Thank you all for the kind words!
After a couple of busy holiday months that my guitar spent a good portion of in Michigan, Ryan and I were able to coordinate a day for me to come back and do final assembly and setup last Friday.
Aside from a couple of teaser pics where Ryan was careful not to show me too much, I had no idea what she would look like under finish when I walked in and I couldn't have been happier.
(Finish came in at about .003)
The B/S deepened in color with the sides taking on a very deep red/burgundy and the back being a hair lighter, but still very rich. The finish made the silking in the lutz really pop. This top is stunning today and will just get better and better with age.
Ryan again showed other-worldly patience in watching and coaching me through tasks he could do in his sleep. After spending a few minutes admiring the finish, we started work on the frets...
Level, crown, and polish the frets after waxing and taping off the fingerboard:
We then cut the saddle blank down to length and then carefully carved it to its final shape. This was more tedious than I anticipated and I ended up with a shape I wouldn't have guessed came from careful work with a couple of files and 320 grit sandpaper:
We then started from a nut that Steve and I had already rough cut to the right width and bottom angle and cut the string slots.
We spent some time playing with the height of the saddle and nut to get the action closer to final height and then broke for lunch.
After lunch we shaped the nut. This is one of Steve's jobs and though he offered to let me do it, he did the majority of the shaping:
After getting the nut and saddle close to final height we made a final truss rod adjustment and tweaked the action. I prefer something on the low side of medium action so I don't get fret buzz when I'm playing palm-muted flat-pick rhythm stuff and that's what we ended with.
I didn't do a great job of snapping pics during the work on Friday, but took a few minutes before leaving East Texas yesterday to get some of the obligatory "leaned against a local tree" pics:
I'll get some more pics of specific details over the next few days and if you have anything in particular you'd like to see don't hesitate to ask.
I'll add some thoughts on the tone and possibly even throw together a quick video in the coming days after giving her a little more time. First impressions on that front are excellent though!