Methods For Rounding The Neck

[Mickguard]

I'm shaping a neck for my next project --this will be the first real neck (although I wussed out and bought a fretted fretboard).

I started with a rasp and surform, and now I've got it pretty much rough-shaped to within a millimeter of where I want it-- now comes the part where I need to get it perfectly rounded and smoothed.

I'm using sandpaper for this part--starting with 80 grit. I'm also using a caliper and comparing my progress with a couple of necks I really like (my Melody Maker and especially my Epiphone Sorrento)

But I'm wondering what methods others are using for this step? How do you get the neck perfectly rounded and smoothed and flat up and down the neck? Do you just eyeball it? Do you use a special tool or other setup?

By rounded, I'm not speaking about the profile, but about achieving a smooth transition for the curve(s) of the profile.

[biliousfrog]

I've been using cabinet scrapers. I started with a mix of round wood rasps & a curved surform & then removed the scratches with scrapers & I'll finish up with fine sandpaper. The scrapers can remove much more wood than you'd expect but also leave a very smooth surface. With practice you can get a finish to rival fine-grit sandpaper. I got these & they've been brilliant so far.

[guitar2005]

I'm shaping a neck for my next project --this will be the first real neck (although I wussed out and bought a fretted fretboard).

I started with a rasp and surform, and now I've got it pretty much rough-shaped to within a millimeter of where I want it-- now comes the part where I need to get it perfectly rounded and smoothed.

I'm using sandpaper for this part--starting with 80 grit. I'm also using a caliper and comparing my progress with a couple of necks I really like (my Melody Maker and especially my Epiphone Sorrento)

But I'm wondering what methods others are using for this step? How do you get the neck perfectly rounded and smoothed and flat up and down the neck? Do you just eyeball it? Do you use a special tool or other setup?

By rounded, I'm not speaking about the profile, but about achieving a smooth transition for the curve(s) of the profile.

I use a spokeshave to smooth out the neck after the roughed out rasped neck is profiled. I follow that with sandpaper. The spokeshave really helps in smoothing things out.

To measure the neck profile, I've used pieces of cardboard cut out in the profile I want. I traced the profile from another neck with a profile gauge and traced the profile onto cardboard.

[Prostheta]

I use a chamfer bit on a router to rough in the angle, then use a spokeshave and surform to shape, then a spindle sander to round and finally a long strip of 80 grit using a pull-pull method with both hands and the neck's back facing upwards. Rounds it off a treat!

[GuitarGuy]

I guess everyone has their method. I use a die grinder with an aluminum bit. then a fine mill file to get rid of the roughness and then sandpaper for finish.

[Mattia]

Rasps (microplane, half-round cabinet in various grades: rough machine-cut one, and a pair of hand-cut rasps for finer detailing, Japanese shinto hacksaw rasp) for most of the shaping, and scrapers (straight and curved) to really refine the shape and transitions. Shoeshining with sandpaper also helps smooth things out.

[Southpa]

Starting with a squared block I first cut the side tapers. I've done it before with all kinds of tools, ie. handsaw, jigsaw, etc. I now make a template and use the router. The sides are then marked for depth. It depends on how thick your block is, if its real thick then it has to be rough cut with a hand saw leaving about 1/4" to spare. Then I use rasps (round, 1/2 round and flat) to get it down further. Then smooth it out with a spokeshave followed by coarse grit sanding, usually 80, then finer up to about 320. All thru the process I am checking the back of the neck with a steel ruler. Its very important to maintain a straight profile and take high areas down when necessary. Its also very important to know where your truss rod is when doing all this. I basically keep sanding until the neck feels good.

[westhemann]

i eyeball it for the most part...straightness and comfort along with flowing into the body are the most important to me

[P90]

I was also reading thru the CNC thread pinned at the top, and apparently CNC is NOT so much used for shaping the back of the neck? These handtools (rasps, spokeshavers, etc) are actually preferred?

Edited February 16, 2007 by P90

[Mattia]

I was also reading thru the CNC thread pinned at the top, and apparently CNC is NOT so much used for shaping the back of the neck? These handtools (rasps, spokeshavers, etc) are actually preferred?

Dude, hardly ANY of us have CNC machines. Also, since I carve each neck individually, I'd still need to finish-carve a CNC'd neck to get the exact profile I want.

Carving a neck with hand tools to essentialy finished state takes me considerably less than an hour. I spend more time fine-tuning it to make sure it's exactly how I want it to feel, but it's lots of fun...

[aidlook]

I just carved a neck today.. Used a rasp and then an orbital sander (a REALLY good orbital sander)...

[TechArt]

Used to its fullest potential, CNC is one of the best ways to carve a neck. I believe The large manufacturers (Taylor, Martin, Gibson, Fender, PRS, and others) use one or both of the following two methods: CNC or copy carvers (i.e. large duplicarvers).

On a run of the mill Fadal (a CNC used by many guitar makers) you can carve a neck in under 5 minutes. Accuracy will be within about .002" of what the machine code says that it should be. The copy carvers used by some companies such as Fender are also very effective tools, albeit less flexible (Fender uses a german made copy carver...zehnheiser? or something like that). They typically carve a large number of necks all at once.

Of course with CNC & copy carving, your end result is only as good as your code. If it's great code, you'll get great parts...if it's not...it's the old crap in, crap out....!

[spazzyone]

i eyeball it for the most part...straightness and comfort along with flowing into the body are the most important to me

the CNC only ruff shapes the neck but it does shape it

after i get one of the machine i use a RO sander and a pair of dial calipers to shape it the reast of the way and to finish sand it to specs

[Mattia]

Used to its fullest potential, CNC is one of the best ways to carve a neck. I believe The large manufacturers (Taylor, Martin, Gibson, Fender, PRS, and others) use one or both of the following two methods: CNC or copy carvers (i.e. large duplicarvers).

On a run of the mill Fadal (a CNC used by many guitar makers) you can carve a neck in under 5 minutes. Accuracy will be within about .002" of what the machine code says that it should be. The copy carvers used by some companies such as Fender are also very effective tools, albeit less flexible (Fender uses a german made copy carver...zehnheiser? or something like that). They typically carve a large number of necks all at once.

Of course with CNC & copy carving, your end result is only as good as your code. If it's great code, you'll get great parts...if it's not...it's the old crap in, crap out....!

'Best' in this case only means 'most cost effective in a mass production setting'. And frankly, taking Taylor as an example, CNC is not the best way to go about it. 'Simple' carving setups (which are not CNC, they're single function, mechanical devices. Load up necks, machine moves the only way it can; no copy carving, which is how gibson did/does its tops) are much faster.

Most of us aren't in this to mass produce, and since I've yet to make two necks that are identical, and don't feel like spending many, many hours fine-tuning and proofing neck carve code (ie, time in which I could likely easily carve 100 necks), it seems like a massive waste of energy unless you're mass producing. I know of a few smaller builders who use CNC for a lot of things, including necks, but most use it to get a 'rough', basic neck shape, and then further refine it by hand to fine-tune the profile to the customer's wishes. CNC is then just another way to get rid of the bulk of the shaping process.

[fryovanni]

Since this is Mick's topic... What were you thinking dude? Why didn't you use your CNC machince to carve your necks? See, that is the problem you just keep overlooking the right tools for the job. You probably need to organize your shop. I bet you put it under one of your benches and just forgot about it.

Rich

[erikbojerik]

A sanding drum chucked into an electric drill. Drill goes in a vise so you can hold the neck with both hands.

[johnsilver]

Rasps (microplane, half-round cabinet in various grades: rough machine-cut one, and a pair of hand-cut rasps for finer detailing, Japanese shinto hacksaw rasp) for most of the shaping, and scrapers (straight and curved) to really refine the shape and transitions. Shoeshining with sandpaper also helps smooth things out.

+1

I really like microplanes. I now have the rough and fine microplanes - one following the other. Then I use flat and half-round fine rasps to smooth and finalize transition around volute and heel. Then sanding.

[TechArt]

Used to its fullest potential, CNC is one of the best ways to carve a neck. I believe The large manufacturers (Taylor, Martin, Gibson, Fender, PRS, and others) use one or both of the following two methods: CNC or copy carvers (i.e. large duplicarvers).

On a run of the mill Fadal (a CNC used by many guitar makers) you can carve a neck in under 5 minutes. Accuracy will be within about .002" of what the machine code says that it should be. The copy carvers used by some companies such as Fender are also very effective tools, albeit less flexible (Fender uses a german made copy carver...zehnheiser? or something like that). They typically carve a large number of necks all at once.

Of course with CNC & copy carving, your end result is only as good as your code. If it's great code, you'll get great parts...if it's not...it's the old crap in, crap out....!

'Best' in this case only means 'most cost effective in a mass production setting'. And frankly, taking Taylor as an example, CNC is not the best way to go about it. 'Simple' carving setups (which are not CNC, they're single function, mechanical devices. Load up necks, machine moves the only way it can; no copy carving, which is how gibson did/does its tops) are much faster.

Most of us aren't in this to mass produce, and since I've yet to make two necks that are identical, and don't feel like spending many, many hours fine-tuning and proofing neck carve code (ie, time in which I could likely easily carve 100 necks), it seems like a massive waste of energy unless you're mass producing. I know of a few smaller builders who use CNC for a lot of things, including necks, but most use it to get a 'rough', basic neck shape, and then further refine it by hand to fine-tune the profile to the customer's wishes. CNC is then just another way to get rid of the bulk of the shaping process.

I believe Taylor uses the rotoshaper you are talking about as a preliminary neck roughing step (I'm guessing you saw this on the factory friday video?). If you check out episode 13 of Factory Fridays you'll see that the heel & final carve is done using CNC.

CNC can definitely be an effective tool for quick turnaround as well as mass production...it all depends on how good you are with CAD/CAM.

[Brian Porter]

I usually use a Orbital Sander and check the fit along the way. Templates at varous fret places are a good idea.

[Guitarfrenzy]

Your best bet, unless you found the CNC you lost under your workbench.. .. is to do it by hand with starting with rasp, moving to spokeshave, then scrapers, and finally various stages of sandpaper to smooth it out. Just like everyone has stated so far. I also use a contour gauge if I want to match a certain contour and keep checking my progress while I keep shaping the neck. It doesn't take long to shape a neck if you use the right tools at the right time. You wouldn't want to use just sandpaper to try to take off huge amounts of wood, just as you wouldn't want to use a rasp to do the final touches. Besides it's totally fun hand shaping the back of the neck, and unless your goal is to make as many necks a day as Fender, Gibson or Taylor, then no need for CNC.

[Mickguard]

Since this is Mick's topic... What were you thinking dude? Why didn't you use your CNC machince to carve your necks? See, that is the problem you just keep overlooking the right tools for the job. You probably need to organize your shop. I bet you put it under one of your benches and just forgot about it.

Rich

No, here's the thing. See, I left my CNC stuff in my teleporter the other night, and somewhere between Tokyo and the Alpha Quadrant, that all went missing.

It's definitely interesting to see the range of methods here --and the different approaches to the process.

For me, carving the neck (this is the second one I've tried but the first one that will be used on a guitar) is definitely a hands-on manual process. In fact, I'm enjoying it so much, I'm just dragging it out over several days. I'm just in no hurry to get it done. And I don't think I'd enjoy it as much using any kind of power tool. That would go too quickly for me. Part of that is also I'm nervous that I'll overlook something if I rush it too much.

I can see where a pro would be interested in getting things done as quickly as possible. Although I don't see the 'handcraft' in the use of CNC--that makes sense for things like slotting, but for the actual work, well, seems to take a lot of the fun away.

But I'm into the final sanding phase, up to 220 grit on the neck, and correcting some things at the headstock. I need to reduce the thickness of the heel too--I'm thinking my best bet to keep the heel flat will be to attach sandpaper to the piece of mirror I use (I epoxied a wood handle to the back). I need to remove a millimeter or two because the body wood isn't very thick.

[TechArt]

I also enjoy doing some things by hand. I guess the main reason that I got into it for guitar making is that I do CAD & CAM all day long at work...so for me, they are better tools. I don't think there is any "handcraft" per se in CNC work. It's more "design craft" i.e., the art is in the 3D CAD work.

[fryovanni]

I also enjoy doing some things by hand. I guess the main reason that I got into it for guitar making is that I do CAD & CAM all day long at work...so for me, they are better tools. I don't think there is any "handcraft" per se in CNC work. It's more "design craft" i.e., the art is in the 3D CAD work.

I work with CAD and other software in construction design and engineering daily, and I can understand why you enjoy working with it. There are the two big realities that just about every hobbiest faces though. Financial and space limitations making some things out of the relm of options. It is a great tool, and I look forward to the day that they become more accesable to the common hobbiest(much the same as wide sanders, larger bandsaws, drill presses etc...).

For shaping I use sanding drums, and rasps for the heel and volute areas. I use spokeshaves, small planes, scrapers, sanding block and loose sandpaper to catch the longer part of the back. I use my calipers to frequently check my work. I prefer to use blades as much as possible to limit dust.

Peace,Rich

[Guitarfrenzy]

........... I prefer to use blades as much as possible to limit dust.

Peace,Rich

Amen Brother!!!