discussed along with scale length. Either 25.5 or 25    Fretboard radius still to be decided.
• Bolted neck as per original Wedgetail.
• Bigsby with Roller saddle bridge.
• 2 x Mick Brierley P90 pickups with Black covers. 500k pots.
• Separate Tone & Vol pots for pickups, still to be discussed.
• Top Carved or Flat to be discussed.
• Binding, colour & finish still to be discussed.

Anyway, we’re up and rolling and just waiting for the timber to turn up. All supplied by David Linton from Australian Guitar Timbers.

Looking forward to getting into it and bringing you along!