Oct. 29th 2024

A little slow with the update. I had a neck blank that it had a few mistakes that I was working around, mostly with regards to the original layout also I took a few short cuts that did not pan out. So I started a new neck using some jigs I had used in the past a few news ones made with the CNC. I grabbed a new blank with plans to cut a scarf joint and use excess to build a stacked heel from the same blank. With the bridge already located care need to be take to put the 12 fret in the exact correct location.

As with the first blank I used my scarf joint jig on the band saw, used a plane to clean the cut surface







I tapered the neck from the fret board side. Basically I drew the necks profile on one of the sides. I like to keep the bottom of the headstock scarf joint right at the nut location. So with that line setting the break of the angle I was to use a plane on both the neck and the headstock properly tapering the neck and thinning the headstock until the angle break was set to the correct location. That left the head stock thick, so I used my SafeT plane to thickness the head stock.





I laid out the stacked heel and glued it to the neck. Having tapered the neck from the fretboard side the back of the neck was still square, not a big deal but I did not have to deal with the taper angle. My backwards way of setting the neck angle leaves the neck angle square to the upper bout. I put the angle into the lower bout and leave the upper bout square. Amazingly when it is finished the guitar looks normal.





With the heel block installed I went out to the garage and used my table saw and a sled I use for my Spanish heel classical neck and a tenon jig to cut out the tenon. I set the table saw blade to 3° (next build 5°) Also note how I use a drill bit (drilled in square) at the 12th fret location to locate the cut. I do one side flip to the other. The pin makes sure that the cuts are even





With the tenon I drilled the holes for the brass inserts that I used. In the first picture I eye balled the holes with a hand drill. They were sort of straight, this time I went through the effort to set up my drill press to drill square holes.



This time I was able to set the inserts in straight. Note I leave the tenon long and clamp the tenon tight to avoid blowing out the tenon while inserting the inserts.

This neck blank is much closer to fitting correctly.

Nov 2nd 2024

This is going to be a bolt on bolt off neck. Before routing for the neck extension pocket the neck set needs to be perfect, or life gets hard later in the build. So I can not describe the number of times I checked the next angle and the location of the 12 fret to the bridge. With a fret board placed correctly on the neck I also used strings to actually see the string paths to the bridge for the E strings.



This neck joint is from the Gore/Gilet books. The idea is to route a pocket into the neck and a heel block extension in the guitar. The block extension is then glued only to the neck part of the pocket. The first pictures shows the routing jig and a test insert I made out of plywood on my cnc



I double checked all of the setup angles once again and routed the pocket about .6" deep.





Here is why I needed a test plug, I tried to account for the router guide but the plug was a bit big.



I went back to the cad software took a thirty second off the plug and had the CNC route a mahogany plug.











A much better fit, I left the plug a tad proud so I planed it match the neck.



A nice fit!



And for the first time I left off the wings I need on the head stock and kept most of the neck alone. This allowed me to take the neck back to my router table (still setup from earlier) and route the truss rod slot in the neck extension.





Now I can start profiling and carving the neck.

Nov 2nd 2024

Finishing up the neck joint, I added the brass inserts to the neck extension and drilled the bolt holes in the heel block.







Once again checking over all of the setup parameters, and getting ready to glue on the wings where I need a bit more width.



Before gluing on the wings I can still rely on the square section of the neck to cut out the rough heel profile.



While I am at it I trimmed the heel length.

Nov 2nd 2024

On to the neck. I have a little time each of the last few days so bit by bit I have been putting the neck together. First off I add a couple of small wings on the headstock.



As the headstock was designed and cut out on my CNC so that I could use it to help shape the headstock. I mostly cut it out on my bandsaw and finished shaping with a pattern bit.







Before gluing on the headstock veneer, I quadrable checked the fretboard relative to the scale length. I glued on the fret board without taking pictures.



I used a drill the 10 mm holes required for the gotoh tuning machines





I checked the thickness of the headstock; they were a bit thick at 15.5 mm as can be seen in the picture. I set up the safeT planer and took them down to around 14.5 mm. I like the safeT planer as I can keep the back in plane with the face.





I glued on a heel cap and started to shape the heel and start the transition between the neck and headstock. I used a rasp for the heel and a knife for the headstock transition. I will finish the transitions after I shape the neck.