Reddit reviews Building Electric Guitars: How to Make Solid-Body, Hollow-Body and Semi-Acoustic Electric Guitars and Bass Guitars

my grandpa has built acoustics for a long time so he's always been a resource, i also had this book which is a great source of info on the entire process: http://www.amazon.com/Building-Electric-Guitars-Hollow-Body-Semi-Acoustic/dp/3901314075

As someone who's actually hand cut/measured a fret-board once, I will never do it again. I used the standard Fender scale length for reference. The problem with it is the required degree of accuracy needed to successfully produce a properly tuned fret board. It's painstakingly slow. I used this particular book and it's fantastically well written. It covers how to literally build a guitar from scratch, including winding pickups, making a fret board, and even how to make a truss rod (that bit that runs down the middle of the inside of the neck). I built one for a school science project out of only things readily available from a hardware store (save the strings, also not an electric for the sake of time) and it was surprisingly good, but hard to tune.

My recommendation is Building Electric Guitars by Martin Koch

Hello fellow aspiring luthier! I decided a few months back that I wanted to learn how to build guitars too (get away from the computer, learn a skill, etc.). The fact that you have your dad's tools and expertise is a huge booster. I'm starting completely from scratch and it's slowing things down.

A few resources:

Martin Koch's Building Electric Guitars - You'll see this book mentioned often as one of the staple reads. It's cheap and a quick read. Highly recommend giving it a look.

Crimson Guitars - I stumbled upon their kit building series where Ben and his apprentice take a cheap kit and make it an expensive custom guitar. From there, I fell in love. Their YouTube channel is packed with videos meticulously documenting every step of guitar building. Check out the Clarity build series. Their latest bit is a 12 hour guitar build. Crimson also operates a store and produces their own tools and products. I've purchased their fret-leveling kit and am super happy with it. Finally, there is the guild. I haven't joined, yet but intend to eventually.

Pitbull Guitars - In searching around, these were the only guys I could find a PRS-style kit from. Turns out they've got a pretty good resource in their forums (and it's open to anyone). Lots of information throughout the forums (though poorly organized) and helpful folks who have finished many builds.

Here's what I did when i got started on my first bass - see pics here:

I bought and read three books cover-to-cover:

• Building Electric Guitars - In depth, good theory, something of a "reference"
  
• Electric Guitar and Bass Design: The guitar or bass of your dreams from first draft to complete plan - this book focuses purely on design. I think it's interesting even if you don't want to build because it helps you understand why basses are designed the way they are and what is right for you.
  
• Make Your Own Electric Guitar & Bass - This is a step-by-step recipe for building a specific bass. I didn't make that bass, but it was helpful to follow along.
  
  I watched LOTS of youtube videos. Both on making basses and using wood working tools. I wasn't familiar with wood working walking in, so I would make a list of what I wanted to do each day and then spend 30 minutes or so watching videos on how to use the tools and the step.
  
  I hung out at projectguitar.com. Great website with some really talented builders and noobs like myself. I followed along with other builds and kept a build thread myself. It's amazing how helpful people were in answering very specific questions.
  
  I went window shopping. I lived for several years in Tokyo where there's an entire district of guitar and bass shops. I hit up a bunch of shops, played a bunch of amazing basses, took a ton of pictures, made a bunch of notes, and got a feel for what I wanted. I was able to get my hands on basses in the $5k-$10k price range to see what those builders did. It was inspirational and upped my thinking substantially.
  
  I've now built several basses and two guitars - I am hooked. Playing something that I made myself really adds to my overall enjoyment and it inspires me to practice more. Plus I really like the mind-clearing focus required to be successful in the shop. When I'm working I have to clear my mind and focus only on the task at hand.

The best way to start, IMO, is to read. Get as much info as you can on the subject. There's a couple of books that are pretty good; This One or This One are good places to start. Another thought is to check out websites like projectguitar.com. They've also got a forum with lots of tips and such.

Finally, it's going to be a big asset if you already know your way around some various woodshop machinery, if you plan on doing it all from scratch. Knowing how to solder helps too.
One final thing. Do't expect to be able to build something utterly incredible your first time around. Start simple; it's easy to bite off more than you can chew. You will make mistakes; it's pretty much guaranteed. Don't worry about it. When you finally finish, you'll have an instrument that you can be proud of.

Good luck!

EDIT: Almost forgot, there's also an /r/luthier subreddit as well.

I've been interested in building my own guitar for a few years now. I started seriously looking into it during my senior year of high school, and bought this book.

I plan to (at some point in the next few years) build an electric guitar. I want to build it completely from scratch, so I don't want to buy a neck.

What are the most important tips you wish you had known when you first started building?