Chronicles of a first-time guitar builder

This is the story of a first attempt to build an electric guitar, based on the famous Les Paul model created by Gibson in the 1950s.  The descriptions of how I tackled the task are sometimes quite detailed, so that other beginners can avoid my mistakes. Some pages contain a mixture of subjects, but the headings below indicate the main content of the page. Note:  Guitar Number 2 is now in progress here.

The beginning...  The idea and the start of building a guitar body                     Page 1        Gluing and shaping the guitar body                                                                   Page 2        Drilling holes and making control cavities                                                           Page 3         Building the guitar neck                                                                                      Page 4        Neck and body joint                                                                                            Page 5        Fret-board                                                                                                         Page 6         Headstock                                                                                                          Page 7            Putting it together                                                                                              Page 8         Bits and pieces to do before staining the body                                                  Page 9         Final Staining and sealing                                                                                Page 10         Spraying the "burst" and fretting                                                                      Page 11         Minor setbacks and a new fretboard and fret-cutting jig                                   Page 12         Fretboard continued...                                                                                      Page 13         Attaching the fretboard and masking for finishing                                              Page 14         Lacquer and the final finish                                                                               Page 15         Buffing and polishing                                                                                         Page 16        Pictures of the finished instrument                                                       Pages 17 and 18        A home-made tool for cutting a binding groove                                                   Link         Making bits and pieces of hardware                                                                     Link        Hardware continued...                                                                                           Link

For those who are not guitar fanatics, this is what a real Les Paul guitar looks like, and the labels might help in following the building progress.