So, how do you do this thing?

If all else fails, read the instructions. At the lack of the luxury of having an actual 58 LP, (or any LP for that matter), close at hand to copy from, the next best thing, (or maybe ever better), is to get plans for it. PROPER plans! I don't think my friend's Zakk Wylde is going to cut it as a template for a 58, although very little has changed over the last 50 years or so, besides cosmetics - but then again, what's the odd's of him borrowing me his Zakk?

Insomnia can be a good thing. During the past week I spent only a few hours sleeping, and I used the awake-time to do some online searching. Sure, I found some plans and diagrams for building a Paul, but to be honest and with all due respect, they suck! Now I ask you with tears in my navy blue eyes, what good is a plan without any measurements?

Being the anti-capitalist that I am, I don't own a credit card, (or bank account for that matter), so buying online is impossible. Eventually, after a lot of searching, I realized that there is no other way but to buy PROPER luthier plans online. Thanks to a helpful capitalist friend, (one with a credit card, that is), I bought some plans from Pilgrim Projects via e-bay. These plans come highly recommended, and I saw some other people use it for their own projects while I was researching my own project, and the results looks really good. If they can follow the plans, so can I - I might be stupid, but I'm not THAT stupid...

Here is the link to the plans I got from e-bay. Alternatively, go directly to the Pilgrim Projects website, where you can get a wider variety of products, probably at a better price than you would get it for from them via e-bay. It is the exact same plans that you can get directly from Stewart-MacDonald, where the ones from Pilgrim Projects come from anyway.

For those of you that is not interested in building your own and simply follow my progress, there is no need to go to the link, so I will post a few pictures of the plans, just to give you an idea of what I'm dealing with here.

These pictures are all supplied by Pilgrim Projects.

The plans cost $9.50, with a $4.00 shipping charge inside the US, but since it was shipped to me in South Africa, the total cost of the plans was $17.50 - that comes to R132.29 for us locals. I got confirmation of payment yesterday, and they will be shipped within 2-3 working days. With the weekend upon us, and the state of the local postal service, I hope to have them in my hands by the end of next week - that might be optimistic, but lets hope for the best!

Thanks again to my friend for helping out with the credit card! It's much appreciated! (You know who you are.)

*NOTE: These plans will probably be framed, with all my notes and calculations and shit scribbled all over them, and put on the wall somewhere... just not to sure where though. Not for sentimental reasons, but purely because I really like technical drawings. I think a mahogany frame would be just the thing ;)