Chambered S-type

[SSS-tonelover]

i just finished this one. Loosely inspired on Strats, rear cavity mounting, Ibanez jack design, Warmoth chambered concepts, 4x2 neck headstock, upper neck access, and EQ on-board.

This is a "clamshell" guitar with internal chambering impossible to detect from the outside, a "sleeper" so to speak. i used poplar 21mm thick (doubled up for thickness) and with an two layers of 1/16" veneer and two layers of 0.5mm rosewood in the middle of the sandwich to get to 45mm total thickness.
After some drawings (Illustrator) and template creation (1/4" MDF) I got down to it with the router, and then followed up with the other usual luthier tools.

Things went pretty much to plan, however the 1st neck I have earmarked for it turned out to be warped and with a stripped truss rod (GFS 'factory second' I had sitting for some years and had never examined closely!). I got a Kimise 4x2 from eBay and used it, but after assembly discovered its neck scale was not a true 25.5" but 3.5~4mm shorter. Interesting, eh? The Wilkinson high E saddle just could not intonate, it needed to go further forward than the bridge design allowed. I substituted Graphtech saddles as the 'string break point' sits much further forward and allowed perfect intonation. Good thing I knew that. The workaround would have been to use another neck, or shave the heel of the Kimise (about 3mm) and redrill the mounting screws. Too much work for no real gain....
Specs include
-Chambered poplar body
-Graphtech saddles
-Wilkinson bridge
-4x2 locking tuners 18:1 ratio (Aliexpress)
-Artec MT3 control system / EQ
-Mystery Korean pickups
-Free-Way 10-position switch
 

[Bizman62]

6 hours ago, SSS-tonelover said:

after assembly discovered its neck scale was not a true 25.5" but 3.5~4mm shorter. Interesting, eh?

That's a common issue with partscasters, the dimensions may not match. Even more so if they come from different factories. Trying to find a matching neck to a ready routed bridge cavity is a hit or miss game.

And why is that? Well, one reason might be what happened to a fellow builder: His printer can split a large picture on several A4 sheets but when he made a template using the prints it appeared to be a tad smaller than intended. The kit manufacturers obviously can't directly counter engineer the big name models so they may as well rely on free drawings made by some hobbyist which already has the potential of measurement errors and if the part builders print such drawings for their templates with a hidden scaling the measurements can be way off.

[SSS-tonelover]

I can see that, but with CNC (at the factory level) errors have generally been going down. Now, for example most all clone Strat pickguards are pretty darn accurate in the placement of all 11 screw holes, though that was not true even 10-15 years ago. Things like the Strat blueprint can be found on the internet, including critical neck dimensions, so are available to any clone factory should they look. With the huge partscaster industry, and with all the sharing that goes on legally or otherwise most critical dimensions are known. There is no copyright to avoid when using a neck scale for example, though a headstock shape may be protected.

Anyway lesson learnt, always check, never assume -- even from a previously used supplier.

The image here is a superimposition of a Strat body and neck and some of the calculations (magenta) I use to establish matching references (such as nut to tremolo screw holes) are "Fender 25.5" scale compatible, assuming the scale is that actually (nut to 12 fret should also be measured).  The 1st neck seemed within 1-2mm by my calculation (so within tolerance) and I should have done the same test with the second neck, my error.