The DIY way

Tired of spending lots of money in guitars, amps, effects, etc? Tired to be 6 or more months saving to pay that gadget you wanted for your guitar and, when it is in your hands, you see a new and more spectacular one and have to start again the process?

Well, you can play lottery or you can emulate Brian May and many others making your own gear (DIY, do it yourself). We will give you some indications of how you can start.

If you’re interested in guitar/bass DIY:

• Project Guitar.com is a website full of tutorials on creation and maintenance of your own guitars. Every month a DIY guitar contest winner is picked from all participants and his guitar is shown in the main page. Contains a list of suppliers to almost everything you would need in guitar DIY.

Thegarehanman’s - Tang Top (Winner of April)

• At DIY:happy you can find an article explaining how to make your own guitar/bass pickup.

Final aspect of DIY bass pickup

• Tired of your Floyd Rose bridge? DIY Guitarist shows how to convert it into a fixed bridge.
• Guitar Nuts has some tricks for reducing the noise of the guitar, improving cable quality and many more.

If interested in Amp DIY:

• Steve, an expert in guitar amp DIY has a website, Steve’s DIY Guitar Amplifier Pages, with lots of information, layouts and resources for building your own tube guitar amp. He advises about the danger in manipulating vacuum tubes.

One of first Steve’s amps

• At Mars Amplification you can buy amp kits or electronic components for amp DIY.
• Building an Onboard FET Guitar Preamp at DIY Guitarist will teach you step-by-step how to do what the article title says.
• AX84 is a cooperative tube amp project with several tube amps projects active with information, documents, schemas and possibility to buy kits at Doberman Music Products, LLC, which seems to be an sponsor. Images of finished amps are available too.

Carl Berger’s P1 Amp

If interested in accessories DIY:

• The Vinyl Tourist explains how to make your own audio cables.
• Again, DIY Guitarist contains lots of info on how to develop your own guitar FX.
• General Guitar Gadgets can make an expert of you in DIY stompbox with his tech pages.
• Audiofile has a tutorial to build a hi-fi speakers. Not for guitar or bass, but may be interesting for music listeners.

You can find a lot more information in blogs like Harmony Central, any DIY blog, Google or Technorati, etc. DIY is a way of life so you can investigate as much as you want and with practice you probably will get a really good result.