Graham McDonald Flat Top Neck Joint

[hawthorn1213]

Hey!

Does anyone have any experience with making the Mandolin Project (Graham McDonald) flat top? I'm not thrilled with the bolt on neck and was thinking about going with a dove tail? Any thoughts?

[Donaldreid]

Hi, I have built a mandolin from the Graham Mcdonald book and like you I didn't fancy the bolt on. I think this was mainly because I had an eye on building an electric guitar at some point. I didn't use a dovetail, I used a tenon joint but with 2 dowels to lock it off.

[Cary Fagan]

My attitude was the simpler the better. I used the bolt-on and it worked fine and has held up for two or three years now.

[pops1]

Breelove mandolins have a bolt on neck and seem to be fine, there are a lot out there.

[Bill McCall]

Bourgeois Guitars also use bolt on necks.

[Br1ck]

And Collings and Taylor.

[hawthorn1213]

Hi, I have built a mandolin from the Graham Mcdonald book and like you I didn't fancy the bolt on. I think this was mainly because I had an eye on building an electric guitar at some point. I didn't use a dovetail, I used a tenon joint but with 2 dowels to lock it off.

Thanks for the feedback! Did you just use his neck block design to use your tenon joint?

[Donaldreid]

Yep. I used the neck block as per the plan and cut a mortice in it. I just glued the neck tenon in then drilled 2 holes centred on the join lines and glued in dowels. I'll try to post some photos but I dont seem to have one of the dowels.

[multidon]

FWIW there are different kinds of bolt on neck joints. Breedlove necks were flush joints with no tenon. Taylor uses a mortise and tenon with bolts, no glue. Weber uses a mortise and tenon with bolts and glue. Not sure about Collings.

[soliver]

I've just started reading Graham's book myself... y'all have me excited!

[Rick Lindstrom]

Sounds like you used the old Irving Sloan neck joint method with the dowels and all.