Hi All,

There seems to be some interest in the question "What's the best way to attach the neck to the box?" and it is a natural follow-on discussion as attaching the neck is probably the next thing you'll do once you have your box built and your neck/headstock sub-assembly built. So I have set up this discussion group so we can explore this topic further.

There seems to be four general methods of attaching the neck assembly to the sound box. They are:

1.) Neck glued on top of the soundboard (ala mountain dulcimers)

2.) "Neck-thru" the box (with the neck piercing the two (opposite) sides of the box)

3.) "Neck-almost-thru" the box (with the neck piercing only one side of the box)

4.) "Bolt-on" or "Screwed-on" necks

5.) "Set-in necks" using a tight mortise & tenon or dovetail joint as well as glue to form a secure neck-to-body joint.

However, there are usually several variations on these themes and we'd like to explore these ideas as well. For instance, there are a number of variations as to how bolt-on necks are actually bolted on (different fasteners used), and other differences in using additional internal (or external) bracing to avoid such problems as the neck bowing upward on a bolt-on neck when you first go to tune up the instrument.

We should also discuss the advantages and disadvantages of these different techniques so we can be better informed when we go to decide which way to attach the neck to the box.

Maybe I can begin by bringing together some build photos showing these different techniques. I'll go do that now...

A.) NECK-ON-TOP Photos

My guess as to the best known CBN member who builds primarily neck-on-top style CBGs is a fellow who goes by the moniker "Crow". His builds are typically fret-less and come with home-made tuners based on eye-bolts, which I guess he is an expert at making. Here's a group photo of some CBGs he built, all with the neck-on-top the sound board design and eye-bolt tuners. Can't build a much more basic (simple) instrument than these.

2.) The following photo is a mountain dulcimer I built with a raised neck-on-top the sound board design that is fairly characteristic of this type of instrument.

Simple mountain dulcimers have the fingerboard laid down against the sound board for the full length of the neck.

3.) Here is a photo of one of the several different Cigar Box Mountain Dulcimers (CBMD) that Diane in Chicago has made. This is a double box CBMD where two identical cigar boxes have been joined together side-by-side (with a big hole between the 2 boxes I suppose) to make a larger, contiguous sound box that is commonly used on this kind of instrument.Diane has also made single box CBMDs and (as I recall) three-box CBMDs, all with the necks (or more accurately, the fingerboard) attached to the top of the soundboard. Diane is currently making Cigar Box Violins (CBVs).

B.) NECK-THRU Photos

1.) Here's an example of a neck-thru CBG built by Jarmo Katajisto. His fret board extends beyond the initial neck-to box joint, requiring the lid to be slotted as well. One of the big advantages of a neck-thru design is that you can use the tail end of the neck for a tail piece simply by drilling a hole through it for each string. By terminating the strings on the neck, it protects the box from the strains of the string tension, so the tail end of the box won't need much (or any) reinforcement as compared to a Neck-almost-thru design, which often requires the tail-end side of the box to be reinforced to hold both the neck and the tail piece.

One of the problems with a neck thru design (where the tail piece is the tail end of the neck), is that the strings have a tendency of wanting to cut their way thru the wood of the neck. To prevent this, Jarmo has added a fret to protect the neck, and what looks to be some kind of grommets to protect the hole tops as well (otherwise those holes look too big).

From my experience, cigar boxes come with three types of lids. The first is where the lid is just a hinged flat piece of board as in the photo above. The second kind of cigar box looks like after they built the box, they used a band saw (or other saw) to cut the top 1/4 off the box to form the lid. Then, the third kind of box has one side slightly shorted than the other three sides. The three sides also have (what's the term, I've forgotten) a grove cut in them and a flat board that slides down this slot to close the box. Additionally, home made boxes usually have no lids at all, the sound board is glued directly on top of the box frame. My reason for mentioning these different box types is to illustrate the point that different box types mean different attachment techniques, usually in the form of minor details which tend to catch you up unless you are prepared for them.

In the case of cigar boxes like the one Jarmo used in the photo above, the neck often comes out mounted lower than the sound board. There are at least two ways to correct for this. One is to cut a deeper "hollow" in the neck (that hollow in the neck-thru part of the neck which helps to keep the sound board from touching the neck for better resonating), deep enough to bring the neck up to "level" with the sound board. This also means cutting out shallower slots in the neck- and tail-sides of the box to bring up the neck. So, hopefully you discover this problem before you cut the slots for your box. The other method to fix the problem is to add a fret board (fingerboard) to raise the height of the neck to be level (or slightly higher than) the soundboard. I have even seen examples where the builder combined both these techniques to overcome the problem. Now, if you are a fret-less slide player, their may not have been a problem there at all, but us fretted guitar players like a low action and sometimes that pesky (but essential) lid on the cigar box gets in the way.

2.) Here is one of Grizz's build photos of a neck-thru CBG showing how he reinforces the back side of the neck opposite of where a "hollow" was cut to avoid having the neck come into contact with the sound board. Hopefully the reinforcement piece he cut fits tight up against the neck- and tail-sides of the box. Also, the neck probably should not lie on top of the backboard, which I feel would have a minor negative effect on the resonating properties of the box.

When I reinforce the neck of a neck-thru (or neck-almost-thru) CBG, I usually begin about an inch and a half before neck side of the sound box and extend it all the way to the tail end of the neck. This means I have to cut deeper hole(s) in the box to accept the neck, but I feel a longer reinforcement area only makes the neck in this area all the more stronger. The resulting neck/box joint looks like a small heel on the neck.

In the photo above, notice how the builder has cut two holes in the top (lid) of the cigar box in order to mount the neck.This is an example of the second style of cigar box where the box looks to have had it's top 1/4 cut off to form the lid. Since this kind of box lid has sides, they need to be notched to accept the neck. Depending on the thickness of the neck, you may also have to continue the notch hole on the box sides as well. In theis photo. it appears the builder is also using the four wooden cigar box inserts (originally used help to hold the box & lid together to form an airtight seal to help keep cigars fresh). I usually remove them, since to use them would require you notch two of them a little bit as well to accept the neck. I usually glue and screw down my necks for maximal strength. But other builders rely on tight fitting pieces and the strings to help keep the box lip closed and the neck firmly in place. Yet other builders only use screws, so they can come back and easily make adjustments. I guess this is a matter of builder's personal preference.

3.) Some builders attach the neck to the lid so that the cigar box can be more easily opened. If the neck is attached to the bottom of the box, then you would have to remove the strings in order to open the box. Opening the box is often a desirable feature if you put pick-ups ("pups") and other electronic components inside your box to amplify the sound. Here's a photo that show's what I'm talking about:

This was one of Wes "Moaning Mule" Yates' earlier CBG builds. The photo is a bit blurry, but you can clearly see the neck attached to the lid of the box. I'm sure Wes likes easy-to-open boxes to fix or adjust the electronics inside. Here it seems like to turn on the pre-amp, all you need to do is open the box, plug in the battery and close the box again. Don't forget to plug-in your amplifier cable. To tun off the pre-amp, simply reverse this process. I recall seeing another wiring diagram where the jack was wired in such a way as to switch in the battery when you plug in the amplifier, and it cuts out the battery when you pull the amplifier plug out again. So, there's one work-around to minimize the number of times you have to open the box. Of course, all mine are acoustic only, so rarely is there a need to re-open the box.

4.) Neck-thru designs offer some additional design possibilities, such as shown in the following photo of "Cremo" a "headless 5-string Cigar Box Banjo" built back in 2008 by Bear. Notice how the headstock has been relocated to the tail end of the neck.The tailpiece is now on the head end of the neck, just past fret 0, and the 5-th string tuner is at it's normal location next to fret 4. This same headless design can easily be adapted to other instrument designs.

As I am currently recovering from foot surgery, and will likely have my other foot done, I am now inspired to build a headless neck-thru 3-stringer walking stick as I sketched in the diagram below.

Any design improvement suggestion are welcome.

C.) NECK-ALMOST-THRU Photos

1.) Here's a home-made box with a pretty basic neck-almost thru design. This photo is one of the many build photos that Grizz has uploaded to CBN to document his builds.

The tail end of this neck will have to be raised a bit before being secured to the tail side of the box in order to get a good 3 degree downward tilt in the neck to help realize a good string height need for good play action. Notice how the neck doesn't touch either the sound board or the underlying back board. This is to allow maximum vibration of these surfaces for better resonating acoustics. Also, notice how he has cut a grove in the neck for a home made truss bar. I think I probably would have extended the truss bar further down the neck as terminating the truss bar at the neck seems not to add much strength to this usually weak area. However, some truss bar is probably better than no truss bar, especially if you plan to make a 4, 5, 6 or more stringer. For more photos on this build, check out this link. There are a couple shots of his home made truss bar there, too.

2.) Here's a Neck Almost Thru design with a neck that is bolted on. This is one of Jon Pruett's builds and he says the bolt-on approach allows him the option of easily adding shims to adjust the neck angle to adjust the string height (action). Ideally, the neck angle should be about 3 degrees down.One observation about this design is why was the neck-thru part of the neck slotted or partially slotted? One would expect that this weakens the neck. I doubt that it would recover that much space within the box to improve the resonating characteristics of the box. It seems that the builder had originally tried to maximize the internal space in the box for better resonating, but then decided it weakened the neck too much and so glued back in a piece of wood that extends most, but not all the way to the tail side of the box.

Other builders might also beef-up the neck-thru part of the neck on the opposite side of the neck to compensate for the weakness introduced by "hollowing out" the area of the neck just below the sound board. This is usually done by gluing on another 1/4" thick board to the opposite side of the neck from this neck hollow area.

3.) One of the problems with Neck-Almost-Thru designs is that you need to come up with a good (and strong) tail piece. Builders have used many different things for tail pieces, and the subject deserves its own discussion area separate from this one. To illustrate the problem and one easy solution, check out this photo of how Ben (C.B. Gitty) first worked it out on his CBGs:

Ben used a short piece of copper pipe screwed into the tail-end side of the cigar box for his tail piece. Hopefully, this area where the tail piece was screwed into was backed up by some strong bracing, or perhaps the tail end of the neck itself. Copper was also used to protect the edge of the cigar box, as strings tend to like to cut through the wood. Copper, brass and aluminum make ideal material for tail pieces as these metals are rather soft and easy to work, and make better tailpieces than what you can make from wood. My wooden tailpieces tend to pop-off, break, or be slowly cut thru by steel strings. I definitely need to investigate metal working techniques, but what Ben has used above looks simple enough that I can probably even make one.

D.) BOLT-ON NECK Photos

1.) Here is a bolt-on neck box guitar built by Dogfinger Steve. One of the major advantages of a bolt-on neck is that it leaves a lot of room for a resonator, such as this metal bowl that Steve used. Most resonator based CBGs are built with bolt-on necks, though a few have used neck-thru or neck-almost-thru designs. Usually these exceptions use a deeper box and route the neck down below the resonator to the tail-end of the box.

Talking about Reso-CBGs, I have see one design where the builder cut the resonator can to fit around the neck, which may work well, too. I was left wondering that if you take a tuna can, cut off the upper rim, then cut out two wide slots for the neck, then invert the can and install it into the box by resting on the soundboard via the remaining rim, whether that can resonator design would resonate better than the equivalent can left unshaped and with both rims in place (and using a bolt on neck). Maybe a diagram would better illustrate what I'm talking about to achieve a neck-thru or neck-almost-thru Reso-CBG:

D.) Set-in Neck Photos

1.) Here is a tin box guitar where the neck is mounted to the internal wooden framework via a dovetail joint. On a cigar box, the neck-side of the cigar box will have to be reinforced with a fairly thick board, one large enough to support this type of joint. Joint looks like about 1.5" thick. This photo is of an instrument that Michael Fred Johnson built using a Guinness beer tin. I'm thinking the internal wooden framework is hot glued to the tin, but I'm not 100% sure. Pretty cool instrument.

More recently, Michael Fred Johnson has been employing a "V" Joint as can be seen in these next two photos. Will try to gleam more information from him as to how things fit together and are glued into place. Cutting all the way thru the neck-side of the box would seem to severely weaken the design, but I haven't seen the completed joint yet.