Les Paul Body

[Phillip Allen]

I was considering making a Les Paul body from Sitka spruce with a Maple top. I was going to cut it slightly smaller so I can cover the sides and back with veneer. Anybody have comments on this.

[Mark Swanson]

What do you expect to gain from it? And veneer is so thin that you would not have to make it any smaller, it adds very little to the overall size.

[David King]

It does seem like a lot of extra work but if it saves some weight and a mahogany tree why not? I'd go for a thicker veneer so you can still round off the back corners without cutting through to the spruce.

[Randolph Rhett]

Or leave it spruce. It's not like spruce is an ugly wood.

[Dave Locher]

I had the same thought: if you're gonna build it out of spruce why go to all the time & trouble of covering it up? That sounds like pretending it's something it's not, which seems odd.