Little Phatty Custom Wood Side Panels

GregRule · Post by **GregRule** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 5:33 pm

Hi, everyone. I'm new here.

I know this topic has come up before, but I thought I'd chime in with some new info...

I bought a Little Phatty Stage edition recently. I immediately fell in love with it, but wished it had wood side panels like the Tribute edition. My friend Mike McKnight turned me onto Stephen Jones (www.synthwood.com) who does synth mods, including custom woodwork. He made me a gorgeous set of walnut panels for my LP for a very reasonable price. He's in Seattle.

Photos here: http://www.synthwood.com/gallery/rule/littlephatty/

Cheers.

Voltor07 · Post by **Voltor07** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 6:46 pm

Walnut, you say? Sounds nice! How much did that run you, if you don't mind? Does synthwood do inlay work?

GregRule · Post by **GregRule** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 6:56 pm

I don't want to speak for Stephen but I believe each project is unique, and so the price fluctuates based on the hours he spends doing it. All I can say is ... I was very impressed with the quality of his work and how reasonable the price was.

Voltor07 · Post by **Voltor07** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 7:12 pm

The coco bolo Voyager they did looks SWEET!

EricK · Post by **EricK** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 7:30 pm

It would be great if you could find out if he would do the STAGE II version with the Midi and the USB connections.

Voltor07 · Post by **Voltor07** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 7:32 pm

EricK wrote:It would be great if you could find out if he would do the STAGE II version with the Midi and the USB connections.

In coco bolo!

GregRule · Post by **GregRule** » Fri Apr 10, 2009 11:20 am

If you're interested to see photos of the upgrade (plus other work Stephen has done) ...

Synthwood.com > Customer Gallery

lushr · Post by **lushr** » Mon Mar 23, 2015 10:12 am

I wish someone in Australia did this, I'd love to get my poly 61 and little phatty set up with some nice wood ends. But I'm not paying international shipping on something so heavy.

GregVDS · Post by **GregVDS** » Mon Mar 23, 2015 4:42 pm

I found an italian guy who does that.

I asked him for Wenge, zebra wood, nice essences of wood, but his prices are way too high for me (around 260€...). Anyway, my Sub 37 has already very nice wooden cheeks, so...

But if Moog would sell some replacements in other woods (heavy hint, Moog!), I would eagerly look to it

.

Best Regards,

Greg

ozfunghi · Post by **ozfunghi** » Mon Mar 23, 2015 11:41 pm

GregVDS wrote:I found an italian guy who does that.

I asked him for Wenge, zebra wood, nice essences of wood, but his prices are way too high for me (around 260€...). Anyway, my Sub 37 has already very nice wooden cheeks, so...

But if Moog would sell some replacements in other woods (heavy hint, Moog!), I would eagerly look to it .

Best Regards,

Greg

Just out of interest, what do you think would be a fair price if €260 is "way too high"? I'm not sure how expensive the wood would be, but i'm sure he'd need a couple of hours to cut, process and finish the panels. I have no idea what the going rate is for this kind of custom job.

GregVDS · Post by **GregVDS** » Tue Mar 24, 2015 4:07 am

Truely, I don't have a clear idea, but 1/6th of the synth price seemed a bit overkill in my case.
100€ would seem in line with the other wood kits Moog is selling for the Slim Phatty and Minitaur for example.
Here, one needs to create the piece in itself, then carve the left connectors hole, and then carve the recessed insides where the steel plates sit. And then finish the pieces.

That makes these pieces a tad more complex to produce than the simpler Minitaur ones, so they would be more expensive to produce and sell. Now with the wood price, sure, fancy species I was talking about could be priced higher for the exclusivity they offer.

Here the italian artisan is a luthier, woodworking mainly to build bass guitar, only on order, so his prices are higher than series production Moog could arrange, even if limited series of a fex hundred pieces of each wood type.

100€ for the maple ones, 150 to 200 for rarer species, such as zebra wood, wenge, macassar ebony and so on.

But this is only my view about this.

Greg

ozfunghi · Post by **ozfunghi** » Tue Mar 24, 2015 8:46 am

The wood in itself and the amount needed, is only a fraction of the cost i think. This guy has to make a template for a one time job, figure out all the caveats (or start over), set up his workplace for this job etc... Are the original Moog side panels made by hand or is it done in a factory? How big is the order that Moog places for their sidepanels at once? I'm not saying it would be "mass production" per se, but surely you can't compare it. Having a suit tailormade or buying your wife a handmade leather bag will also cost you quite a bit more than buying off the shelf. After all, it's none of the guy's concern whether the job is for a €1300 synth, a €4000 synth or for a Rolls Royce interior. The price of the wood stays the same and the amound of time he needs to invest, just as well. That's why it would be interesting to compare his price to other prices for similar custom jobs.

lushr · Post by **lushr** » Tue Mar 24, 2015 9:20 am

It's not cabinetry. They have a perfect template to work from, I could probably give it to a local guy and he'd make the cuts for $50. I'd do the staining myself. But I don't really know anyone who I could ask these days. It can just be solid pine with a wood stain of your choice.

charbot · Post by **charbot** » Tue Mar 24, 2015 6:22 pm

Dont use pine.

Toecutter · Post by **Toecutter** » Sat Feb 06, 2016 10:59 am

I haven't done any for the LP, but do these ones for the SP if anyone interested.

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Little Phatty Custom Wood Side Panels

Little Phatty Custom Wood Side Panels

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