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I made a custom spacer for two outer dado saw blades and then made a custom table saw insert that has a guide rail glued to it right in the center between the two blades. The neck drops over the guide rail and we just run the neck through the saw.

Has anyone had success with dispensing with the steel truss bar altogether and only using carbon composites in the neck of a steel string? It seems like an awful lot of weight could potentially go away, though it would probably limit the guitar to one weight of strings.

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Jim Howell
Charlotte, NC

[QUOTE=jhowell] Has anyone had success with dispensing with the steel truss bar altogether and only using carbon composites in the neck of a steel string? It seems like an awful lot of weight could potentially go away, though it would probably limit the guitar to one weight of strings.[/QUOTE]

I do that with my little ladder braced guitars and haven't had a problem yet, course they've one been out about a year or so but I think they'll be just fine. I suggest only light gauge strings although at Healdsburg, I had a heavy handed Mary Flower do my demo and I put mediums on for that. She uses fingerpicks and pulls & snaps pretty hard.
I run a 3/16x1/4 down each side of center.

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

John--

Thank you. That is good to know. It seems to me that it's viable and I think that I'll try it in an upcoming small body build.   

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Jim Howell
Charlotte, NC

I like to keep the necks adjustable for playing technique differences.

Terry, I was going to ask you how you did your routs for this task,
But this explains it. Thanks!

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Anderson Guitars
Clearwater,Fl. 33755

Am I the only one who tends to splay the rods a little, following the fingerboard taper?

I have a question I have about the reinforcing bars AND truss rods.

If you add the bars and then you adjust the neck with the Truss rod, doesn't the truss rod now have to fight the reinforcing bars? If the reinforcing bars are strong enough to help resist neck bending, then it would seem the load that the truss rod has to overcome is significantly increased?

Joe

Well, yes, but the neck will be stiffer, more stable, and require less truss rod adjustment to shift it from where the string tension wants to put it.

The bars add stiffness to the neck, but they're definitely not so stiff as to prevent the neck from bending at all; I've built only one neck in which the truss rod had to be used to add relief to the neck rather than to remove it; all of them (save the first) have had a pair of 1/8" x 3/8" graphite bars, close to all of them have been mahogany of one sort or other, with a few laminated necks in the mix as well.

Especially with a neck that has CF rods in it, it's a good idea to clamp the neck into shape before adjusting the truss rod.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

[QUOTE=Mattia Valente]Am I the only one who tends to splay the rods a little, following the fingerboard taper? [/QUOTE]

You are not the only one. I do that too.

Mark

My thinking re: splaying the rods is two-fold. Perhaps even three, although the third is simply 'because it sort of feels right'. The rationalizations are that it's a more even distribution along the neck (more or less follows the string path, between second and third, and fourth and fifth strings), and that non-parallel rods may add a little more counter-twisting resistance than rods perfectly in line with the truss rod, but that may just be wishful thinking.

Mostly, it's not really any more difficult to do (not the way I do the routes, without a table), and it seems right. The taper's subtle, and there's no problem running them into the headstock joint/getting in the way of the truss rod access cavity.

This is a relatively 'extreme' splaying for me, on the adjustable neck acoustic I'm making (keeping in mind the end of the extension, reaching to about 19th fret, is 40mm wide):


This is a bit more 'typical' (on an electric neck, not going into the headstock on this particular one):

Interesting stuff! Before retiring to my finish up my IT final, I quickly played with the CF rods I just got in from that place you mentioned Mattia, LAC.  It's funny because I hadn't really read up on the CF placement variations and within a minute of standing looking at the neck there my first thought was to splay them as you have shown.  In all honesty, it just seemed more logical to me, whether it is or not, can't say.

 I'm thinking Setch might have some thoughts on the subject as he did a neck with tapered laminates of mahogany as an experiement, I think, I'll have to go back and look it up.  Anyhow, when deciding on what to do, splaying them just made sense to me and now seeing this thread I feel much more confident in the idea. Tomorrow, I will likely put them in once I finish my finals, I planned on a subtle taper/splay for my electric neck(laminated), very close to what you have showing on the second picture.  Jason