Crazy guitar idea

Hello everyone. I’m new to the makers community and just joined DMS and I have a ton of crazy ideas but no idea on how to get them started, what classes do I need to attend to get the knowledge and where to start. This time I’m talking about an idea that has been bugging me for a while. I want to build (or try to) a clear acrylic (plexiglass) guitar. Has somebody ever made one? Is this even possible? any advise will be appreciated, I have no clue on how to begin. To be honest, I don’t even know if I’m posting this correctly.

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They’re out there, so it’s definitely doable.

Most of these appear to be cast clear acrylic, then with the space for the guts routed out. That makes me think you might be interested in mold-making and resin casting, for which classes are occasionally posted on the calendar.

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Hi jast… I know I have seen electric guitars done this way, but I’m thinking more of an acoustic one… have you seen one? I think it would be cool to try… thanks for replying!

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Can you recreate the structure of an acustic guitar in clear acrylic? Sure. Will it sound like an acustic guitar, most likely not. Wood is selected for its vibrations, acrylic will not vibrate the same if at all. Electric guitar is going to be your best route if clear acrylic is the building material.

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great… thanks for the info!

Welcome to Dallas Makerspace. You’re posting in the right place to ask questions.

As you become more familiar with DMS and how it operates and your questions become more focused, the topic categories might chnage.

If it is building the wooden component a better category might be Wood Shop.
If the component is the electronics (if electrical guitar) then maybe Electronics.

Not required - off topic is fine, but the some people tend to follow the ares they are interested in.

Welcome - I’m sure you’ll get lots of answers. When you do your build, take photos and post to the show and tell. Post your problems and solutions also, those are important as you will be contributing to our hive knowledge and may help someone avoid a mistake.

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This sounds like a thing you can do, but I’m not sure you’ll be happy with the results. The real question is how much the wood affects the tone and if you can compensate for that with other design choices. You’d probably have to build dozens in order to get to a point that you are satisfied that the sound is as good as you can get it, and even then, you may not be happy with the sound.

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thank you for replying!

thank you… Honestly I don’t care that much about the sound, as long as its emits some… however, my Idea goes a little further… after its made, I want to put some color coded LED’s inside that will activate every time the string and the fret board make contact, to create different color patterns as you play… just for the heck of it…

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There’s lots of cool builds out there. This one is one of my favorites:

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cool build… where can I get that type of acrylic here in Dallas? I moved from Puerto Rico and still figuring out where to get stuff…