Masonite Strat

The “Thunderer”

The body is basically a kitchen counter top

Dimensions

Height	105cm
Width:	29cm
Depth:	9cm”
weight:	3.9 Kg
Scale Length	25.5in.(64.8cm)
No. of strings	6

build

Hold on a minute – you didn’t make this guitar -Strictly no, but when anyone talks of building an electric guitar, they usually mean they assemble a bunch of parts from new or second hand sources. I put a fair few hours in this as my original intention was to refinish it (Orange with a white scratch plate), upgrade the pickups and sell it. However, when I had sanded back to the body through the 17 or so layers of paint that is customary on new Strat copies, I revealed a surprise. Initially, when I saw the first signs of the body, I was intrigued; The wood was a dark brown colour – not the light wood I was expecting (usually agathis, basswood or alder ). I gently sanded more, It looks like oak or something, no couldn’t be. I sanded more and eventually revealed enough to try to identify the wood.

Only it wasn’t wood, well, it sort of was. It was wood fibre, held together by glue/resin. It was thick hardboard, masonite. One popular make of guitar in the 60s the Danelectro was wade of masonite but that was deigned around a hollow body. They did this because it was cheap and and also gave a great tone. I kept this guitar because, I like it and think it sounds great. Some guitar afficionados talk at length about guitar tone and selection hardwood for bodies and necks but I would argue the difference is minimal. I think weight is what seems to give a guitar a better tone. Custom weights are designed to clip onto guitars to achieve just this. Anyways I kept the body and swapped the parts out, Made a scratch plate from the most apt material that I could – some flyboard I had salvaged elsewhere, changed the hardware and shaped the headstock – you can probably tell.