guitar body from template, different neck

[simon1138]

Hello,

i am building a body template at the moment

i have a neck from a bc rich, it is a 24 fret with regular nut and truss rod cover. the template i have shows a floyd rose which i have bought with a locking nut. i want to use the 24 fret neck instead of a 22 fret. is there much difference when cutting the neck pocket?

i want to fit the locking nut but i think the truss rod is in the way, i am also concerned about the height of the locking nut. most people in videos on youtube, just seem to chisel out the nut, flatten the area and fit the locking nut. i have seen that they use a ruler to check the height against the first few frets.

what is the best method here?

thanks

simon

 

[Bizman62]

9 hours ago, simon1138 said:

i want to use the 24 fret neck instead of a 22 fret. is there much difference when cutting the neck pocket?

The nut pocket can be similar.  A deeper pocket will make the highest frets difficult to reach but there'd be less neck tilt. That in turn can be addressed by a longer upper horn. As @norm barrows said, you need to set everything according to your scale length.

In simple terms, as you already have a finished neck you'll have to measure everything according to it.

1. Start by measuring how long the neck pocket should be for the heel. The flat part can stick out a little but the fixing screws have to be within the pocket! Notice that this determines where the bridge sits on the body.
2. Having got your neck seated measure where the bridge has to be. The 12th fret has to be exactly halfways between the nut and the bridge. In other words the distance from the very edge of the nut to the crown of the 12th fret has to be the same as the distance from the 12th nut to the edge of the bridge poles.
3. Position your bridge along the bridge line leaving some adjusting range both ways. A rule of thumb says the bridge pieces of the lowest string need to be adjusted about 3 mm back and the highest 1 mm forward. Mark the front edge of the bridge and the posts.
4. Now you know how much space you have between the neck and the bridge. That's where you fit the pickups.

[ADFinlayson]

you can make a pocket template to fit your existing neck quite easily - clamp the neck heel to a sheet of mdf, then stick down some pieces of mdf around it, fitting snuggly, then remove the neck and route the inside area where the neck was clamped using the other mff pieces as a guitar and you have a template. 

[simon1138]

thanks for the help,

i am not really concerned with the 24 frets, i have never played that high anyway or intend to. i think that i will make the neck pocket template seperate to the body template that i have. 

 

[Bizman62]

I guess this post answers to the neck pocket question: