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Seems like for steel strings the debate is always bolt on mortise and tenon vs. dovetail. Why isn't the classical guitar style neck joint, where the neck is first attached to the top with a relatively large neck block, ever mentioned?

Is it a strength issue? Just a matter of tradition? A problem for resets?

I was discussing the possibility with a luthier and he suggested that the larger neck block underneath a bigger portion of the fingerboard might give the guitar considerably more sustain in the upper register.

But it seems like if it was a viable option, a number of people would be using it, or at least discussing it.

Enlighten me, please!

Andrew Wright
Managua, Nicaragua

I think the main argument against it is the impossibility of a future neck-
reset. Perhaps a strong A-frame bracing allied with a Spanish neck-block
would prevent the top from distorting with time in this area. I'm sure other
will pitch in.

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Laurent Brondel
West Paris, Maine - USA
http://www.laurentbrondel.com/

laurent is exactly right. It's a lot tougher to do a neck reset on a spanish heel and if you build your guitar light enough to be responsive, in time it will need a neck reset.John How38747.6139236111

_________________
Tickle your guitar daily, and it'll tickle you back.

Also, don't forget the tension on nylon strings is much less than steel strings. I think a spanish heel on a steel string would fold like a taco in about a week. Even with extra support, I think that design would be fatal on a SS.

John

Jeff Elliott has done it for years. I asked him about the neck reset issue and
he didn't seem worried about it. Just another data point...

Cheers,
-Dave

Charles Fox taught the Spanish heel joint for steel strings for many years. The main difference being that the sides are glued into the slots. The side slots are cut & the sides sanded for a snug fit & glued in without the traditional wedges.
I built 4 guitars this way over 25 years ago & none have needed a reset thus far.
Structurally, I believe this method to be at least as good as any other common neck joint, but should the neck ever need to be removed, the only practical way I can figure out is to literally saw it off.

whilst i've not done it because of the repair difficulties cited above, the noted australian builder jim williams does so and incorporates the method in his building book.

they don't fold likea taco, or anything else for that matter.

My first guitar used this joint. It has had no problems at all. Of course I do use light strings on it.

I will say it is a PITA to finish nicely. Finishing is much easier when the neck and body are seperate.

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Joe Breault
Merrimack, NH
Perpetual novice

I'm guessing the dovetailed or mortised and tenoned neck joint came into
being for the purpose of simplifying production and finishing. I've built a
few dreadnoughts with a Spanish heal and they have withstood the test of
time just fine. I would bet they will actually function longer before they
need any kind of reset. I now use a bolt-on neck for the reasons above --
it's easier to finish, buff, and assemble. But the Spanish neck joint is well
engineered to provide rigidity and lightness. Just MHO.
Craig

I've used the Spanish heel exclusively for 25 years on steel strings. I have had a few problems with a couple of early guitars, but that was my fault for not building in enough neck angle initially. I also did not use radiused soundboard bracing back then. To "reset" these it is a matter of popping the fretboard off and changing the angle by adding ebony to the underside to angle the fretboard as needed to get enough height at the bridge.

I've designed my current guitars with enough neck angle to allow for enough height at the bridge and to allow for adjustments if needed, which I didn't do early on.
With this joint you glue the neck in early on, so it is important to get the angle built in early on. A minor downside is that binding is a little tougher because the binding ledge has to be hand chiseled into the neck, you can't just route all the way around the body. Also, the finishing process is different because the neck is already on. The upside is that there is no neck fitting involved later.
With modern methods of neck construction, using adjustable truss rods and carbon fiber neck reinforcement, the necks just don't move much. The interior portion of the neck block extends a few inches into the guitar under the soundboard so the fretboard has a little more solid support, and the back has a little more glue surface area at the foot to counteract any creeping there.

I will say that I do leave enough "meat" in the foot to be able to dovetail a new neck into it in the event that someone runs over their guitar neck or somehow manages to break a neck off.

Hi Rob, good to see you again here at the OLF!

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Lance@LuthiersForum.com

I used to use Spanish heels on steel strings, including 12s, and never had a problem that I could attribute to the neck joint. One or two got dropped and broke in the usual ways, but.....

Traditionally Spanish makers used to accomodate the inevitable pull-up of the neck due to body distortion by using a really thick fingerboard. When the action got too high and the saddle too low they just pulled frets and planed it down at the nut end. Eventually you'd run out of fretboard, but by then the maker would be dead anyway, so.... With steel strings the movement should be much quicker, although I can't say from my own experience if that's so or not.

I started using plug-in necks mostly to decrease sales resisitance: steel string players feel better when they see that the neck can be reset. It can be argued that the joint is a weak spot that will eventually fail, requiring a reset, and you'd be better off without one. It's hard to say; I think if the joint is well fitted it ought to hold up OK. Sometimes they are not well fitted, of course, but we hand makers are _never_ that sloppy, are we? ;)

I was talking about this once with Chris Martin, and he pointed out that they'd need a much larger plant if they made them the Spanish style, simply to have room to swing guitars around without knocking into stuff. It's as good a reason as any to use that joint.

I still use a 'chin' under the fingerboard extension, to support those high frets, and help keep it from pulling cracks in the top as the ebony shrinks. I also dome my tops, and use an A-brace that plugs into the neck block, so at this point I'm a 'belt and suspenders' man. Once I finish building a guitar I just hate to have it come back for a repair.   

Y'all are assuming that guitars need neck resets because of the joint pulkling apart, but that isn't so, in the majori9ty of cases. Most guitars in need of a reset have a perfectly tight joint that didn't move one bit.

It's the entire guitar that slowly deforms over time. A bit here, a bit there, and it all adds up. Of course, we can build spo sturdy that nothing moves at all, but this is wood, and wood is, well, wood. And these are guitars, that, if we want them to sound their best, should be just at the edge of destruction.

Heck, even all the overbuilt ASIAn guitars from the 70's that litter the area i live in are all in need of a reset. I have someone come by once or twice a month asking if I can help their guitar. The neck joints all look solid, but the neck angle has gone the other way. Many is the dissapointed guitar owner who discovers his guitar that cost $200 in '73 needs $500 worth or work, now, and the only guy around who can do the work, won't <g> Most of those necks were pinned and epoxied. No touch...

My point? Above all else, it just makes sense to me to build things that are repairable, in our lifetime, and the next generation's. I've already built two replacement necks for my guitars that have had accidents. Had these been a spanish heel, the repair would have been horribly complicated and involved, and even converted to a bolt-on or dovetail ocne the neck was sawn off, the neck block that remianed would still have the grain running top to back, which can easily split if dovetailed or bolted.. As it was, I mede a new neck to spec, and installed it in 30 minutes. Guitar is as it was when new, with no sign of a repair having taken place.

<shrugs>

Just makes sense to me.

What's the big difference that prevents a SS from folding under the stress? I know and have seen first hand the disasterous results from putting steel strings on a classical guitar (no it wasn't me, I know better ). Does the truss rod provide support for the joint somehow? Why would that joint fail so quick on a classical but not a SS?

John

Like Mario said, it's not so much the neck joint as the rest of the guitar deforming. The top pulls up, the back and sides relax. If you look at the neck joint it will probably still be tight but there is now no saddle left and the action is too high. So you reset the neck as that is the only adjustment available.

_________________
Tickle your guitar daily, and it'll tickle you back.

John:
Steel strings _do_ pull up under stress. The top bracing is a heck of a lot stronger on them, the bridges are better desgned to stay put under the extra stress, and the tops are a lot thicker, but they do have more of a load on them, and they do move. Just because I have not seen any untoward distortion in the ones I built with Spanish heels _yet_ doesn't mean it won't happen, and it did seem to me to be a good idea to switch to the plug-in to accomodate that movement. As Mario pointed out, it's not failure of the neck joint that we're insuring against, but failre of the rest of the thing. That said, the neck joint becomes another possible failure mode once you make it that way, and another thing you have to be careful about.