[retailer]

Found some time to get to work on the cab for the amplifier, the finger joints that caused me so much grief during the Vox copy build decided to co-operate - mostly - what took me over two days on the Vox was completed in less than 2 hours, even though the joints were quite tight the dry run trial assembly went well but when it came to actually gluing the joints, they refused to go that last mm or so to be fully home, not sure why this occured possibly the glue made the timber swell, end result was a mm or so depression on each of the fingers, some were better than others, not having any bar clamps and not wanting to be too heavy handed with the plastic mallet I squared up the cab and let the glue set. I had 2 options either sand back each panel so the fingers were level with the surface or fill the voids with plastic filler - I went with the plastic filler, a bit annoying as the fingers were only a mm or so shy of the surface, if there is a next time I'll make the fingers a little less tight.

After cutting the 2 front slopes I did a trial placement of the interior cleats and it was here I realised there was no room for cleats to strengthen the joints between the top panel and the sides, I started to think I had made an error of some sort, surely Fender did not rely only on glued finger joints to secure the top panel to the sides, a few hours of internet searching and I came to the conclusion that is how it must be, just to be a bit safer though I drilled each second finger and glued a 5mm dowel through into the top panel. The 5mm thread bolts that secure the chassis to the top panel need to be custom made, manage to get one made before I called it a day.