Members captainultimus Posted June 17, 2009 Members Share Posted June 17, 2009 so im staring to build the neck for my guitar. and i have a question about the headstock. The book i have says not to make it all one piece and that i cut i piece off and glue it at an angle so it is stronger and i dont need to use string trees. but dosnt fender make the neck and the head stock out of one solid piece of wood? and if they dont would making it out of one piece of wood make it the much weaker? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted June 17, 2009 Members Share Posted June 17, 2009 so im staring to build the neck for my guitar. and i have a question about the headstock. The book i have says not to make it all one piece and that i cut i piece off and glue it at an angle so it is stronger and i dont need to use string trees. but dosnt fender make the neck and the head stock out of one solid piece of wood? and if they dont would making it out of one piece of wood make it the much weaker? Not in Fender's case, because they sort of "scoop" an area out of the existing neck for the headstock, which leaves all the grain still running straight through the neck and maximizes the grain length and, thus the srtength. If you have straight grain, and then make a one piece neck by carving an angled headstochk, the grain will be short at the spot where the neck changes from straight to the angled part and will cause a potential weak area that is prone to breaking. This is why Les pauls and other similarly built gibsons and the like are famous for having thier headstocks break off at the angle. stronger way. This leaves the grain in both pieces running as long through them as possible adding strength, and the scarf joint created, also maxi9mises the surface area that gets glued, also adding strength. weaker way although the added wood thickness in the bottom pic, called a "volute" is a strengthening technique for one piece neck/headstocks. Also, the angle doesnt have to be as much as 13 degrees. That is on the extreme end, and alot of people go with less of an angle than that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members captainultimus Posted June 17, 2009 Author Members Share Posted June 17, 2009 do you know where i would find a diagram or something showing how fender does this because i dont want a really angled head stock i want to keep it pretty fenderish looking and if making it one solid piece is gonna make it week than i would like to not do that lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members stormin1155 Posted June 17, 2009 Members Share Posted June 17, 2009 Yes, what Dave said. First thing is what style headstock do you want? If you want an angled headstock, then I would recommend doing a scarf joint (that's what it's called). If you are doing a Fender-style, then a seperate piece isn't necessary. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members captainultimus Posted June 17, 2009 Author Members Share Posted June 17, 2009 Yes, what Dave said. First thing is what style headstock do you want? If you want an angled headstock, then I would recommend doing a scarf joint (that's what it's called). If you are doing a Fender-style, then a seperate piece isn't necessary. yeah i just want pretty much a strat headstock. pretty much what im making is an hss hardtail strat and i want it to look like one as much as possible (besides the green paint and black block inlays) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted June 17, 2009 Members Share Posted June 17, 2009 here is a good thread showing the complete process of building a strat and a neck. Seriously, dude, it took me like 30 seconds to find this stuff on google. Google is your friend. Use it. http://web.mac.com/adnrebyavner/iWeb/Site/Building%20a%20Strat,%20p4.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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