24 fret to 22 fret swap

[espnut2]

Does anyone forsee any problems with putting a 22 fret neck on a body that previously had a 24 fret neck, as long as the scale is the same (25.5")? Thanks

[westhemann]

will not work....

the neck heel is generally longer on a 24 fret neck

[ThePlague]

you can do it. www.warmoth.com sells 22 and 24 fret conversion necks. the thing is, you may have to take your neck pickup out to fit a 24 fretter in.

and the biggest thing is, will you actually be able to reack the 24th fret? if your guitar currently has 22, then the cutaway was probably designed so you could just reach 22. if you add 2 more frets on, you won't be able to reach any farther.

perfect example of this, gibson les paul doublecut (studio?). i tried one in a guitar shop. sure it has 24 frets, but what's the point when you can only reach 21?

[westhemann]

i assumed he already has a 22 fret neck in mind...because if he was buying a replacement,wouldn't he just buy the right one?

[ThePlague]

whoops i misread the topic. i thought he was talking about putting a 24 fret neck on a 22 fret body.

i'm not sure if it'll work now.

[westhemann]

you can do it. www.warmoth.com sells 22 and 24 fret conversion necks. the thing is, you may have to take your neck pickup out to fit a 24 fretter in.

and the biggest thing is, will you actually be able to reack the 24th fret? if your guitar currently has 22, then the cutaway was probably designed so you could just reach 22. if you add 2 more frets on, you won't be able to reach any farther.

perfect example of this, gibson les paul doublecut (studio?). i tried one in a guitar shop. sure it has 24 frets, but what's the point when you can only reach 21?

actually youread it backwarsds

and warmoth necks are made for a standard strat style neck pocket....a 24 fret guitar does not have that

to make it even more complicated,not just any old 24 fret neck will fit either,without modding...the heels on guitars such as ibanez and esp are proprietary(meaning it would be like putting a ford motor in a chevy truck...you can do it,but you have to modify the connections(motor mounts))

[RAI6]

warmoth.com sells 22 and 24 fret conversion necks.

The 24 fret necks that Warmoth sell are 22 "fretters" with an extended fingerboard.

It's intended as a replacement on a 22 fret neck guitar.

ESPnut2 has a 24 fret body, and is going to put a 22 fret neck on it.

While the scale isn't a problem, the heel is.

Obviously, a 24 fret neck is longer than a 22, so the heel on the 22 will stop before the appropriate position in the neck pocket.

If you just shove the 22 fret neck into the pocket, as far as it goes, THEN the scale will be off.

And that wouldn't be good.........

[spirit]

Am I being dense, or is there no sense in replacing a 24 fret neck with a 22? If you don't want to use the top two frets, fine, so just don't use them, or is there something I'm not getting?

[mynamesucks]

Am I being dense, or is there no sense in replacing a 24 fret neck with a 22? If you don't want to use the top two frets, fine, so just don't use them, or is there something I'm not getting?

exactly my thinking

[Hardtailed]

Am I being dense, or is there no sense in replacing a 24 fret neck with a 22? If you don't want to use the top two frets, fine, so just don't use them, or is there something I'm not getting?

Well, you do get a sweeter sound out of a neck pickup when it is located under what should be the 24 fret (that's why you can strike a natural harmonic over the neck pickup's coil, assuming it is properly located). But that also means relocating the pickup... which will look quite ugly unless you hide everything with a pickguard.

As for the neck itself, most 24fret necks have a longer heel (and not just an extended fretboard like Warmoth does), so for a 22fret neck to fit, you would have like 1/2" of free space in the neck pocket... and that's assuming there is enough "pocket" left to attach the neck properly.

[GregP]

I can't imagine a tangible benefit. The whole pickup location thing is one argument, but even that has 2 sides, which helps 'prove' that it's a very subjective thing which many people might not even notice as making a difference to their tone.

Greg

[rhoads56]

Well, you do get a sweeter sound out of a neck pickup when it is located under what should be the 24 fret (that's why you can strike a natural harmonic over the neck pickup's coil, assuming it is properly located). But that also means relocating the pickup... which will look quite ugly unless you hide everything with a pickguard.

Are you saying a neck pickup, when located where the 24th fret normally is, would sound better than a neck pickup located a 1/4" either side of that "harmonic" position??

If that is what your saying, you are wrong.

[Hardtailed]

Well, as for locating under an harmonic, I too find it's useless since the harmonic moves as soon as you're not playing the open string or the 12th fret... Still that's where Leo and Lester decided to put their neck pickups...

It has more to do with being farther from the bridge, which allows it to pickup a softer sound. If you can hear a difference between the middle pickup and the neck one, then moving it around has to produce a difference...

Of course, modifying a guitar from 24fret to 22fret just for that reason does not make sense at all.

[frank falbo]

The location of the harmonic is irrelevant. But don't use phrases like "you're wrong" when 1/4" movement in either direction does indeed make a huge difference in the neck pickup's tone. It is just as Hardtailed said, more about the distance away from the saddle.

Some 24 fret guitars like the old Ibanez RG's were actually 22 fret style necks with the extension. So you could put any stratty neck on there and have a big gap with a recess showing. But the scale would line up. But that warmoth 24 fret extension neck is exactly that, too. So either would work. But if it's cut for 24 frets and no extension, you have very few options besides moving the bridge and maybe the middle and bridge pickup routs.

[MuriSan]

I am in this situation. I have a Kiesel Zeus 6 (headless). It has Fender scale length so 25.5 inches, 24 frets and 20'' radius. I love the guitar except the neck. I'm more traditional and play lots of African rumba which is very high on the neck. Paradoxically, I'm a lot more comfortable up there on a 22 fret neck with a more traditional radius. It's funny but it's also very difficult for me to orientate on that neck. I constantly don't know where my hand is. I pick up the Fender, I don't have to look and I know where I am. I've had the Kiesel first so it's not a matter of being used to it. Well, Kiesel doesn't want to build it for me, which is quite disappointing. You think it would be possible to turn my neck into a 22 fret one? Perhaps replacing the whole fingerboard? 

[Bizman62]

Hi and welcome! And holy necro bump!

Someone correct me if I'm wrong here, but if the scale length remains the same, there's no difference between a 22 to a 24 fret fingerboard other than the two extra frets that require moving the neck pickup closer to the bridge. From the nut to the 22th fret they should be identical. Same thing with a 30 fret guitar, the extra length is just eating the space where you'd normally put the pickups. Ibanez RG2011SG is a perfect example of that.

Thus your problem isn't the number of frets, it's more about the neck profile and/or the fingerboard radius. Replacing the entire neck would be the easiest solution as the Kiesel has a bolt-on neck. The main problem with that would be to find a neck that fits the neck pocket unless you do it from scratch. I mean, for example there's a difference between Strats and Teles despite being from the same maker, the Strat neck has a rounded end whilst the one of the Tele is straight. Taking the Kiesel neck apart might give a hint whether you could take a standard Fender 24 fret neck with your desired radius and just cut the headstock off. That might work within the intonation range.

 

[henrim]

Wow, this thread is soon turning 20 years old!

Yes, like @Bizman62 says, if the scale length stays the same the only difference between 22 and 24 frets is the length of the fretboard. If you shortened the fretboard and somehow filled the empty space between the fretboard and the neck pickup the guitar would look like something like the second example in this crude photoshop I did.

Probably an easier solution would be to pull off the last two frets and slope the end of the fretboard (example 3). This would probably be easier to make decent looking than filling the space between the fretboard and the neck pickup if the whole fretboard was shortened. 

If you wanted the fretboard to end where it ends now and make it 22 frets, you would have to shorten the scale length. Which would require making a new neck or chopping the existing one.

[ADFinlayson]

The whole point of wanting a 22 fret neck instead of a 24 is that the neck is not as long, the only way you change out a neck and get the desired outcome is if the 22nd fret ends up where the 24th fret use to be, which means the bridge needs to move. 

[henrim]

20 minutes ago, ADFinlayson said:

The whole point of wanting a 22 fret neck instead of a 24 is that the neck is not as long, the only way you change out a neck and get the desired outcome is if the 22nd fret ends up where the 24th fret use to be, which means the bridge needs to move. 

Yes. Although if you had to move the bridge on that particular guitar, it would be easier to make a new body

[Bizman62]

4 hours ago, ADFinlayson said:

The whole point of wanting a 22 fret neck instead of a 24 is that the neck is not as long,

So despite the scale length being 25.5" on both versions the 22 fret neck is shorter on a Fender? That would mean that the bridge would be closer to the end and the overall layout would be an inch or so closer to the bottom.

[MuriSan]

Hi. Guys, thanks for your replies. Actually the idea is not to drop two frets but to have all that scale lentgh divided to 22 instead of 24. That would mean, all across the fingerboard the distance between two frets will be slightly bigger. So it's just a reallocation of the scale length for 22 frets instead of 24. Besides having a custom neck done by someone else, maybe just replacing the fingerboard, in my case it is made of bloodwood (the neck itsefl is of wallnut). My question is. This will have no impact on the intonation? It should be ok, no? Because the distance between the nut and my pickup stays the same and the scale length is the same. Only the frets will not be positioned in the same place.

[Bizman62]

1 hour ago, MuriSan said:

Actually the idea is not to drop two frets but to have all that scale lentgh divided to 22 instead of 24. That would mean, all across the fingerboard the distance between two frets will be slightly bigger.

Doing that would ruin the intonation.

Think about the #1 rule of scale length: The 12th fret has to be right in the middle of the fretboard, no matter the scale. The position of each fret is based on mathematics: You divide the scale length by 17.817 for the first fret, then divide the distance between your 1st fret and the bridge by 17.817 for the second fret and so on until you've reached your desired number of frets. More here: https://www.liutaiomottola.com/formulae/fret.htm#12th2about

The pickups have nothing to do with intonation or scale length, they're just placed in the free area.

As I said in my first post here, the issue is in the neck/fingerboard profile rather than in the number of frets. You can test that by putting the Kiesel and the Fender face to face, nut against nut and each and every fret should match except the two last ones of the Kiesel. As you said, the radiuses are very different to each other, 20" is almost flat compared to 9.5. Also, Kiesel allows you to choose from three thicknesses of a C shaped neck. Fender has at least 20 neck profiles, many of which are available or have been used in Strats. Doesn't that make 60 different Zeus-Strat pairs? Which one matches your experience?

[MuriSan]

Thanks, Bizman62. It's clear now. That means tere's no reasonable way to do this.

[Bizman62]

23 minutes ago, MuriSan said:

That means tere's no reasonable way to do this.

Again I repeat myself: Take the neck off to see what the neck pocket looks like. If it's square, a Tele style neck might fit. If rounded, a Strat style neck might fit. They can be very inexpensive (~50) depending on where you buy them. For minor adjustments you can use shims. Then just cut the headstock off and attach the end block. All you'd need is a screwdriver and/or hex key and a drill. More importantly, everything you do can be reversed if you're not happy with the result.

Before doing that, figure out the fretboard radius and the neck profile of the Fender you like.

[MuriSan]

On 2/4/2024 at 5:38 PM, Bizman62 said:

Again I repeat myself: Take the neck off to see what the neck pocket looks like. If it's square, a Tele style neck might fit. If rounded, a Strat style neck might fit. They can be very inexpensive (~50) depending on where you buy them. For minor adjustments you can use shims. Then just cut the headstock off and attach the end block. All you'd need is a screwdriver and/or hex key and a drill. More importantly, everything you do can be reversed if you're not happy with the result.

Before doing that, figure out the fretboard radius and the neck profile of the Fender you like.

THanks Biszman62. I'll do that. I'm familiar with the Tele vs Strat neck pocket difference.