A full day off work with no other jobs on........

so, template marked onto the maple......

and then the maple cut out and tried for size......

Quick pass with the sander to get to over spill from the filler away....

and then rout out first to the depth of the maple

its not an airtight, perfect fit, which is fine.  there will be filler around the maple and then depending of if it works, either a sunburst leaving the centre of the maple clear, or if it turns out that a sunburst is beyond me (likely!) then solid colour covering the joins and filler.

and then bring it all down to the depth of the pickup routs, leaving a shelf all round for gluing.... and a pleasant surprise....  its not chipboard after all, what LOOKED like chipboard was the butchery done by a previous owner to fit the HB pickup.....

then glue and a bunch of clamps.

One wee thing...... On the net, I often see folks doing carpentry and guitar building indoors.

these folk are obviously single.

The mess produced by routing out this tiny space is spectacular!  definitely an outdoors job