Rating: 
Summary: The Best Book For Those New To the Business
Review: This book is excellent for beginners who want to toy with the idea of building their own hand-made custom electric guitar. It is very descriptive with tons of pictures. He shows you the easiest way to make 3 styles of guitar with plenty of do's and don'ts. There is also lots of background info on the guitar industry's hottest brands and models. I feel this is the very best book you can get on the subject. I made my first guitar using this book and it sounds and looks great thanks to Mr. Hiscock's help. Th cool part is that I only 15.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent book, well-written, highly recommended
Review: This book is excellent. No, it will NOT take you step-by-step through building a cookie-cutter guitar. It will not show you how to copy a Les Paul or a Telecaster. It will not show you how to use that new jointer you just purchased from Sears. It does not contain wiring schematics for every single pickup and control combination. What it WILL give you are the fundamental techniques used in the construction of a solid-body electric guitar with a style of your own choosing. The three basic styles of guitar are presented: set-neck, bolt-on neck, and neck-through. Mr. Hiscock is not going to hold your hand nor would I expect him to do so. His style is to impart the important fundamentals and details of guitar construction and leave the design work and heavy lifting up to you. If you cannot understand this book or how it is written, you should not be allowed to use power tools, either. There are plenty of basic woodworking books on the market to get you started with basic carpentry, too. There are hundreds of sample measurements and router template tracings included as well. This book is a great combination with Dan Erlewine's Guitar Player Repair Guide. If you have experience in woodworking and some basic familiarity with electric guitars, this is a great book. If you're 15 years old and have never owned or used shop woodworking equipment and electric guitars, this book will not work for you until you have some basic woodworking skills.
Rating:
Summary: A Very Detailed Guide
Review: This book represents a well-thought out, very complete guide for anyone wishing to build their own guitar. Several introductory chapters guide you through the steps of designing your own instrument and address specific possible problem areas such as frets, truss rods, neck angle & bridge height, saftey, proper tools, laying out hardware positions, etc.The next three chapters give step-by-step construction notes for three specific guitars. (A carved-top set neck model, a flame-maple topped tele, and an 8-string bass featuring some exotic woods) These three guitars were well choosen for this book: between the three of them you get just about any characteristic you'd want on an instrument. Final chapters deal with finish, set-up, and asembling a guitar from components. Although the author is British, Americans shouldn't have any trouble - measurments are given in inches and metric, and the author has taken care to explain most British slang terms in USA-friendly terms. The writing itself is very well done, easily understood, and has enough humor to lighten the mood without spoiling it. Out of several similar books I've seen/read, I would vote this one as best written and most complete.
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic book.
Review: This is one of the best "how to" books of any sort which I have ever read. Mr. Hiscock writes at a level which is appropriate for beginning woodworkers, but not boring or condescending to more experienced craftsmen. If you have any desire to build your own guitar buy this book before any other.
Rating:
Summary: The best out there
Review: This is one of the best guitar building books out there. It helps you with many doubts that arise during the process of building a guitar, plus details the construction of 3 major projects: A bolt on guitar, a set neck guitar, and a bass. Following every project step by step, you get coverage of mostly all processes involved in any kind of electric guitar building.
In my own project I had a strong doubt about neck angle, since I was using a TOM bridge, but this book helped me clear all that. Filled with black and white illustrations all along, the book deals with designing a body, cutting it, binding it, building a neck from scratch, gluing or bolting it and dealing with electronics, to finally achieving high gloss finish. There is also a very useful set of templates for pickup routing of guitars and basses. In all, with this book and supported by the guitar maker's forums on the net, I was able to build my first guitar. Check my website for pics of my project.
Peace
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding
Review: While I was expecting a little more on the end of actual "blueprints" on guitar making (which this book has none of). It does have very helpful schematics for pickup wiring and very very useful tables on fret lengths of all guitar scales. With the negative out of the way... This book is great. It will take you through the construction of three guitars. A solid-body attached neck PRS style guitar, a bolt-on neck Tele style and a neck-through style bass. Mr. Hiscock then goes on to show the limitless possibilities for combining the styles. His reasoning for not putting in an "blueprints" for a guitar were simple. #1, a custom made guitar is like a fingerprint. It is unique and personal to you. You make what is comfortable and good for you. If he gave you blueprints, you'd just be recreating a Melvyn Hiscock guitar. #2 (not mentioned, but implied) Copyright reasons. He can't go around telling you how to make a Fender Strat... That would just be bad news for him if Fender ever found out. Anyway, 4-1/2 stars... but I can't do that here, so 5.
Rating:
Summary: Insightful
Review: While I was expecting a little more on the end of actual "blueprints" on guitar making (which this book has none of). It does have very helpful schematics for pickup wiring and very very useful tables on fret lengths of all guitar scales. With the negative out of the way... This book is great. It will take you through the construction of three guitars. A solid-body attached neck PRS style guitar, a bolt-on neck Tele style and a neck-through style bass. Mr. Hiscock then goes on to show the limitless possibilities for combining the styles. His reasoning for not putting in an "blueprints" for a guitar were simple. #1, a custom made guitar is like a fingerprint. It is unique and personal to you. You make what is comfortable and good for you. If he gave you blueprints, you'd just be recreating a Melvyn Hiscock guitar. #2 (not mentioned, but implied) Copyright reasons. He can't go around telling you how to make a Fender Strat... That would just be bad news for him if Fender ever found out. Anyway, 4-1/2 stars... but I can't do that here, so 5.
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