jaycee

Been there, done that! Excact same deal, same cause, same solution. With a little care it'll be invisible. I doubt I could even find the repair on mine if I wanted to...

Thats encouraging ( not that you did it but you repaired it ) I took the clamps off this moring levelled the top edge along it's length and will re-route the straight edge after I get some more double sided tape.

But so far it is looking good.

The "binding" remedy did cross my mind before I took the clamps off, a light coloured wood about 10mm thick for contrast

After gluing the heel block on, I was going to router the excess material off the side of the neck. However being there was about 4 - 8mm on one side and 5 - 10mm on the other I decided to saw the main bulk off keeping the routering down to a minimum, a decision I would be glad I made

After lining up the straight edge template and securing it with double sided tape I started to route, all was going very Merrily when I noticed that the pencil line near the nut end of the neck had disappeared. It was then I realised that the secured template wasn't secure but had been moving whilst I was routering, resulting in 3mm to much being taken off at the nut end I wasn't very happy.

After a bit of thoughtful thinking I remembered the pieces that had been sawn off, so I straightened up the what was now a wonky routed edge and glued in one of the pieces I had cut off earlier.

Hopefully being near the edge I may loose a bit of it when the neck is shaped

Any type of tube will do as long as its stiff enough Different size drill bits (using the shafts) copper pipes from the plumbers, pencils.etc..etc... Just put double sided sticky tape on them put on the sandpaper and away ye go.

Happy sanding.

On my Strat tuners are 6 on one side have 25mm centres,

On my Acoustic 3 a side the centres are 35mm.

I can e mail you a gibson style head stock and you can model your own from that if you wish

Is there a way to square the narrow sides of this blank for gluing?

I mean, at the home shop.

With "standard" power tools.

I have no huge stationary planers, no table saws, no circular saws.

I was in a simillar situation with some timber, so I took it to a local joiners shop ( which I searched for in the phone book) he squared and put it through his thicknesser for a couple of beers. Well worth a try

What differences are there between the Neck, Middle and Bridge pickups on a Strat, or any guitar that has two or more pickups which look the same.

Hope this helps

Last picture on page

I got two projects going at the moment 1 acoustic the other electric, although I really want to concentrate on the acoustic. I have the headstock scarfed on and when the truss rod finally arrived ( 4 weeks ) It was to long ( will do for the electric tho ) when I tried to re order it from allparts ( in the UK ) they don't do it in the length for an acoustic.

The one I wanted is a 2 way like the Stew Mac hot rods but a flat steel bar welded to the end nuts rather than two bars.

I'll have to phone David Dykes next week and get a suitable one from there.

I routered down a piece of 10mm ish mahogany to make the headstock veneer, glued it on and being that the edge of the veneer at the nut end is 90 degrees to the fret board ( as opposed to being level with it ) I will have to put some kind of rails so under the router when I route the truss rod channel so that the router ride over the top of the edge.

I remember somewhere on here someone said "sometimes it's not what you do, but the order inwhich you do it" wish I waited until that channel was routered before I stuck on that veneer.

And I must get a camera

Ok thanks Mat, so I need a rod thats basically the length of my neck i.e. from the nut to the tenon

P.S after doing some more research I came across This Pictorial tutorial which confirms what has been said.

I think it's the 13th pic down

So this is the way I'll do it unless anyone has any reason not to.

On the plans for my 12 string the length from the nut to the tenon is 375mm ( 14 3/4" )

In Cumpiano's book this this measurement ( from nut to tenon ) is basically the length of his truss rod plus the adjustment screw.

On my Tanglewood acoustic (which is an Ovation copy) the truss rod extends to the end of the fretboard, which if it starts from the nut makes it an 450mm (18") rod, being that the heel block finishes about 50 - 60mm ( 2- 2 1/2" ) from the end of the fretboard what (if any) advantage do you get from having a rod this long rather than one which ends just past the tenon.

The scale length is 25" and the body joins the neck at the 14th fret

If you really want to build one from scratch, I would suggest doing a strat style guitar, ( you don't have to worry about the neck angle) although if you check out the tutorial section on the home page there is plenty of material for you to read.

Another reason for making a strat for your project is once the body is routed out most of the hardware screws to the scratch plate. March may seem a long way away but as Wez alluded to, in guitar build terms it isn't.

Welcome to the forum and I hope all goes well.

3)For an accurate neck pocket look at Koch neck pocket or Myka neck pocket jig.

Brian.

I used the Koch way of routing my neck pocket, and at the bottom of the body I taped a paper measuring tape onto the center line, with the 100mm ( 4" ) mark on the line. This enablled me to make sure that the two rails were the exact distance from the centre giving me a perfectly linned up neck pocket, it worked a treat,

Ouch !!!!! that hurt and I only got till the first chorus

Welcome to the the forum.

I presume the guitar is intact with all the hardware on it, exept maybe the wammy bar.

The first thing I would do is plug it in and see if the electrics are ok. If not, take the scratchplate off check the wiring and see if any of the wires have come off thier terminals, you can get diagrams from Here re-solder and check again.

Make sure the neck is nice and straight and it is nice and securely bolted on to the body.

As long as that is ok start with the "decorating".

small dents and chips won't affect the sound just the aesthetics of the thing. It realy depends on how you want the guitar to look, after you've finished restoring it, filler and sandpaper will go a long way to making it look nice after a paint job.

But before spending any money on it or time and effort make sure that it is a viable prject

that's my 2 pennies

Most of the bridges I have come across are either rosewood or ebony, what is the reason for this?

I thought it may be the density or hardness of the wood, but is there any light coloured wood that could be used?

That is nuts man, it sounds pretty good too.

...that's what headstock ears are for. Seriously, 3" wide neck blank with ears is a perfectly 'safe' way to build. Even 2.5", really...

+1

ears for both necks.

It seems a potential waste of wood to size the neck blank based on the width of the headstock.

Ok thats good to know. I agree with what you say John I hate waste so you ll be happy to know the reason why I have used a 3" wide neck blanandto include the headstock, is the timber was salvaged from a builders skip, the mahogany were door frames and I got about 6 x 6' pieces, all of which are at least 3 inches wideand 2" deep.

I have to work around the bolt, nail holes etc but I won't be short for neck blanks for a while

Thanks guys.

I made a 14 degree scarf joint jig which is just 90mm. So I can happilly cut the excess width off the headstock boards knowing that it is still wide enough.

If I had made the jig 100mm ( 4" ) wide then I know it would have been ok.

Saying that mind some of the jackson headstocks look about 100mm in width if you measure from the widest pionts...

I am doing a les paul style head stock, the timber I have for the neck is 90mm (3 1/2 " ) wide. Is that enough width for the head stock or will I need something wider.

If some one could measure the head stock' width and length that would be great

Cheers

For me, the book is what allowed me to fully understand and integrate the information presented on the web.

I must agree with Mat theres nothing quite like a book even with the vast amount of info on the net.

You can pick it up , put it down whenever you want, and cumpiano's book is exellent.

Check out your local library to see if they have any mine had cumpiano's which I was very suprised at

You could router the angle using a jig like This

Glue it up using Setch's method and voila a good scarf joint, and when you put a 2mm veneer on top of that very strong

I like curved bottomed slots better. I like the detail of making a perfect radius bottom on a nut blank to match the radiused nut slot.

Is this a personal thing like knowing everything is curved and uniform even though (as in the case of the base of the nut) you can not see it, or do you think it alters the sound in any way.

Google it, theres lots of AU sites including guitar sites with info on it. For what it's worth I used Ash ( not sure what type tho ) as the neck of my strat and so far its fine, probably a good 12months now

Check This out it's how I did my neck pocket and was very good. Hope it helps

Also try the place where you got your router from for the router bit

OK, all cut and joined up using Setch' scarf joint technique ( thanks Setch ) next part is the heel block...........