Official Luthiers Forum!

Hey All,

Well, I finished my parlor guitar last night. This was an experimental build. I tried an adjustable neck joint, and I wanted to see how light I could go with the bracing. It's redwood top, S.American Laurel b/s, EIR rosewood trim, and FP finish.

Here are a few impressions:

The Good:

I really like the small size, short scale, wide string spacing, and 12 fret neck. It's a really good fit and fun to play.

The amount/quality of sound was good. I was afraid that it would sound choked and lack bass, but it had plenty.

I liked being able to bolt on the neck without worring about fretting over the body or flattening the fretboard.

I learned a lot.


The Bad:

My first FP job was not a total success. I couldn't wait for perfection, so I went ahead without it. I still have a ways to go to get a smooth, level surface.

My adjustable neck is not stable enough. All three contact points are too close together. I can feel a little movement. I see why some of you use
brass rods inset into the neck and pointed adjusting screws.

I think that I spent as much time fiddling with the adjusting screws as I would have just setting a regular bolt-on neck. Maybe the only adjustment needed
is neck angle. Also, I spent a lot of time working through the sound hole so I had a lot of opportunity to slip and ding the finish.


The Ugly:

I cracked the top while french polishing. Due to a couple of sand-backs to get rid of splotchyness caused by sloppy Z-poxy application, my top was waaay too
thin. Redwood sands fast.

The top is so thin and the bracing so light that implosion is imminent. The top is distorting badly and I doubt it will last long. I didn't even leave it
strung at tension last night. I'll rout the top off this winter and try again.

Here are some pics:

Interesting guitar Bruce.   Do you have any pictures of your adjustable neck, how it interfaces with the body, the way that the heel and the sides interact, etc, etc.

John

Bruce I like it very pretty.

Don't feel too bad about the redwood I did sanded my first one too thin too, now I only use much finer grits of paper than I would on spruce, as you say redwood sands away fast.

Whats the back and sides ?

How thin did you go on the redwood top? My #2 and #3 are in progress, 12-fret parlor's with adjustable necks... One was going to be a redwood top but I put the soundhole in the wrong spot, so I'll have to save that for a size 5 or something.

_________________
______________________________
Jonathan Kendall, Siloam Springs AR

John - Here are some additional pics:
Neck Joint

Russell - The back and sides are South American Laurel.

Jon - I thinned the top to .030.
Just kidding. I started at about .120 but I'll bet the lower bout ended up at half of that. I can lightly push my finger up from the inside and see a small bulge. Yea, I screwed up.

Great Job. I'll have to remember that redwood sands quick. I have a ton of it.

Bruce,

Does the heel of the neck rest on the sides of the guitar? I looked at the additional pics and it looks like the heel might be set into the area routed out of the sides.

Wayne

_________________
53% of all statistics are made up on the spot
http://driftwoodguitars.blogspot.com/

Thanks for the look Bruce. It seems like a good taylor rendition with adjustable "shims"

What do you think about it.

John

Nice work! It looks as though you put your finger through the side as well.

Wayne - The heel of the neck rests on three bolts that are threaded into the neck block. These bolts provide the adjustment.

John - After posting my original impressions above, I further tweaked the action last night. It was nice to be able to set my saddle height and then dial in the string height with just a few turns of the screw. I think that a joint more like in Dave's pics would be better. My next will have flying braces from the neck block to guitar sides, pointed adjustment screws for the top two, and a way to adjust neck angle from the outside while the strings are at tension.