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Electric guitar question

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weewillie said:
do you rout the truss rod slot?
Click to expand...
Got the truss rod fitted today. I didn't want to route out the slot from the neck to the pickup recess until I had the rod welded up and cut to length. Also started on the back covers today. They are aluminum sheet with some Leopard wood as a veneer.
 
I'm going to play with some guitar building one of these days, but I must admit that making the truss rod has always made me a bit nervous.

That wood is going to look amazing when it's finished.
 
drooartz said:
I must admit that making the truss rod has always made me a bit nervous.
Click to expand...
What do you have reservations about? The truss rod itself or cutting into the neck? You can buy truss rods prefabbed, you only need to cut it to length and thread one end 10-32. I made my own because the prefabbies didn't do exactly what I wanted.
 
Mostly cutting into the neck, I suppose. I'm just going to have to give it a go one of these days and work through my own nervousness. I may start playing around this summer, to see what I can accomplish. Not that I need another hobby, but I've already got most of the tools so it would be an inexpensive experiment.
 
The first thing I did was cut out the head. This gave me a location for the nut and the end of the fretboard. The two lines at the left of the neck are where the angle cut ends and the bridge side of the nut. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I routed for the truss rod next, while I still had plenty of wood foundation to attach a router guide to. The route is 5/16" deep, I made it in three passes going down 1/8" on each pass. Doing this minimized the chance of the bit grabbing the wood and flying off course. If it had, it would still be covered by the fretboard, so no real worries.
 
The covers are finished, they turned out well considering the glue shifted the veneer off the aluminum while I wasn't looking and hardened. I barely had enough veneer to redo, but the grain is off on the small cover. Got the head drilled too. Sanding a lot today.
 
I'm going to try a graphite nut. The word I've heard is the graphite will keep the strings from binding when bending notes. My other guitar has a locking nut, so this is new to me. I have no clue what a string separator is. :blush:
 
gregw, i like your "nutty" idea for the reasons explained, a string seperator is a small metal clip with a small screw to hold it down to the face of the head stock and is positioned to allow strings to reach nut slots without interfearing with each other, generaly used with head stocks that have steep angles from the tuners to the nut slots to keep strings evenly spaced, its hard for me to tell just how closely your strings will be when installed, it looks to me from your pict. of your head stock that at least the angle of the low "e" string may require one to keep it from jumping out of its nut slot when that string is tightened. your guit is gunnah be a beauty!!!!!
 
Hmmmm, you mean string trees ? What I know about them is they keep the angle of each string consistent over the nut. So with a non-sloping head (Stratocaster), the high E, has less of an angle to the tuner from the nut. The locking tuners I have sport two holes each for the string to go through at different heights. The last two tuners (furthest from nut) are taller, which works for a sloping head (I hope). The angle for the low E may be a problem though as you point out.
Traditional_Fender-style_String_Retainers_Detail2.jpg
 
gregw, ahah!! WE SPEAKAH da samma laggah weech!, yes thats what ive tried to say, i only wish you lived closer to me so i could show you the damage ive done to this kind of problem, i just wanted to let you know that if you run into the angle thing thats its easily solved, you do very nice work, ill try to send you picts of a 1960 original gibson howard roberts i repared/replaced the snapped off head stock, the owner was able to sell it for $6700.00 totaly no sign of a fix, sorry for sounding like blowing smoke out my own assteresk!!!!!!!!
 
Greg, he means something more like a comb, with a slot for each string. I had to use one on a 5-string bass I assembled a few years ago, as the low B kept jumping out of the nut slot due to an error on my part. It sat right behind the nut, and kept the string angle straight going over the nut.

Think similar to a locking nut, but without the locking bit...
 
Inlays are done, and I'm glad. What a tedious job. I started to get the hang of it on the second to last one. Now I can glue the fret board on the neck and get to final sanding.
 
Very nice!
 
gregw, nice touch! let me know when you install the frets, ive got a long fret file, expensive but works great, also a set of six fret cross files for various width fret material, so if ya need em dont fret! :yesnod:
 
Well, work slowed my progress a little. A tad more sanding, maybe one more coat of clear and some polishing. The colors looked pretty awful when I first stained it. Sanded much of it back, the clear helped pull it back more too.
 
Thanks for the offer Anthony. I think I'll be OK with the frets file-wise. I'm thinking of using my Thor hammer to put 'em in. That way, I can justify putting this thread in a British car Forum. :wink:
 
That's a very interesting grain pattern you're working with.
 
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