[phreak]

looks like you're having a bunch of fun.  i'd like to see what else you do to it

Here's James Hetfield's new Ken Lawerence Explorer.  This is one of the best guitars i've seen.  Try to top it

[Martinus]

That fretboard is a smashing piece of work. Don't like the black hardware though, looks a bit tacky compared to the rest of the guitar.

[Setekh]

Originally posted by Maeglamor
More soon if you're all still interested.

Absolutely, dude. But can you tell me - what does the truss rod do? I don't notice one in my guitar...

[pyro-manic]

It controls the shape of the neck, so you can adjust the action. As far as I'm aware, acoustics don't have 'em.

Maeg: Not to worry. Just thought I'd ask.  Ooh, found this the other day - these things are sweet in every possible way. The Warpig got a rave review in Total Guitar, and the others look impressive as well. They're expensive, but they're the mutt's nuts.

[Martinus]

Not far off the mark Pyro. A truss rod counteracts the pull of the guitar strings, before truss rods were invented you had to have a pretty bulky neck to stop it bowing under the strain of the string pull. A truss rod pulls the neck back straight or ideally with a little relief towards the strings (a string's vibration has greatest amplitude at it's center hence more relief near the 12th fret than at the nut).

Acoustics do have truss rods, Martin guitars (which kick neck) used to have a solid steel rod imbedded in the neck, now they have conventional truss rods. If you want to see the adjustment nut get yourself a small mirror (I pinch my sister's when the need arises ) and hold it inside the sound hole beneath the strings, if you tilt it so that you can see where the neck joins the body you should see a silver allen nut.

I'm going to do a bit more to the neck tomorrow and hopefully it will be all glued up by tomorrow afternoon.

[Martinus]

Holy crap dude! Those pickups cost a fortune. You'd need to be a fan. Personally I think Kent Armstrong's pickups are as good as any other offering I've heard and they're way more affordable.

Oh yeah, I should mention that it's generally not such a great idea to go mucking about with your truss rod if you don't know what you're doing. You can mess up to the point of destroying a cheap guitar or having to have some rather expensive repair work done on a pricey one. That said, it's not the most difficult thing to adjust if you're careful, I just wouldn't recommend it.

[Setekh]

Ah, I get it Maeg - makes sense that they'd have to have those on any instrument that uses metal strings. Cool, thanks.

[Martinus]

More!
Ok I started off with a bit of an advantage; as I have access to the school's workshop I got to play with all of the nice powertools so that means I have access to a bandsaw!


Usng the bandsaw I cut the sides off the neck block, resulting in something more akin to what you'd expect a neck to look like:


Notice that I always cut outside the line; Confucious say "it is always possible to take more off but adding more is recipe for much sadness".


Next, on to the fretboard. The fretboard must be pretty damn straight and square; not the weird guy in the corner square, level along it's length and width square. Religiously square.
I check this using a guide from one of the machines which is ground for accuracy so I'm pretty sure it's going to be spot on.


Once it's good to go I glue the truss rod in, glue the fretboard blank on and clamp seven shades of heck out of the whole shebang:


Basically you leave it to sit for a few minutes whilst the two part epoxy sets a little then you clamp it until you get glue seepage all along the edges thus:


The glue can be cleaned off later with a knife, but first I must scrub my hands for about three days solid to get rid of the mix of epoxy and oil from the clamps. People look at you weird if you're plastered in black crud.


I'm going to really have to make a push next week to get this done in time for the grading, so you should see a lot of progress between tuesday and friday hopefully.

[phreak]

lol @ the clamps

i found out that my crappy ass microphone actually records sounds off my amp rather well  
perhaps i'll post something in the Art Forum once i have the chance to record it.

[Setekh]

Hmmm, is that thing clamped enough, Maeg?

Awesome work, looking forward to seeing the next instalment of Maeg's Luthering Made Easy.

[Sandwich]

Awesome.

[Martinus]

Originally posted by Setekh
Hmmm, is that thing clamped enough, Maeg?

Well, it'll do.

You see if it's not uniformly glued down then the next part is going to be a pain in the neck (no pun intended); I'll have to take a plane to it to ensure that the fretboard is square with the neck heel and believe me, that's difficult.

[pyro-manic]

Holy crap dude! Those pickups cost a fortune. You'd need to be a fan. Personally I think Kent Armstrong's pickups are as good as any other offering I've heard and they're way more affordable.

Heh, they are a bit pricy. Do you have a link for those? I'm looking for a new bridge pickup for my SG, cos I'm finding it a bit weedy. The neck one's lovely, but the bridge is sounding a bit weak. If they're cheap, then that's a plus.

Not far off the mark Pyro. A truss rod counteracts the pull of the guitar strings, before truss rods were invented you had to have a pretty bulky neck to stop it bowing under the strain of the string pull. A truss rod pulls the neck back straight or ideally with a little relief towards the strings (a string's vibration has greatest amplitude at it's center hence more relief near the 12th fret than at the nut).

OK - didn't know that. But the only reason you'd mess with the truss rod would be to adjust the action, no?

[Martinus]

Yeah, effectively. A lot of people are convinced that it's the way to adjust action but in reality it's a number of different factors combined.

[Martinus]

Ok a quick (and crappy IMHO) update; forgot to bring my camera so I had to use my phone. I'll probably replace these photos with proper ones tomorrow.

Ok I made a router jig (guide) from plywood which basically involves cutting the plywood to fit the heel of the neck as closely as possible. I then screw this to the top of the guitar. No marks will be left because the place that I used screws will soon be a cavity for a pickup. Pretty simple but it works.


Using the router I cut the cavity into the guitar body where the neck will reside.


Here's what the cavity looks like after I remove the jig, pretty clean eh?


And here's a picture of the neck in place, note that I have cut the fretboard sides flush with the sides of the neck itself. Look at the photo of the clamped neck for reference.


Unfortunately a teacher decided to do a little bit of work on the area around the neck cavity and I'd not realised, luckily the neck plate still fits (barely) but I had to fit it slightly off center. No biggie but not as perfect as I'd like.

Here's a good sign: Then neck centerline and the body centerline still match, you can also see how close the neckplate is to the edges and how the heel of the neck sticks out on both sides. (Not so good)

[Image lost]


Lessons learnt today:
Bring the blimmin' camera.
If you want something done right...

[Setekh]

Originally posted by Maeglamor

[color=66ff00]You see if it's not uniformly glued down then the next part is going to be a pain in the neck (no pun intended)
[/color]

No pun avoided, you mean.

You know, those aren't bad for shots taken from a camera. Neckplate looks nice and shiny and pro.

[Joey_21]

Wow! Progress coming along nicely. Makes me want to build my own. But as I'm running on a lack of time, I don't know when that will happen.

[Martinus]

Ok got a decent amount of work done today but it's kinda one of those things that's small and time consuming so it doesn't look so fantastic. Anyway:

[Updated: Some of the photos above are the 'replaced' higher quality versions, I kept the post to ensure everything flows logically...]

A better picture of the neck attached to the body (remembered my camera obviously ).


And the neck socket (a fine piece of work if I do say so myself )


As you can see the fretboard is flat along it's entire length and width (relatively speaking of course, a microscope would tell a WHOLE different story. )


Here's the neck socket template I made, it's 5mm plywood cut to fit the end of the neck as closely as possible, the two holes are where I use screws to fix it to the top of the guitar body.


And in position, note the holes for the screws that fix the neck to the body:

[Martinus]

Back to the neck; mother of pearl dots (yep, the real stuff). These you will see adorning many's an expensive fretboard.


And here's the fretboard with holes drilled for them and shallow slots, I'll cut them to the proper depth later with a slightly larger saw, these slots give the big saw a better chance of staying in the slot accurately and not gouging the fretboard.


I use good old superglue to glue the dots into the fretboard and the little green screwdriver allows me to press them in firmly without the mess of having a half finished neck stuck to my hands. (frustrating and cumbersome, or so I've heard. )


As you can see I leave the dots sitting a little proud of the face of the board, once I finish sanding and cambering the fretboard these will be flush with the surface and will look quite cool when polished.


Fretting tomorrow I hope.

[Martinus]

BTW sorry pyro, forgot to mention the link, it's http://www.wdmusic.com/

They supply to the US and to UK so it's quite handy for me.