Official Luthiers Forum!

I've read here and elsewhere about the horrors people have endured when trying to implement the stewmac neck joint (dovetail or straight) tenon/mortise jigs.

The whole set up cost $100 for the templates and the router bit PLUS unknown time and costs for the building of the platform to make them work.

There's been a LOT of discussion and it seems that these things are a lot of trouble to get good results.

My question is, and this is strictly for straight bolt ons, has anyone employed the use of one of those table saw tenoning jigs? Delta, Grizzly and a host of others sell these things for about $60. From the pictures, it seems that you could dado out both the mortise and the tenon with a high degree of accuracy and ease. Does anyone employ this system and if so, (or not) could you please enlighten me as to it's strengths and weaknesses?


mconk39028.5189699074

I could see it working for the tennon on the neck. But I couldn't even imagine how you would put a body into it to mortise the joint. Maybe you would do that with the neck block (which I do by the way) but you don't need a tennoning jig for that. Just a fence. Yes, accuracy could potentially be good for the tennon itself buy you wouldn't have much control of the neck angle. So you would likely be stuck making 90 degree joints which would take a lot of hand work to set the neck.
You don't necessarily need to pay the big loot for the templates to get the same result. Make 'em. Heck, if you can make a guitar, you certainly should be able to make a male and female template(s) that match up just right. It will take a bit of time but will likely only cost you a couple of bucks for the lexan. Less if you make them out of plywood.

I have one of those Mike and I use it for furniture tenons, but I haven't used it for neck tenons. I clamp my neck to my table saw sled and cut it that way, following Cumpiano's method of making the cuts. I've done 6 necks and they came out great.

Ron

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OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

As for neck joint angle, I'm thinking once you have the neck assembly together (heel, neck, everything still square) you slice the 1.5 degree angle off the heel with the table saw and THEN cut the tenon. Dado the mortise into the block PRE-assembly.

I'm not asking if this is the best way, just if you think it would be an easy, accurate way.

I have the Stew Mac jigs. They work great, but it makes a mess and is very noisy. I built a sled like Sylvan Wells has and used it on the neck for the first time last week. Much faster, quieter, and cleaner.

Let me put it this way - I'll not use the router again for the neck tenon.

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"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered." G. K. Chesterton.