Drawing a complete electric guitar in Fusion 360 for CNC milling

[@DeanMakes]

Thank you for taking the time to record this process, I've got basic fusion knowledge but seeing somebody do something I'm looking at doing myself has really helped.

[@Audiohotshot]

You're most welcome!

[@chrisernoii4258]

ive been designing guitars on fusion 360 for almost 4 years now, I'm by no means an expert but definitely somewhat experienced. this is by far the most helpful, and instructional video I've ever come across. Thank You so much for putting this out there! Cheers!

[@Audiohotshot]

Thanks, you're most welcome! I forgot to include the frets in this video, so be sure to check my other video if you are interested in how to project frets on the fretboard,

[@dp38]

Absolute Masterclass! I replicated every detail and learned so much in the process! So many of my questions were answered by simply watching you work! Incredible, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge.

[@Audiohotshot]

Great to hear! I hope you find the extended version just as helpful; it is divided into chapters and contains extra details on certain subjects. You can find it here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/qZnbmqVnj5l1rZo Cheers

[@dvasquez324]

Thank you very much. This tutorial is the first to make sense to me. Designed a bass guitar while following the video.

[@Audiohotshot]

Glad it all worked out!

[@Viskovitz]

Dude, you are legend. I´ve been making guitars in fusion 360 a lot and I´ve never thought of making those transitions by joining bodies and smoothing transitions. Nice job!

[@Audiohotshot]

You're welcome! I was inspired by my other guitar, which has a neck-through-body construction, this kind of looks the same way... at least I've tried

[@robv5217]

Fantastic video. I’m going to check out your other stuff. I am an absolute beginner on fusion 360. My only suggestion would be to go into more detail on the actual use of the program. Your abilities on the program are light years beyond mine. Thanks for taking the time to do this.

[@Audiohotshot]

Good suggestion! I try to use the most basic tools only when drawing, in a next designvideo I'll try to incorporate your suggestion. I'm sorry if it sometimes looks confusing on this particular video; but you're most welcome to ask anything. I'll try to give a clear answer, or else look at my website as well. That just might clear things up as well. Cheers!

[@richardrice893]

This is the most direct approach I've seen to date- very nice work. Thank you for taking the time to make this video. Although I've been building guitars for 50 years, I haven't had a need to learn CAD- I built my cnc mill from scratch 10 years ago, but my sons have done all the programming. I seem to be fighting with one hand tied behind my back, always waiting for a file, or not getting precisely what I had in mind. This aspect is well beyond my comfort zone, but Fusion 360 has been a bit easier for me to grasp than Rhino and others that my sons use. My CAD journey is only weeks old, and it is quite a different approach for me, but your methodology seems to make sense from both an engineering and lutherie point of view. I only wish I had a better grasp of the tools you use so effortlessly. In conclusion, I wanted to thank you for your efforts, I will be spending many, many hours trying to pick up on what you have presented.

[@Audiohotshot]

I'm sure you'll be able to figure it out! Fusion is a very friendly piece of software, and it also produces the GCODE directly. I like the fact that those 2 are combined in one program. Question: would you like the tools more explained in the video as well (I mean how loft and split body and construction plane work and so on?) or just what keys I press? Thank you for the kind words!

[@richardrice893]

@@Audiohotshot that would be extremely helpful, yes. This was my first exposure to offset planes, loft, etc. I am very much a beginner, and need to stop/rewind/ watch and listen, and still think about what every click or sound is- the UI of Fusion I have is newer than almost all tutorials, so simply finding a tool or setting is quite difficult. I cannot tell you how thrilled I am at having seen your work this morning. Every tool selection, plane, pan or orbit counts, every click or keystroke. I hope to live long enough to soar with it. LOL Again, thank you. ;)

[@richardrice893]

I don't know you, or your background, but you are really on to a good system, and a nice presentation. It feels like a lifeline to me, despite what you cover in three minutes takes me five hours.. hahaha

[@Audiohotshot]

Hahaha I will try to add keystrokes in the video as well. For what its worth: I use “l” (non capitol L) for drawing a line, and “x” for making a line a construction line most of the time. Everything else is pretty visible in the fusion menus I guess. But I promise I will try to incorporate the keystrokes next time :-) good luck with your drawings, glad you find it helpful!

[@BeatJugular]

Awesome tutorial! I have barely used blender earlier, and still I'm able to follow it with only a few google searches. Thanks! Gonna check out your extended version as well. Thanks!

[@Audiohotshot]

Great to hear it works out for you in Blender as well! Curious about the result!!

[@BeatJugular]

@@Audiohotshot That was a little unclear. I meant that my experience with 3d modelling was just a little bit of blender, and i still managed to follow this in fusion 360 with no problems. ;)

[@Audiohotshot]

:-) still great to hear!

[@veronjeri2525]

This is mind-blowing!!!!!!!!!I love it

[@SimonettiBasses]

Excellent video! I just made the jump to making my basses on a cnc and this was extremely helpful.

[@Audiohotshot]

Glad you like it! Cheers!

[@ziny2814]

Nice guitar & Nice movie.Thank you.

[@MarkGutierrez]

Fabulous. I picked up so many tips and tricks from this vid. How about making a video on efficient tool paths. Thanks!

[@Audiohotshot]

You're welcome! I was thinking about doing a video on toolpaths, it will be here soon!

[@TheMoroaddict]

Toolpaths shouldn't be a problem imo... Few tips, avoid adaptive since it's taking so much time, go with parallel for roughing (flat 6-12mm end mill) (I usually limit the depth to 4-8mm per pass with extrude+protect+surpress extrude), leave 0.7-1mm stock to leave and finish it with morph spiral or parallel with 0.7-1.5mm stepover (ball end mill ofc)...feed&speeds I usually do 18k rpm and 2kmm/min feedrate for hard woods...Drilling go with recommended for plastics and increase rpm to 10k+ and select deep drilling for full retract... In the end, 3d contour the fillets and 2D contour it for the final shape and you're good to go. That way you'll have almost no sanding to make it smooth

[@cp_guitar]

Excellent instruction, thanks for posting!

[@Audiohotshot]

You’re welcome!

[@joaosalema6646]

Ahhh i wanted to see how you'd do the top carving =(

[@squiresuzuki]

I've been working through this video and designing my first guitar (or anything in CAD really), it's super fun! A couple of notes from the first third of the video: - You use 400mm for the *diameter* of the fretboard. Is this a mistake? There are lots of guitars with 400mm *radius* fretboard, but 200mm radius seems small. - You use 8mm for the space between the tuner holes and the edge of the headstock, but I'm not sure that's enough -- the washers on the tuner post would be just touching the edge. My Ibanez RG for examples measures at 15mm. - I know it was just a quick example, but to anyone designing their own headstock, you must add in a few dimensions to ensure each string coming out tangent from the tuner post lines up with the slot in the nut. I believe you can use arcsin(nut string spacing / tuner spacing) to get the correct headstock angle. For example arcsin(7.2mm / 23mm) = 18.2 degrees, which is a bit off from what you used (17 degrees). - I watched your headstock video and it was very helpful. I wanted both a volute and an angled headstock, which none of the examples in that video covered, but was able to achieve it using the tips from example 1 and 3, with some modifications. - To expand on the fretboard radius, I also wanted a compound radius. Pretty straightforward, just draw another circle at the nut for the smaller radius, then create a loft between the two circles. - Also regarding the fretboard radius, I needed to use a vertical construction line to keep the circles on-center. - 16:13 you create an offset plane on the bottom of the neck joint, but I believe there's already a construction plane there from when it was made?

[@Audiohotshot]

Great to hear from you! All videos are about showing you the way I draw and which tools I use, as I didn't find a video online which showed me how to start from zero to begin with. Please do not take my dimensions as a guide (I'm sure your designs are better than mine :-). Sidenote: the radius I use (200mm radius or 400 diameter) is not really that weird, and feels pretty good to me, all my guitars have different diameter/radius. I have a video where I machine this particular fretboard as well, so feel free to have a look. I really like your idea for a compound radius, I hadn't thought of that while making this video! At 16:13 you don't even have to draw a construction plane; you could also directly select that face. Still, I hope my way of drawing is of some use to you. Cheers!

[@PabloCanizo]

Excelent video!

[@Audiohotshot]

Thanks! Glad you like it!

[@rob182935]

Thanks so much for this great guitar drawing tutorial. I am new to Fusion 360 and have tried to follow your instructions but when trying to split the neck joint I get the error message "No intersection between target/s and split tool". I'm sure I did what you said but I can't seem to correct this. Can you help?

[@Lovelifefloweracab]

Hi! Thanks for this video, it helped me a lot. I'm newbie to Fusion and 3d, don't understand why You don't use capture history function?

[@Audiohotshot]

You're most welcome! I don't use capture history because I think Fusion has weird way of trying to take steps back in time (which, i think, overcomplicates stuff). My main goal is to draw as effective with sketches and bodies as I can, without overcomplicating things with helpful 'tools' as Design History and such. I just want 3 bodies: the guitar body, the neck, and the fretboard. Oh, and when I delete something, I do it on purpose and not to take steps back in time (or any other variation on that theme :-) Hope this helps

[@richardrice893]

Quick q; At 4:30, when extruding the neck joint, you subtract 3mm, then 43mm more. What is the 3mm representing? 43mm is stated body thickness, but where does the 3mm come into it? Thank you again!

[@richardrice893]

Nevermind, I see now it's for a reveal between the fretboard and face of body- such as to accommodate a pickguard. I may be slow, but can figure things out as I go along. LOL

[@Audiohotshot]

No problem at all. You are right, sir. The 3mm plus 5mm for the fretboardheight + some clearance of the strings (+/- 2mm) = 10mm which is the height of my strings at the tremolo. Indeed on a Fender guitar a pickguard would fit perfectly in that space. Hope this helps. :-)

[@glennroggenkamp7271]

Great video, thanks! I’m curious to know how you would contour the second face of the main body after the flip. Will you make a contoured fixture?

[@Audiohotshot]

If I understand your question correctly; look at my other video which handles the camprocess of the body: kzbin.info/www/bejne/hpqac2V_p5t8r5I It'll show you the camprocess for doublesided milling of the body; also, it shows you one of many ways of doing doublesided milling. Hope this helps!

[@glennroggenkamp7271]

Thank you. That explained it well. Thanks also for posting your processes. I’m not a luthier and I’m only just learning to play but I really want to CNC my guitar and your videos went a long way to explain some trouble areas for me.

[@Audiohotshot]

Glad the videos are helpful!

[@richardrice893]

Hello again, I've returned for a closer look at your rear body contour cutting with a T spline plane. I have had good luck with the method, but noticed your body remains visible while you're in sculpting mode... As soon as I create a T spline plane, my bodies disappear.. it was frustrating, at best- but I made a test object and recreated the situation.. same result every time. I went forward and drew, modified the plane- then had to navigate back to Drawing-Design with the dropdown on the upper left. Once I returned to the Design mode, the missing bodies came back. I was able to make adjustments, to a point, to fit the T spline plane to the body- but it was lots of guesswork to work with no bodies as a reference. Am I missing something here? A setting, perhaps? Again, I thank you for your wonderful, helpful videos. Little by little, I'm beginning to understand Fusion 360 a bit better- and the drawings/parts I'm making are definitely getting better each day.

[@Audiohotshot]

Great to hear back from you! I created this new video including keystrokes and more explaining, you can find it here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/qZnbmqVnj5l1rZo This might just be clearer to you. Also I included the contents including timestamps to quickly navigate through the video. (I do apologize for the lengthy video :-) I try to be as precise as I can.)

[@RichRice]

@@Audiohotshot I'm absolutely knocked out with your help, and your generosity. Should you find yourself in Chicago sometime, I owe you a steak dinner. :-)

[@Audiohotshot]

​@@RichRice I'd love to someday! (if it wasn't for the long flight over the Atlantic :-)

[@Bassboll]

hello, i'm new to fusion so this video is amazing. fusion ask me what kind of controls I want (solidworks, cad...) what type of controls are you using? thanks

[@Audiohotshot]

I'm not quite sure I understand your question correctly. I'm mostly using the mouse and keyboard, but also quite often use a 3Dconnexion Spacemouse Compact.

[@FEV369]

I'm new to CNC, is fusion 360 all you need to build stuff as in does it make all the g-code and tool paths for your CNC machine then run it? I keep seeing a debate as to if you can just use the free fusion-360 over Aspire that's $1,700 bucks. I am ready to buy a CNC machine and they want almost 2k in software, then I see fusion 360 is free and many say it's better but a bit harder to learn because it does more, I'm ok with that. I'd rather spend the cash on upgrades than software if "better" is free for hobbyists. Thanks!

[@Audiohotshot]

Fusion360 indeed acts as a design- and CAMtool. I use bCNC running on a raspberry Pi as GRBL Sender to my DIY machine. (for more info and budget spending on my DIY machine: www.audiohotshot.nl/howto-how-i-built-my-diy-cnc-machine/ ) Hope this helps!

[@fenders9911]

wow this guy nos his stuff

[@Audiohotshot]

Just wait until you see the extended version.... ;-) kzbin.info/www/bejne/qZnbmqVnj5l1rZo Glad you find it helpful!

[@wadetomczyk8043]

How in thee hell did you get the plane to work at 11:09? When I try to reduce head down to 15mm my point doesn't go to top of head stock it goes all over the place.

[@Audiohotshot]

Maybe it is more clear in this video? kzbin.info/www/bejne/fam9f4hshbGsmK8

[@rob182935]

Regarding previous comment sorry I meant to mention it refers to the part of the video at 5:45

[@Audiohotshot]

That could have a number of reasons; but most likely; be sure the neckjoint has the same width as the neck. Be sure the neckjoint part is derived from the Neck. Also, make sure to select "extend splitting tool" as well.. although you should be fine without. (it's pretty hard to help without seeing what you've done, I'm sorry). Hope all works out!

[@rob182935]

@@Audiohotshot I appreciate your quick response and understand it is difficult to assess the problem remotely. You've given me a couple of things to look at and hopefully I'll be able to sort it out. Thanks

[@kimchatterley7415]

@@rob182935 I get the same problem as you did. When I try to delete the redundant part of the neck, I get an error message "This feature is referenced by other features in the timeline". If I then click "Delete", it deletes the whole neck. Did the solution from @Audiohotshot work?

[@Audiohotshot]

Did you disable capture design history? If not try this: don’t use “delete”, but use “remove” (it is in the drop down panel of the body). Let me know if this works for you! :-)

[@rob182935]

I disabled capture design history as Audioshot suggested and it worked for me. Thanks.

[@ronin2167]

Sooooo many questions...but he's not teaching, he's just showing.

[@Audiohotshot]

Feel free to ask! :-) (btw did you check my website as well? ( www.audiohotshot.nl/drawing-a-guitar-in-fusion-360/ ) Maybe this is what you're looking for? )

[@pedagogue2714]

Bro which software is it plzzz tell me plzzz plzzz

[@Audiohotshot]

Yo, fusion360 rulez man! Peace out ;-)

[@green323turbo]

Fusion360 is made by Autodesk ( autocad) . Its a cloud based cad ( with cam) that you pay a monthly fee for. Its state of the art compared to others.

[@spannerman4886]

The only problems I had is that you're obviously using keys and shortcuts that are not visible on screen so sadly not very helpful unless you're already experienced with Fusion could you please include shortcuts and keys please also my version is newer and has some different features Thanks anyway I have learnt somethings that are useful