Building A Neck-thru Blank

[MescaBug]

Hello,

I started building my first neck-thru blank. I used a 2" X 40" hard maple board. It is planed to 1 3/4" thick by 2.5" wide and ready to be worked on.

I'm having a very hard time cutting the fingerboard portion of the neck to approx 1". My 9" band saw isn't powerful enough, I don't want to do it with the jigsaw. I can use the router, but routing a 1" X 15" area is just plain crazy. What are you guys using to cut that part? No, I don't have access to other powertools, or workshop. Buying other tools is not an option either, at least not for now. I already spent 1000$ this weekend.

I got another idea to make things easier. Simply glue a 1" X 40" board to another 1" X 16" board for the body. Is it a good idea? I heard that glue is not very good for the tone. Glueing these 2 boards + body wings + fretboard, that is a lot of glue. Maybe I'm wrong, and it's perfectly correct to do it that way. I need some opinions.

I did dome search and almost every neck-thru project I saw uses a 2" board, that is cut to the desired thickness.

Let me know what you think,

Thanks!

David

Edited October 16, 2007 by MescaBug

[six_stringer]

Search this site for "router sled". There is alot of information about this here.

Look at this post: http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.ph...;hl=router+sled

Without being able to cut the excess off of your neck blank you will have to waste that section by using your router. Hand tools can be used but for that much wood removal it would take more time.

I bandsaw mine but I have used my router and a homemade router sled to thickness the back of some of my necks and bodies. There are a couple of different ways to do this.

1) Make a wide router base out of plywood and add pieces to the ends of the base so that it is raised up high enough to go over your neck blank or whatever else you need to thickness down. You will need a flat level area that is large enough to place your neck so that the jig can slide around over the work piece. I doublestick tape my work piece down to keep it steady.

or

2) Build a router thickness jig like in the link above. It has a sturdy base and has sides (rails) but is open on the ends. You still need a router base that is long enough to go past each rail for the router to attach to. It doesn't have to be very complicated but it should be sturdy and the sides should be the same height. This jig can be used to thickness bodies, backs of necks, backs of pegheads and neck pockets.

"I got another idea to make things easier. Simply glue a 1" X 40" board to another 1" X 16" board for the body."

I suppose that could be done but I think you should stick with the thicker stock. It's easier to smooth the neck to heel transition with thicker stock in my opinion and you don't see where the wood joins up.

Good Luck,

Jeff

Edited October 16, 2007 by six_stringer

[j. pierce]

I've cut bodies, and the waste section off the back of through-necks out with a coping saw, by hand. (Bodies actually end up being easier to cut convex curves from the top via a series of straight cuts with a larger saw) For thicker pieces of wood, it ended up being not much slower than my jigsaw. (I killed my last jigsaw trying to do these cuts, so I switched to the hand saw.) Yeah it takes all afternoon, and you need a more than one good blade, and you need to be careful and it still needs a fair amount of cleaning up afterwards. And your forearm will look like Popeye's when your done. Now that I have access to a bandsaw, will I go back? Not unless I absolutely have to, but there are worse ways to waste a couple of hours.