Acoustic Guitar Construction

Got back on the neck today. Glued down the head plate and cut down the thickness of the blank close to size. I'll need to take about 1/16" more off the back off the headstock then I have a walnut veneer to glue on back there.

I also have the fretboard positioned on the neck with locating pins for future gluing in place, with a space between it and the head plate for the nut.

Making some progress again.
Headstock shape is cut out and excess wood cut off the neck shaft.

Today I routed the body and neck for the mortise and tenon bolt on joint. John P, I'm still using the Simpson jig you sold me so many years ago, with a couple modifications. I also made a centerline finder to use on the body jig which has helped alot to get the neck alignment very close.

The heel tenon has barrel bolts. I drilled all holes and installed the barrel bolts. Adjusted the tenon length with a chisel to make the neck just fit flush with the body. First bolt on the fit is very good.
I have up to 1/8" room on the heel for a cap.
The fretboard extension sits flush to the top.
The angle is good. With fretboard on with no frets I have 7/16" gap at the saddle location. With the frets I should get about 3/8", just what I want.

The fretboard mounted is off the center mark at the tail end about 1/16", so I have just a minor adjustment to make to get it on center after the neck and heel are carved.

I'm quite happy the the overall fit and look so far.

It is looking good!

Not too exciting but progress.
I fretted the fingerboard all but the 1st and 13th frets where the locating pins go for positioning on the neck while gluing.

I made a heel cap out of Ebony with a thin walnut veneer under it. Took some extra material off the sides of the neck heel area and glued the cap in place with rhe neck mounted to the body. I slightly loosen the neck bolts and slip a piece of wax paper between the heel and body, then tighten the neck down. Now I can glue the cap on the bottom of the heel tight up against the binding without gluing the cap to the binding. When it's dry, loosen the neck and the cap is where it needs to be and later will fit right against the binding.

Then I proceeded to install the truss rod, a two way Stewmac rod first putting some spots of chalk in the trough, then laying in the rod. I had space for about a .010" veneer over the rod for a flush surface to glue down the fretboard.
I have a caul I made contured with a 16ft radius to match the fretboard, and slots cut into it to fit over the frets.
When clamped up I get good even pressure on the fretboard and a good glue up.

Okay the fret board is glued to the neck and the last 2 frets installed.
I planed and scraped down the neck flush with the fretboard and then carved the heel to the cap. I also relieved the heel ckeeks leaving just 1/8" surface to make contact with the side.
Still lots to do to get the neck shaped.
I mounted the neck and it is dead center with the end of the guitar.....so that is nice, and the heel to body fit is near perfect. Yah!!!!

Sweet!!

Slow going this week but today I did drill and mount the tuners. I'm using Taylor tuners that use a post on the back for positioning instead of a screw, and the post is at the top of the housing. Different. This is the 3rd guitar using the Taylor's.

I started carving the neck. I almost got it done, just some fine tuning around the heel and smoothing to do.
Thickness at the first fret is .870 and .980 at the 10th fret.
I should finish it up tomorrow. Then I'll fine tune the headstock transition into the nut area and sand it all up, slightly rounding the face and back edges.

I'll remount the neck and check again the heel to body fit and the centering of the fretboard with the body.

After this all I have left is to drill the hole and taper it for the end pin, and the put in my fretboard extension screw down system.