Neck Setting

[John Jesseph]

Hi all-

Finally getting back to building, got the f-holes cut and tonebars installed and shaped. I have the Stew Mac videos and have watched Don over and over (to my wife's irritation) setting a neck. He glues the top on the rim, then clamps the assembly to the benchtop and uses a couple of homebrew gauges to zero in on alignment. Any other thoughts on this part of the process? I would prefer to glue the back on first, but will follow Don's process for this instrument. A big part of this instrument is collecting ideas for accuracy, efficiency, and repeatability for future instruments. Any ideas on this would be appreciated....

[sunburst]

Well, here's a quote from Jim Hilburn on another thread; "center line, center line, center line."

Keep a center line in on the fingerboard surface of the neck, the heel button area of the neck (squared around from the fingerboard surface), the top of the mandolin, and the back surface of the neck block, and keep them lined up throughout the process.
Also be sure the center line of the neck points directly toward the center line on the tailblock. The height of the bridge will be determined by the gauge/jig that you use to measure the neck angle.

Go slow. figure out which direction you want the neck to move relative to the body and figure out where you need to remove wood to get it to do that while keeping your center lines lined up.
Keep doing that 'til the bridge height is right, the overstand (height of the heel at the neck block) is right, the heel fits the body well, the centers all line up, the joint is tight, and all at the same time, and your done.

[HoGo]

Do it slowly and take care. Any method will yield good results then.
I set the neck after complete body assembly. I can hold it during the process against the light and see any gaps in the joint. I don't use any jigs or templates for this so every joint is original. I cut the dovetail into body before gluing plates. Just two angled notches with a handsaw and chisel out the meat. I draw the shape of the dovetail on the top and back of the neck with the end cut at 5° angle. Then I cut it carefully close to the lines with a small hand saw. and work from there with gouges and some coarse sandpaper on bent pieces of sheet metal. I have a long acrylic ruler with a line scribed down the middle to check the alignment and I want my neck to project 1/2" above the bridge position for correct bridge height. This takes me about 2 hours from tracing the outline on the cardboard to finished joint so I think it is quite efficient and doesn't require tons of power-tools and jigs. I did three necks last saturday this way and the time is my average. And each neck joint is completely original. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
Without back the body is flexible so use a stick attached to both tailpiece block and neck block with locating pins that you can use later for locating the back. Look at the Gibson tour on frets.com for some photos how they do it with a temporary back.