Pre-Shaped Neck

[John DiMaggio]

OK - I decided to cheat.

I am building my first guitar. It is a Classical guitar copy of a Fleta.

I found a pre-carved neck on the Bay for around $50.00 so I decided to cheat a little(Lot).

Suggestions for attaching to body please!!!!!

[ken cierp]

Hi John,

I'd certainly install a full length hardwood dowel in the heel -- here's a few idea for fastening.

viewtopic.php?f=14&t=194&start=20

[ken cierp]

And here's another idea

http://www.liutaiomottola.com/construction/Bolton.htm

[John DiMaggio]

Thanks Ken.

Somewhere on this board (I think) I found this:

http://fretsnet.ning.com/profiles/blogs ... pline-neck

What do you think?

[John Parchem]

I would hate to be routing the channel needed for the spline as the shaped heel does not provide a good reference for a straight centered line. It is doable I would just hate to do it. I would just use a single brass insert and use a bolt to apply clamping pressure for a glued butt joint. I do this with all of my ukuleles. I do make sure I have a good joint between the heel and the body using the body to sand the curve into the heel.

Also I often cheat on classical guitar necks but I use a neck from LMI that is made for a Spanish neck joint.

[John DiMaggio]

Thanks John.

The one I am using from the Bay is about $100 cheaper. Since this is my first, I thought I'd give it a try.

[John Link]

Besides butt gluing and using a bolt, you can cut off the supplied heel cap, then make one that extends across the neck/body joint and inlay the extra portion directly into the heel block. See image. I used high-grade, slow setting epoxy for the joint. JB Weld would be a good choice. With a well fit "strap" like this, you may not need the bolt if you have a good butt joint.

Inlaid heel cap

RipStrap.jpg (56.77 KiB) Viewed 1737 times