jay5

I think your design sounds doable. The blades you are talking about should work also. I would imagine that some VERY careful setup would be required but theyre is no reason why you shouldnt be able to mfg a usable rig.

Thenaks for the kind words Kammo! The jig does in fact have a built in taper so the back of the neck lays parallel to the table, very critical. I have a tapering jig ala Benedetto that I used to make the tapered part of the jig so the angles are exact opposites. As far as the "overcutting", if the 1" bit simply ran against the neck, the bit would have cut about 1/8" past the center of the neck. From my drawings, this would have cut into the neck about 1/16" or so at the nut end. By flaring the jig out towards the nut and using the bearing in the table I made it so that the bit wont cut across the centerline thus maintining the thickness taper. As far as a build log goes, the jig is very simple when you have all your specs and dimensions together. These will all depend on your neck specs. What I will do when I have a bit of time is draw up a little diagram to try to better illustrate how the bearing and flared jig work. Give me a couple days.

Great find! Might have to give one of those a try. Wonder how good the blades are?

Peter, my router is a 2.25 HP Bosch, not sure about the amps though. I havent tried it on anything other than mahogany but I imagine the router could handle it. Right now I am taking 4 passes to carve to final depth. I would probably take lighter passes in maple. The bit is a 1" radius Grizzly bit. It is working well so far but I plan to replace it with a whiteside bit when it starts wearing out, I went cheap to make sure everything was gonna work. There are a few more pics on my photobucket site, just search jaysguitarpics. The pics kinda suck, I'll try to get a few more. Erik, I was hoping to just have a bit follow the profile of the neck like you do but I couldnt get any of the different radii to work quite how I wanted. The 7/8" was almost perfect at the nut but left a flat at the 12th. The 1" bit would have been perfect at the 12th but would have overcut at the nut end. I figured that if I was going to go to the trouble of building the thing that I would get it to cut as close to perfect as possible, hence the flared template and bearing. I remember seeing your duplicarver and being really impressed. I may try to start planning one out soon!

Yeah Rick, thats somthing I forgot to mention. A multispeed router is a must with such a big bit I think. I run the thing at about half speed. Tell me, has your power swith started to crap out yet? Mine is getting there, supposidly its a known issue with the Bosch 1617.

Here's a pic of my plane. Its all maple and is essentially a prototype (as it doesnt work as good as my Ibex yet). My angle is a bit too high and the troat is a bit big. I incorporated a little support handle kinda' like the D'Angeleco planes. I really like it. The thumb screw is there to make up for the maple wedge not holding all that well. The next one will probably be Padouk with an ebony wedge like Setch's planes and the correct blade angle.

Here is a neck jig I have been planning on building for a while. David Myka's jig really got my attention when he posted it some time back. I decided to take his design and modify it a bit. Whereas David let the bearing run down the back of the neck, I decided to place the neck fingerboard down and have the bearing follow the sides. I was afraid that after one side was cut that there wouldnt be enough room for the bearing to run when cutting the other half. When I began drawing thins out I found that I couldn't get either a 7/8" radius or a 1" radius to work quite right simply letting the bearing follow the neck. I ended up setting the whole thing up with a bearing below the cutter that would follow the sled instead of the neck. This allowed me to make the sled slightly oversized at the nut end keeping the cutter from "overcutting" and changing the thickness of the neck. Anyway, it works pretty well and was fun to build. It takes me about 4-5 minutes to get a really good, consistant rough carve. This picture shows the bearing below the cutter. This picture shows that headstock support that is adjustable for slight variations in headstock angle. This picture shows a neck off the jig. Right now I am just free handing where I start and stop on the shaft. I will probably add some removable pieces to each end that will allow me to blend the cut instead of just stopping. Finally, this picture shows the neck after the transitions have been roughed it with a rasp (about 5-10 min). All and all I'm pretty happy with how this thing worked out. Thanks for the inspiration David! P.S. Sorry about the crap pics, I'll try to get some better ones.

The planes look great! I'll add a pic of my atempt a little later. Mahogany would make for a good body. If youre worried about wear, laminate a harder wood for the sole and then shape it accordingly. Rosewood fingerboard cut-offs work well. My blades are replacements for the ibex planes but I would be very interested in seeing how scraper stock would work.

How do you plan to get the 3-way in there with no rear access?

Well, simply for the sake of constructive debate, if your slots were cut to the proper depth, you shouldnt need to "seal" the ends. Now, what is the point of sealing the ends when the rest of the board is essential open to the elements? If your board does absorb some moisture it is going to swell, not shrink which is what causes fret sprout. One of the main benefits of binding, IMO is that if your board does shrink the binding can act as somthing of a buffer, keeping the fret ends from protruding. I hope I dont sound like I'm being argumentative. I would love to hear your opinions on my "theroies"

Not to derail the thread, but I'm not sure I entirely understand this statement Wes. While I agree that binding certainly isn't 100% aesthetic, I don't understand how moisture and the fret ends are related.

Cool man. From what Ive heard, all those 51's need is a fret dress and some decent pups to be great players. Can't beat the look either IMO.

Again, thanks to all for the help! I've got a few options at this point. I am working up a modified temlate that shifts the waist on the treble side up and forward, making about even with the bass side. This should shift the line of the carve closer to where I think it needs to be. In addition, Im still doing a few pickguard shapes. Finally, I am planning on softening up the edges of the carve in the waist area so those lines don't "jump" so much. I think that a combination of these things might get me closer to what I'm looking for. Thanks again to all! Expect an update in a week or two.

I have found myself frequenting Ace much more lately. Theyre definately where it's at for funky nuts, bolts, springs and other hardware for jigs and stuff.

Thanks again Pukko! Yeah, the heritage style is definately the one, and you're right, in the playing position it isnt as noticable. I think what I'll do is procede on as is (still a bit of refining on the carve anyway, upper bout being one area) and make a pickguard just in case. It doesnt bother me quite as much as it did originally so I think I'm gonna be ok. Thanks again for all the input !!

First off, thanks to all for the kind words! As far as "fixing" the problem, I am hoping I can come up with a pickguard that I like, I think that might be a good medium. In addition Im gonna make a new template and try to reshape it a bit on the spindle sander. If I can come up with somthing decent looking I might go that rout, but well see. Pukko, I REALLY appreciate those mockups, puts my mind at ease a bit! I was planning on doing a trans turquiose if you wouldnt mind rendering one up, just for kicks. If you're feeling creative I wouldnt mind seeing what an LPish pickguard might look on there too

Thanks for nothing Al J/K, I appreciate your input. Thats really probably what its gonna come down to. Like I said, sometimes I dont mind it and sometimes im like *** did I do?! I think Im gonna put it away for a while and see what I think in a few days. Im sketching out a pickguard on a piece of rosewood as we speak, might do the trick.

So I just finished up my first carved top. I thought it turned out pretty well but there is somthing about it that is really bugging me. I made the body template some time back and I thought it looked pretty cool. I kept fighting with the waist area trying to get it to look right. The final shape has the waist slightly offset and less noticably, about 3/8" fatter on the treble side. I didnt anticipate this being an issue until I carved. The first pic shows the carve and all looks pretty well. The second pic however will obviously relay my area of concern. You can see that by making the carve even in relation to the perimeter, I now have a pretty odd looking thing going on with the carve and the neck pickup. I don't really have any plan of changing the body shape at this point. Sometimes I look at the body and it doesn't really bother me, other times it really gets on my nerves. So my question to you all is whether this is really noticable and if so how much does it bother you. Going a step further, what would you all do? Thanks! Pic #2 Pic #3 Damn! Hang with me while I try to downsize this pic!

First off, that's an innacurate assumption. Now, as far as the "custom CNC" question goes, you will never make a dime doing it for the hobbiest. Even if you were supremely talented at CAD/CAM you would be lucky to make a single dollar selling one body or neck at a time. The amount of time spent at a computer plus material cost and machine time would kill any potential profit immediately. What if you messed somthing up and didnt know until you cut? Now you're in the hole. Not to mention you have no equipment. The only way to make any money doing what you're talking about is doing CAD/CAM for small builders making the switch to CNC technology. Even then you will probably be hard pressed to find enough business to sustain yourself purely on guitar work. Don't forget that decent CAD/CAM packages will run you a couple g's mimimum.

So you all have more money now than you think you will have after college?

SO are you planning on going into business? You're putting together a pretty nice shop there.

PRS headstocks are pretty squatty in the grand scheme. I certainly think 7.5" plus is a safe measurement for a 3X3. If you know what style headstock your using whay dont you just draw it out (or at least the tuner hole spacing)? Then you'll know for sure.

I dont think it necessarily makes it more prone to moving in that area (on its own), but not having the carbon fiber there probably allows the truss rod more control over the neck in that area, which is where you would want the relief to be. Please take this all with a grain of salt as I'm just recounting what was explained to me. What I think happens with inexperienced builders (myself included) is the belief that a neck needs to be dead flat and that any measure that can keep it from moving should be adopted, hence the carbon rods. In actuality, while a stable neck is important, a neck so stiff that it cant be adjusted is obviously a bad idea. I think that McInturff's method was his way of finding a happy medium between rigidity and adjustability. If you run rods end to end, especially the 1/8" X 3/8" ones you will probably make the neck so stiff that the truss rod will loose most of its effectiveness. By not re-enforcing the neck past the 7th fret it seems that you are allowing better adjustability where you want it. Again, I am not sure if this is Terry's reasoning as I have not discussed it with him but it seems to make sense to me. If you are really interested, I would head over to Terry's board,(thetcmforum.com or somthing) and ask for an explanation. He just came out with a new model, the "Carolina" that doesnt use this system but instead has a titanium bar in place of the carbon rods. You may be able to get him to explain both systems in better detail. I would love to hear what he has to say!

At my work we run them from the 7th fret to the 20th or so. The guy who designed our setneck worked for Terry and apparently thats how it was done there. The idea is that if you want the neck to be able to move anywhere it would be in that first 3rd as that is where you want to be able to control the relief. If possible I would run the rods paralell to the sides of the neck as I imagine that having them run across the grain somewhat would help keep the neck from twisting. As far as spacing them from the truss slot, the main consideration should be making sure that they arent pushed too far towards the edges as to be in danger of coming through when you carve.

Keep in mind that you can carve a recurve around the edges to "deepen" the carve a bit without bringing your binding edge down.