While shaping my first neck, I trimmed some material from the back side of the headpiece to make it less boxy looking. After I drilled the hole for the machines and sized them up during a test fit, it looks like the strings are going to be kind of high, maybe too high for the 1/4 inch piece of hardwood I planned on using for a nut. In retrospect, maybe I should have taken the material off the face of the headpiece instead, but my thinking was that if I made any mistakes, they would be on the back of the neck instead of the front.
If after the strings are installed, and it turns out that they are too high, what are my options, other than make a whole new neck? Are there tuning pegs that have shorter shafts that I could use instead?
Thanks for your input. I am documenting my project and posting pics as I progress...
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Rather then try to answer all your questions I will take another approach. (www.lmii.com/CartTwo/Video.asp) This is a link on Luthiers Merch Intl that has a couple dozen videos on all types of things. One shows a Guy carving a neck . Theres an explanation of neck rod types. Good basic luthier stuff. Quite a bit of it.
When I started I bought a book on building an electric guitar. It answered a ton of questions and gave me some basic direction. I built a Saga guitar kit and it came out well. I did not glue the neck as directed however. I drilled and installed inserts that allowed me to shim adjust the neck later on. As a result I have a guitar that plays very easily and has a decent neck set. The book showed me how to adjust the rod, the nut and bridge to obtain a good neck relied and string action. It gave me clearences that will be needed to understand what your trying to accomplish. I would recommend that anybody considering building their own instrument get some base line information. By that I mean a book and or a kit. A decent kit should have direction on set up and finishing. Grizzly Tools has some nice inexpensive kits as well as books. The ukulele kit is well under $50. LMI , Grizzly, Stewmac are all vendors with kits etc. They also have tuners , pickups etc for building your own. Enjoy the journey. Good luck . Chuck
I have a simpler solution you could try, when your winding your strings up wind the whole string onn instead of cutting a whole lot of string off past the tuner and the coil wraping around the tunner will force the string down to the bottom of the tunners post when you tune your guitar. That should thake the string as low as it can get.
If that doesn't work you could also just take the tuners off, make a raise-plate with holes in it and glue that to the back of your headstock. Put the tuners back on and the tunner itself wil sit lower.
Well, my buddy tried out my CBG last night when his band practiced. Here are his comments.
"Well, it sounded pretty rough through my Marshall with or w/o overdrive. I was able to get some kind of tone by bringing the treble way back and the bass up. The small string resonated something awful and maybe raising the bridge will help...."
Will moving the piezo around inside the box make much of a difference?
What would help reduce the resonance on the small string?
I currently have it glued to the inside of the lid, near the bridge, on the small string side.
You can pretty much put the transducer anyplace and it'll "work".... Different sounds, though.
If you put it under the box lid, you'll get more sound from the strings, but putting it on the 1 by 2 *might* reduce feedback (haven't tried it, but seems to make sense). Putting it on the 1 by 2, though, is likely to emphasize extraneous noise--slide on strings, etc....
I put most of mine under the lid, just in front of the bridge and on the treble side.
Iggy said:
And, the transducer should be glued to the inside of the box lid, not the 1x2? Or does it matter?
Thats what I use too, from Radio Shack.
Sometimes when I go in to pull the circuit board on those I just leave the piezo in the case.Sometimes I pull the board and pull the whole works out.I havent noticed all that much difference.I just make sure the piezo's well glued in place to pick up all the vibrations it can.
What kind of piezo do you have?
does it say "VDC" or something like that on the package?
If it does you have to open it up anyway so you can get rid of the circuit board.
I agree with Ted about the string retainer set Up.
My thinking is ,if it's good enough for Fender all these years ,it's good nuff fer me.
If you want to dress it up there maybe a nice piece of brass would look good.
Next question: Do I need to remove the black plastic cover from the piezo transducer, or can I leave it in there? I saw another article where the author broke open the case and removed the insides. Do I need to to that?
And, the ground wire goes to the outside of the phone jack, right?
Replies
When I started I bought a book on building an electric guitar. It answered a ton of questions and gave me some basic direction. I built a Saga guitar kit and it came out well. I did not glue the neck as directed however. I drilled and installed inserts that allowed me to shim adjust the neck later on. As a result I have a guitar that plays very easily and has a decent neck set. The book showed me how to adjust the rod, the nut and bridge to obtain a good neck relied and string action. It gave me clearences that will be needed to understand what your trying to accomplish. I would recommend that anybody considering building their own instrument get some base line information. By that I mean a book and or a kit. A decent kit should have direction on set up and finishing. Grizzly Tools has some nice inexpensive kits as well as books. The ukulele kit is well under $50. LMI , Grizzly, Stewmac are all vendors with kits etc. They also have tuners , pickups etc for building your own. Enjoy the journey. Good luck . Chuck
If that doesn't work you could also just take the tuners off, make a raise-plate with holes in it and glue that to the back of your headstock. Put the tuners back on and the tunner itself wil sit lower.
Hope this helps and good luck on your build.
"Well, it sounded pretty rough through my Marshall with or w/o overdrive. I was able to get some kind of tone by bringing the treble way back and the bass up. The small string resonated something awful and maybe raising the bridge will help...."
Will moving the piezo around inside the box make much of a difference?
What would help reduce the resonance on the small string?
I currently have it glued to the inside of the lid, near the bridge, on the small string side.
Congrats on the first build.
You can pretty much put the transducer anyplace and it'll "work".... Different sounds, though.
If you put it under the box lid, you'll get more sound from the strings, but putting it on the 1 by 2 *might* reduce feedback (haven't tried it, but seems to make sense). Putting it on the 1 by 2, though, is likely to emphasize extraneous noise--slide on strings, etc....
I put most of mine under the lid, just in front of the bridge and on the treble side.
Iggy said:
Sometimes when I go in to pull the circuit board on those I just leave the piezo in the case.Sometimes I pull the board and pull the whole works out.I havent noticed all that much difference.I just make sure the piezo's well glued in place to pick up all the vibrations it can.
does it say "VDC" or something like that on the package?
If it does you have to open it up anyway so you can get rid of the circuit board.
I agree with Ted about the string retainer set Up.
My thinking is ,if it's good enough for Fender all these years ,it's good nuff fer me.
If you want to dress it up there maybe a nice piece of brass would look good.
And, the ground wire goes to the outside of the phone jack, right?
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