A Guitar And Gear Support Forum

Built this a while ago, and put it on sale too for a while - but since it didn't sell quick I decided I'll work on it some more and maybe keep it after all.

So now I put in mostly black HW and a made a pickguard for it, and I think the guard made it much better, the upper horn looked unnecessarily large without it but now it's more like an Explorer.

I decided I'll cut off maybe 10 more mm from the lower corner under the strings, that will give it a little more streamlined look.

But most crucially I found out that when I play it standing up, the upper edge presses against the wrist quite unpleasantly. So what I'm gonna do is give it a contour; draw a line following the upper horn past the bridge and just shave off a chunk to form a slope there.

Now the thing I still wonder about us, if I have a contour slope over the bridge, should I add a 'mirror' small slope for the lower bout as well? I'll try to add a picture to explain.

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So the red lines show the intended contour cuts. For the upper side it's purely practical for playing comfort, but should I add a similar slope just for looks and symmetry also on the other side?

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deeaa wrote: ↑Tue Jun 24, 2025 11:22 pm So the red lines show the intended contour cuts. For the upper side it's purely practical for playing comfort, but should I add a similar slope just for looks and symmetry also on the other side?

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Normally I would say yes, but just the nature of the style of guitar would support an asymmetrical slope ..just my opinion of course

Tonray's Ghost wrote:

deeaa wrote: ↑Tue Jun 24, 2025 11:22 pm So the red lines show the intended contour cuts. For the upper side it's purely practical for playing comfort, but should I add a similar slope just for looks and symmetry also on the other side?

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Normally I would say yes, but just the nature of the style of guitar would support an asymmetrical slope ..just my opinion of course

Yeah, I think so too. A strat also has only upper contour...did the cuts, painting later today. I think I won't slope the lower bout. It's smaller now, but I don't want to steer too far away from Explorer shape.

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Not cutting the lower bout is the best decision.

Erring on the side of restraint was a good call on this. The Explorer is such a unique guitar shape, and a reverse Explorer even more so. Messing too much with the extreme angularity and blocky-ness of the body could easily land you in Ernie Ball St. Vincent territory. Not that I don't think the St. Vincent is a cool shape, but it's just that you'd lose the "Explorer-ness" of the guitar.

There's a history of people being irresistibly compelled to cut on Explorers, with Clapton's 58 Korina and Eddie Van Halen's Ibanez Destroyer being prime examples.