Bowing neck.......

[reb0964]

I've been had my mandolin i finished strung up about a month now and just noticed last night that the neck has a lil bow in it now and the strings raising abit....When i ordered my fingerboard and frets etc...the truss rod wasnt in so i made the neck with out one in it....though the neck was laminated...maple/walnut/maple. Gonna watch and see what it does,,,,im thinking it will only move but so much,,,so i guess after a while i may just lower the bridge.....anyone else have this problem???

[Bill Snyder]

If it is not too late you could try lighter gauge strings. There are a lot of older mandolins w/o truss rods that are still playable, but a lot of them either have shorter necks or use light gauge strings or both.
I built my first mandolin 2 1/2 years ago w/o a truss rod and it is still good. It is not even a hardwood neck. It is yellow pine (a hard, stiff softwood), but I use light gauge strings and left the neck a bit on the chunky side.

[sunburst]

I built a mando about 12 or 15 years ago with very curly wood in the neck, probably Big leaf maple. Even with an adjustable truss rod in the neck, it would not stay straight with medium strings. The headstock bent forward until it looked almost like a Fender guitar. Some pieces of wood just aren't up to the challenge of 8 strings worth of constant tension.

I built one about a year ago with a very stiff, Sugar maple neck. It has no tension on the rod, and in fact, the neck is a little too straight. I expected it to bow forward a little more. Some pieces of wood are more than stiff enough to withstand the constant pull of 8 strings.

The moral of the story is:
There are plenty of examples of necks that have stayed playably straight for many years with no stiffener or truss rod, but wood is variable, and if you want consistent results, it's a good idea to use something to control the stiffness, or use an adjustable rod. Choosing neck wood carefully for stiffness and stability is also a good idea.

[reb0964]

cool....that makes me feel a lil better...ill tkae these med strings off and try light gauge and see if it works out better,,,,thanks alot!!!