One minute I'm wondering why and the next, I'm thinking 'Wow, that sounds good!'. I try to never speak ill of a guitar. They're like pets - they all deserve to be loved. I certainly enjoyed this more than I expected. Don't stop!
Very inspiring. All of the instruments looked creative and interesting - and curiously all tended to sound much the same [very good!]. I'd love to have a go myself, but realistically, lack the know-how. Maybe one day.
The shaped end to keep it standiung safely is genius ... Taylor do that on some of their guitars by fitting two strap buttons which is an adaptation anyone can try without taking a saw to their instrument.
Love your eye for design. Very funky! Thank you for sharing your work. If you ever decide to start your own line of guitars, I'm looking forward to purchasing a signed "Coupland"
Here in Aizawl, it is next to impossible to get quality parts so we use Ali Express a lot. However, we have a lot of teak but no maple ash or even basswood. And pick-ups, well, one has to hunt for them like an archaeologist would a dino bones😃 Despite, or even in spite of these limitations the joy of playing a homebuilt guitar cannot be beaten by anything not even a new Fender Classic Vibes (another instrument I'm saving up for - extremely expensive here these branded guitars). Thoroughly enjoyed your videos.
I really wanna hear you play more of your semi-hollow electric guitars. Please, believe me when i said they both look fantastic n sound incredibly warm. Thanks for the link. More, please 😊 Good morning from Aizawl India
I just had to comment , your hand made guitars are beautiful and sound like a million bucks . i would love to watch a video of you going through all the steps to turn the blank wood into such a work or art . Thank you for sharing . can i buy mark 2, just kidding but i would love to see how you made that one she sounds so beautiful
I don't really care much for a guitar if it's not 6strings n traditionally shaped but I appreciate your originality n that fact your beast might not be outta place in the courts of the old English lords n kings 👍
They look lovely, thing about a guitar you made by hand is a little bit of yourself goes into it and they're as individual as a fingerprint in the way they play and sound :) I love the flying squirrel haha I trained as a luthier back in the 80's. I'd love to have a crack now at making guitars again. Sadly I just don't have the room for anything like a workshop :( perhaps when one of my lads leaves home this will be a good use of a spare room :) Have you ever considered buying some really nice seasoned wood and having a serious crack ? I actually think your designs might sell for instance look at Chapman guitars or indeed Harley Benton, basically get in touch with a factory in china throw them 5 grand to make a bunch of flying squirrels, then put em on ebay and see how it goes :)
Very nice sounding guitars, tones big companies can not get these days . Higher notes on most new guitars really disturb me . yours sound calm, mature, sweet ... :))
I was really amazed at the sound of all your guitars! Really nice! Did you install truss rods in any of the necks? Just wondering because I'd love to build something of my own from scratch. Thanks for the great video...really enjoyed all of your creations!👍😎🎸🎶
I did not install any truss rods. From my time selling top end guitars, the ones that cost as much as a decent 2nd hand car, I noticed that quite a few of them have no truss rods. The wood they use has been left long enough to dry out naturally. This usually takes about 2 years. The other thing is that their necks tend to be slightly more bulky than cheaper guitars so that was the pattern I followed. Thanks.
Hi John. Would you be willing to make another semi acoustic mark II and sell it. I love guitars with character and would love one like the mark II in my collection
Very Nice. I've built various electric guitars myself, but haven't yet tried an accoustic. Did you do much bracing on the tops? Did you spend much time experimenting to get it to sound right, or just wing it and hope for the best?
nwimpney With electrics you are assured of a usable sound but acoustics are a different thing altogether. All that work and you wont know what it will sound like until you string it up. The first few I did I just used cheep diy materials and had low expectations regarding sound quality. Then when I had the physical construction figured out I used better materials. There is always a balance between making the guitar sturdy and getting a responsive instrument. In one guitar I under estimated the strength and it slowly collapsed under the strain. It is all part of the learning process. While you can simply follow a set of instructions to build a Dreadnought the experimental approach does teach you why things are the way they are.
Yeah, how about the cruuet? I don't even know how to comment save for how much better you could have utilized your resources to build a better looking guitar. But, hey, what do I know? It sounds rather good for such an unique looking acoustic stringed instrument👍
At the time I made this I was performing in churches, dressed as a monk and telling the stories of St Columba and St Patrick. I needed something that looked ancient.
Hi a very interesting channel. I am going to buy a small size guitar for my daughter I am thinking of buying a squire 3/4 in pink , theirs a but an it's the tunners they are junk , would you have an idea of the hole size on the squire mini so I can replace the junk that's on there , I really enjoy your channel I watch with my daughter to find a channel with no swearing is great , me an Beth who's four give thumbs up!
The guitar belonged to an ex pupil so I no longer have it to hand but from memory I believe the machine heads on the mini are standard size. Regards to you and Beth. John
Hi Norman, yes I made the lot. As I started these before the internet I had to work out a formula to get the frets in the right place. The head is the first bit i make as it is the hardest part to get right. Weight wise the Squirrel is lighter than an SG while the pine made guitars are similar to a Les Paul. I forgot to say in the video but the 2nd semi had a lot of material routed out from the top and back.
Yes I used a small two handed plane called a spokeshave to make them. They are without truss rods and so a bit more chunky than your typical guitar. The neck represents half the work involved in the instrument.
Yeah. I have built a few guitars myself but I haven't attempted a neck yet. You can get them from China very cheap and they are pretty good needing only a little fettling. I intend to try a neck build but it looks tricky. What kind of wood did you use for your necks. I have some Canadian maple flooring which is as hard as rock so I am planning to try that.
The blonde LP shaped guitar is entirely made of pine, a B&Q shelf kit to be exact. Later instruments have mahogany necks. The maple flooring should be fine as long as it has been allowed to dry out completely. If I came across a good piece of timber I would stick it in the loft for a year to make sure it was not going to bend on me once it was installed in a guitar.
whats the story with the first fret on ur guitar. I have an old spanish guitar that has a ( 0 ) frett, one extra at the bottom, whats the story with that, was that fine tuning on ur build, an error fixed by the 0 frett? 1min 52 seconds, see your extra frett at the bottom
idealmethod Back in the 60's most guitars seemed to have a zero fret. It was a way of ensuring that the strings were as low to the fingerboard as possible. It also gave a slightly more unified tone as nuts and frets are made of different materials. On guitars like this one the nut is simply a string guide and has no effect on the tone of the guitar. They rather fell out of fashion in more recent times possibly due to the extra work involved in fitting one. It may only add 20 minutes to the construction time but if you are making 100 guitars a week that puts your wage bill up. I have added zero frets to a couple of guitars that came in for repair because they were not playing in tune. One was an Epiphone and the other a Suzuki.
John Coupland I'll second that idea. I know electronics fairly well, so I understand what's going on, but at its simplest, you can connect 2 wires from the pickup to the 2 terminals on the output jack and call it done. ;) I built one of my basses with no volume control, and just adjust it on my amp. It works great. adding a volume control is dead simple though. Adding more pickups and a switch gets a bit more complicated, but is still easy if you find a diagram to follow. Regardless, there's not much you can hurt by doing it incorrectly, as long as you don't actually break the wires off or something. A badly miswired guitar just won't work. you won't hurt anything. You can just open it back up and figure out what you did wrong.
I made all the necks myself. They account for half the man hours involved in making the guitar. At first I copied the fret spacing from bought guitars but later I managed to do the maths so that I could use non standard scale lengths.
idealmethod Yes I made the necks as well. That takes as much time as the rest of the guitar. While you can buy ready made frets I used fret wire which is sold by the metre. 1 metre is enough for an acoustic. On my first guitar I simply copied the fret positions from a bought guitar but I then worked out a formula which gives the correct positions. That enabled me to make instruments with non-standard scale lengths.
No idea why I'm watching this in 2020. But worth watching as man speaks likes singing 😊
Darshana Bamunuarachchi I also watch John’s videos for therapeutic reasons 😊
One minute I'm wondering why and the next, I'm thinking 'Wow, that sounds good!'. I try to never speak ill of a guitar. They're like pets - they all deserve to be loved. I certainly enjoyed this more than I expected. Don't stop!
John your bloody amazing sir. I love them all.
What a great collection - Brian May eat your heart out!
Your LP-sized semi is so good in looks n in sounds - very warm, I love it.
Very inspiring. All of the instruments looked creative and interesting - and curiously all tended to sound much the same [very good!].
I'd love to have a go myself, but realistically, lack the know-how. Maybe one day.
A good way in is to start with one of those build it yourself kits. They do not cost much and you can take them to bits and have another go.
The shaped end to keep it standiung safely is genius ... Taylor do that on some of their guitars by fitting two strap buttons which is an adaptation anyone can try without taking a saw to their instrument.
You never fail to make me laugh John! Appreciate your videos!
Love your eye for design. Very funky! Thank you for sharing your work. If you ever decide to start your own line of guitars, I'm looking forward to purchasing a signed "Coupland"
Here in Aizawl, it is next to impossible to get quality parts so we use Ali Express a lot.
However, we have a lot of teak but no maple ash or even basswood.
And pick-ups, well, one has to hunt for them like an archaeologist would a dino bones😃
Despite, or even in spite of these limitations the joy of playing a homebuilt guitar cannot be beaten by anything not even a new Fender Classic Vibes (another instrument I'm saving up for - extremely expensive here these branded guitars).
Thoroughly enjoyed your videos.
creative work! especially like anglefish, sounds wonderful, God bless
Thank you Clifford and happy Easter.
Lovely work john ! They sound beautiful , fantastic job my friend
I really wanna hear you play more of your semi-hollow electric guitars.
Please, believe me when i said they both look fantastic n sound incredibly warm.
Thanks for the link.
More, please 😊
Good morning from Aizawl India
Glad you enjoyed my collection David.
Awesome guitars John! I always enjoy your videos!
That last one is a Klingon weapon.
You ought to be on the telly
Very beautiful guitars sir, I really like your videos.
New to your videos, just today. Mr. Coupland.. you, are what CZcams is at it's best. Cheers from Minneapolis.
Great video. They might be guitars only their designer could love but inspiring none the less! Flying Squirrel - genius!
GENUSS!!!!!! well done sir.
what an immensely creative fellow!! Not to mention entertaining😳
cheryl lakin I’ve been watching him for years now! God give him good health and all!
They look great
Always like your videos never fail to make me smile.Some strange looking instruments there,but don't sound too bad mate.Keep up the good work fella.
intresting to hear how you acquired the wood B&Q love it.
beautiful guitar. i love your videos. God bless you!
Thanks Julia, May Jesus be with you.
I just had to comment , your hand made guitars are beautiful and sound like a million bucks . i would love to watch a video of you going through all the steps to turn the blank wood into such a work or art . Thank you for sharing . can i buy mark 2, just kidding but i would love to see how you made that one she sounds so beautiful
Love your videos john!! Just finnished building my led Paul copy thanks for the inspiration'
Dawson Hooker Thanks Dawson. Sometimes typos reveal our true desires, a Led Paul, the ultimate heavy metal guitar!
+John Coupland hahahahaha
Great video, John! My favourite was "Angelfish". Really beautiful tone and it looks like it's from the 1300's. :)
Great Work mate, The seccond Reminds Me a bit of a banjo
Brilliant ☺
Thanks Neil, much appreciated.
Really cool!
Good work satch..mabuhay from tambobo philippines
Nice warm tone on that first one.
I don't really care much for a guitar if it's not 6strings n traditionally shaped but I appreciate your originality n that fact your beast might not be outta place in the courts of the old English lords n kings 👍
They look lovely, thing about a guitar you made by hand is a little bit of yourself goes into it and they're as individual as a fingerprint in the way they play and sound :) I love the flying squirrel haha
I trained as a luthier back in the 80's. I'd love to have a crack now at making guitars again. Sadly I just don't have the room for anything like a workshop :( perhaps when one of my lads leaves home this will be a good use of a spare room :) Have you ever considered buying some really nice seasoned wood and having a serious crack ? I actually think your designs might sell for instance look at Chapman guitars or indeed Harley Benton, basically get in touch with a factory in china throw them 5 grand to make a bunch of flying squirrels, then put em on ebay and see how it goes :)
If I was younger I might just do that but I am now officially at the, 'Can't be bothered,' stage of life.
I really love all of your videos
+F And S
Thanks for the encouragement, much appreciated.
Thanks
Very nice sounding guitars, tones big companies can not get these days . Higher notes on most new guitars really disturb me . yours sound calm, mature, sweet ... :))
Thanks Murat, much appreciated.
i like the last one best :D
Thanks for making this - I really like the one you pulled out at 9:28
I second that! That's one cool build!
Very nice
I was really amazed at the sound of all your guitars! Really nice! Did you install truss rods in any of the necks? Just wondering because I'd love to build something of my own from scratch. Thanks for the great video...really enjoyed all of your creations!👍😎🎸🎶
I did not install any truss rods. From my time selling top end guitars, the ones that cost as much as a decent 2nd hand car, I noticed that quite a few of them have no truss rods. The wood they use has been left long enough to dry out naturally. This usually takes about 2 years. The other thing is that their necks tend to be slightly more bulky than cheaper guitars so that was the pattern I followed. Thanks.
John Coupland thanks for the information and getting back so quickly. I really appreciate it! Take care!☺
John Coupland interesting! I didn’t know!
Hi John. Would you be willing to make another semi acoustic mark II and sell it. I love guitars with character and would love one like the mark II in my collection
MicroGroover29 Sorry MG but for health reasons I had to give up guitar making. Just part and parcel of getting old.
Very Nice. I've built various electric guitars myself, but haven't yet tried an accoustic. Did you do much bracing on the tops? Did you spend much time experimenting to get it to sound right, or just wing it and hope for the best?
nwimpney With electrics you are assured of a usable sound but acoustics are a different thing altogether. All that work and you wont know what it will sound like until you string it up. The first few I did I just used cheep diy materials and had low expectations regarding sound quality. Then when I had the physical construction figured out I used better materials. There is always a balance between making the guitar sturdy and getting a responsive instrument. In one guitar I under estimated the strength and it slowly collapsed under the strain. It is all part of the learning process. While you can simply follow a set of instructions to build a Dreadnought the experimental approach does teach you why things are the way they are.
O great
Yeah, how about the cruuet?
I don't even know how to comment save for how much better you could have utilized your resources to build a better looking guitar.
But, hey, what do I know?
It sounds rather good for such an unique looking acoustic stringed instrument👍
At the time I made this I was performing in churches, dressed as a monk and telling the stories of St Columba and St Patrick. I needed something that looked ancient.
Hi a very interesting channel. I am going to buy a small size guitar for my daughter I am thinking of buying a squire 3/4 in pink , theirs a but an it's the tunners they are junk , would you have an idea of the hole size on the squire mini so I can replace the junk that's on there , I really enjoy your channel I watch with my daughter to find a channel with no swearing is great , me an Beth who's four give thumbs up!
The guitar belonged to an ex pupil so I no longer have it to hand but from memory I believe the machine heads on the mini are standard size.
Regards to you and Beth.
John
Thanks John after some digging I believe you are right .👍
awesome guitars John. The Flying Squirel sounds nice. You made the necks headstocks and fretboard? Are the electrics heavy?
Hi Norman, yes I made the lot. As I started these before the internet I had to work out a formula to get the frets in the right place. The head is the first bit i make as it is the hardest part to get right. Weight wise the Squirrel is lighter than an SG while the pine made guitars are similar to a Les Paul. I forgot to say in the video but the 2nd semi had a lot of material routed out from the top and back.
Great work. I love the wacky shaped ones. Not bad sounding guitars. Did you make the necks?
Yes I used a small two handed plane called a spokeshave to make them. They are without truss rods and so a bit more chunky than your typical guitar. The neck represents half the work involved in the instrument.
Yeah. I have built a few guitars myself but I haven't attempted a neck yet. You can get them from China very cheap and they are pretty good needing only a little fettling. I intend to try a neck build but it looks tricky. What kind of wood did you use for your necks. I have some Canadian maple flooring which is as hard as rock so I am planning to try that.
The blonde LP shaped guitar is entirely made of pine, a B&Q shelf kit to be exact. Later instruments have mahogany necks. The maple flooring should be fine as long as it has been allowed to dry out completely. If I came across a good piece of timber I would stick it in the loft for a year to make sure it was not going to bend on me once it was installed in a guitar.
Thanks for that.
whats the story with the first fret on ur guitar. I have an old spanish guitar that has a ( 0 ) frett, one extra at the bottom, whats the story with that, was that fine tuning on ur build, an error fixed by the 0 frett? 1min 52 seconds, see your extra frett at the bottom
idealmethod Back in the 60's most guitars seemed to have a zero fret. It was a way of ensuring that the strings were as low to the fingerboard as possible. It also gave a slightly more unified tone as nuts and frets are made of different materials. On guitars like this one the nut is simply a string guide and has no effect on the tone of the guitar. They rather fell out of fashion in more recent times possibly due to the extra work involved in fitting one. It may only add 20 minutes to the construction time but if you are making 100 guitars a week that puts your wage bill up. I have added zero frets to a couple of guitars that came in for repair because they were not playing in tune. One was an Epiphone and the other a Suzuki.
aahhh
thanks
Now and again, I think of building my own guitar. I'm just afraid I'll horribly mess it up on the electrical side of things.
Farmeryeti On my first electric build I simply opened up whatever guitar I happeneed to have and copied what they had done.
John Coupland
I'll second that idea. I know electronics fairly well, so I understand what's going on, but at its simplest, you can connect 2 wires from the pickup to the 2 terminals on the output jack and call it done. ;) I built one of my basses with no volume control, and just adjust it on my amp. It works great. adding a volume control is dead simple though. Adding more pickups and a switch gets a bit more complicated, but is still easy if you find a diagram to follow.
Regardless, there's not much you can hurt by doing it incorrectly, as long as you don't actually break the wires off or something. A badly miswired guitar just won't work. you won't hurt anything. You can just open it back up and figure out what you did wrong.
What was that classical sounding song you played on both of your acoustic guitars? Thanks!
I was just improvising but if you like that style of tune I have an album called 'Sounds Spanish,' out on CDbaby.com under my pen name of Harpaxe.
@@JohnCouplandguitar Thank you!
Did you make the necks or buy them or are they from dead guitars?
I made all the necks myself. They account for half the man hours involved in making the guitar. At first I copied the fret spacing from bought guitars but later I managed to do the maths so that I could use non standard scale lengths.
did you make the necks and fretts also??
idealmethod Yes I made the necks as well. That takes as much time as the rest of the guitar. While you can buy ready made frets I used fret wire which is sold by the metre. 1 metre is enough for an acoustic. On my first guitar I simply copied the fret positions from a bought guitar but I then worked out a formula which gives the correct positions. That enabled me to make instruments with non-standard scale lengths.
John Coupland sweet. well done. good work, and greetings from edinburgh
What kind of bracing did you fit into the acoustics?
A standard X frame of pine.
You made a good job of all of them