mistermikev

17 minutes ago, ScottR said:

You guys must type faster then me...

One other thing to be aware of Mike. Sanding contrasting colors of wood in such close proximity will cause you to fight snding dust contamination.

SR

He he not typing speaking into my phone! That's why there's so many words spelled correctly! I guess I'm going to 86 the laminate idea but you make a good point especially if you're dealing with ebony!

Now that I think of it oh, both the next are going to be dyed one red Les Paul and one black so I'm not sure laminate in between the pieces is going to make much of a difference. Just thinking out loud

7 minutes ago, ScottR said:

I think the fact that there are multiple glue joints running the entire length of the "sandwich" renders the point moot. Any kind or twist or turn of the neck requires the pieces to move lengthwise in relation to the piece next to it. The fact that they are glued together pretty much keeps that from happening. Add in the thinness of the laminates in relation to their length also diminishes the amount of force any one of them can exert against another..

I'm not saying it cannot happen, but using multiple laminates greatly reduces the odds.

SR

I would think the fact that they're laminated at all would mitigate any Boeing of course that is contingent on the bow being fairly small to begin with. I don't know how straight the green is on my wenge, the centerpiece, going to have to look at that this weekend.

8 minutes ago, curtisa said:

Easy preventative measure for that is to make the neck blank a few inches longer than you need, drill a hole through all the lams before gluing at the extreme ends and insert a dowel through the holes like a shishkebab. Apply glue, clamp up and cut the dowelled ends off when the glue dries.

 

You still need to choose your laminations appropriately for grain direction and orientation. I wouldn't expect a few random offcuts of timber to result in a stable neck if laminated together, just as I wouldn't expect a highly-figured single piece of maple to result in a twist-free one-piece neck.

I've seen one piece maple necks relaminated and flipped into a multi-laminated neck just to maintain the \\\-|||-/// end grain pattern for additional strength.

Considering this grain pattern above for a multi-species laminated neck, theres nothing stopping you using the \\\ and /// laminations ripped from a single piece of timber. The central ||| piece can be whatever contrasting timber you want (strength permitting) as long as the grain is 'more straighterer' than the others and the net pull of any distortions is nulled out by the two \\\ and /// pieces.

Want a 5-piece laminated neck? Just insert two more mirrorred pieces in between. Keep going for 7/9/11 etc pieces. Add as many veneer slivers between the lams as you like - being so slim they'll have no impact on strength and are only there for cosmetic reasons.

Right on some good info there. I don't have a lot of extra material so I'm thinking a decent nail would be a nice substitute for dowels. Going to have to find some veneer somewhere cuz I don't have much stock on that and that would be a nice touch.

42 minutes ago, ScottR said:

Small bows are not a problem. Alternating radial grain direction (flipping the ends) is a good strength and stiffness enforcer. You do want well prepared gluing surfaces so a fat glue line doesn't show up during the shaping. Gluing multiple lams at the same time is tricky--they want to slip and slide in all directions. Be sure to have a plan for that.

SR

Some great advice here too, yes I think I will try to use a nail at either end of the glue up to mitigate slippage. Thank you for chiming in!

43 minutes ago, Bizman62 said:

For what I've experienced and seen the other hobbyists in our group do:

Glued veneers are slippery! It's very easy to slant the pack. Of course you can re-square it by planing but that will both waste material and cause other unevenness. So be cautious to stack the veneers properly aligned. A couple of bolts or dowels at each waste end of the pack will help. A pinch of salt over the glue can help as well. If you add 0.5 mm veneers in between for added contrast the slipping problems will multiply but the result will be stunning.

Another thing to be cautious about is gaps. Even pressure is crucial but you still may end up having a deep gap between the veneers. In such case the only hope is that the gap is only on the surface and will go away when carving the neck! I can tell that's scary...

Perfectly flat is a must. You don't want to create any disorientated tensions into your neck which will most likely happen if you force the planks to bend together. If you can pinch a gap close with two fingers it's good enough. The abovementioned 0.5 mm veneers can also forgive minor unevenness.

I've built a three-piece and two five-piece thru-necks. One of the five-piece ones also had four 0.5 mm enhancing veneers so make it a 9-piece neck, the other one can be counted as a 7-piece. The 3-piece one was by far the easiest - actually pretty much the same dimensions as your woods, a 7/8" center block with 3/4" sides. The 9-piece was slippin' and slidin' all around but with some luck I could find enough solid material in the center. Bolts or dowels or even salt might have saved me from lots of frustration!

 

Right on BisMan, that's a good tip I've seen it myself but forgot about it thank you for reminding me!

so for my "TeLes" and perhaps my other tele, I'm thinking I might try making it out of a laminate of some flamed maple and wenge.  So far, what I know is that I might want to alternate the end grain. 

I have some (semi-rough) flamed maple that's 7/8" and some wenge that is finished 4s that is 3/4"... two pieces of flamed maple and one center strip of wenge should get me close enough to 2 3/16" if I'm careful... cutting too close?

In terms of prep... how important is perfectly flat here?  IE - since you are going to clamp it up... how concerned are you about bow (obviously a big bow would be problems but what about 1/16" bow)?  I would normally use my router plane to get a flat fretboard surface... but running this on the two flamed pieces would be a lot of work (plus sanding out the ridges) and am thinking of just running it through my planer a few times.

Clearly one has to watch out for obvious defects in the wood (don't want any voids) but other than that... what are the pitfalls of doing a lam neck?

I guess we both come away with something then. 

not really nitpicky... just want to know it so I can plan for it.   

I guess the top on a less paul is usually an arc due to the carve - so at the end of the day I'm likely going to have to sand the bridge ring to match that arc anyway...

At the end of the day this thread was really just me working it out.  Sometimes committing to writing it down flushes out the understanding... this was one of those times for me.  I do appreciate you playing along tho!

a gentleman and scholar. 

55 minutes ago, Bizman62 said:

Looks almost like something I might have drawn with Paint!

The neck ring should be similar to the neck break angle and the bridge ring the neck break angle plus the angle put into the body for the pups to be in line with the strings.

hehe, yeah, didn't spend a lot of time making it pretty... just trying to see where things will lie. 

right... the neck pickup ring s/b no angle... I don't know why they put one on.  If you are planing the body at the same angle you plane the neck... it should be parallel (doesn't everyone use the sm angle there?)  so I have no idea why they would put an angle on that. 

The bridge... I guess they go 6.75degrees as it should never be more than that.. and you just have to sand it down... but yeah, if you do a 4 degree pitch it needs to be at 4 degrees in theory... I guess since it's just a few degrees it doesn't matter that much, but I have seen some cheap les paul copies where it isn't angled... and we don't want that!

thanks for the reply biz

edit edit... ppps... looking online it appears that the typical is that the plane does end halfway between bridge and neck pickup.

Can't help but think I'm overlooking something.  (usually when I think that I am)

so looking at this:

and thinking (.383 - .176) =  .207....... .207/1.75 using an online degree calc 6.75 degrees?  seems extreme.

sorry, just thinking out loud here

you are a good muse bizman... I appreciate.

so laying out my geometry for my les paul esque angled neck.  it occurs to me that really any angle would work as long as the neck is sunk deep enough into the body to aligh it with the top of the bridge at its lowest.  it also occurs to me that the angle cut into the top of the body won't ever actually reach the bridge pickup if that angle is aligned with the bottom of the fretboard.  makes me wonder... I think there is an angle to the bridge pickup ring no?  anyone know this angle?  ideally both pickups should sit on the plane that would be parallel to the strings (in gray below). 

obviously one can sand down the pickup ring to make an angle.  begs the question, what is your approach to mitigating this? 

hehe, just asuming this pic means anything to anyone but me...

the cream is the body with a 7/8" top.  the gold is the neck wood and it ends at approx the end of the neck pickup, brown the fretboard 27.5" scale length.  the grey area is the plane I would put in the face of the body - removing all material higher than the top edge.  the darker grey is a 14mm height gotoh bridge (anyone confirm this height?)

55 minutes ago, Livinloud777 said:

Took a couple of minutes to throw this together. Sloppy but you can get the picture. I will probably put something better together next week.

Full Guitar Demo.wav 4.63 MB · 1 download

sounds quite nice even on work speakers.  good job.

that first one is quite nice... might be a hair too much contrast tho.  I think the very first one you posted is a likely winner as it's got some sparkle but will be subtle.

1 hour ago, ScottR said:

Of course.

The stupidest question is the one that remains unasked.....

SR

hold my beer...

and just like that I was all out of reactions!  cool beans.  DEMO... DEMO.... DEMO....... DEMO!

1 hour ago, ScottR said:

Looking forward to this Mike.

SR

thank you sir.  hope you are looking forward to answering stupid questions and providing a shoulder for when the crying starts (hehe).

right on.  i was actually thinking of metalflake for a minute... would be pretty cool... but then I'll be picking small flakes out of every nook and cranny for the next year!  (you know how that goes!)

right on.  that def would be a nice sparkle... not all that pearl tho, but would look nice.  have bookmarked it.

that guitar wouldn't look right with waterslide or paint.  def going mop there.  Just it'd be nice if I don't have to cut it myself as that logo would be tuff to get right.  Really want a more classic look, but not sure about cutting it myself.  for that reason, may take an easier route depending on what I can find. 

I guess in that instance, might be better off dying black after filling grain.

1 minute ago, Bizman62 said:

Cut and paste this as much as you like: https://www.mylespaul.com/threads/gibson-font-full-alphabet.196827/

I was more thinking about availability of the inlay.  I don't recall where, but I'm sure I've seen std 'gibson' inlay... would be pretty easy to take that and mod it to 'Gipsum' whereas 'Givsum' might require cutting it.  If I was cutting myself I could go all the way to "Gig Bum".  hehe

5 minutes ago, ADFinlayson said:

Thought you've been a bit quiet lately, should have known you would be quietly scheming new builds. Especially looking forward to the paul caster 

truth be told I was playing with my axefx3 for about 6wks straight... quite the distraction.  but lately: picture me wringing my hands and plotting world domination via tele build - lol!  afa paul caster... more of a teLes but i digress!  thanks for the reply AD