1

2

Making the neck

Flatsawn or quartersawn hardwood which is knot-free and has a straight grain pattern is ideal for making the neck as such wood carries the lowest risk of warping. Maple and mahogany are the most commonly used types of wood for making the neck, but in principle there is no reason why you should not be able to use other hardwood timbers such as birch, alder, ash, oak, or others.

The neck can be of two different types: the frets can be installed directly into the neck, or a separate fingerboard can be glued on. There are differences in making these two types of neck which I will explain in the following. I recommend that for your first guitar you make a neck with glued-on fingerboard; although it is a little bit more work-intensive, it is at the end of the day the easier and safer approach.

Preparing the neck blank

For making a one-piece neck a 25mm (1")-thick blank is required; for a neck with glued-on fingerboard you need a 19mm (3/4")-thick blank. The width of the neck blank depends on the width of the peghead, and its length on the length of the neck plus the length of the peghead. If the board is not wide enough, you can glue on pieces later to make it wider on the peghead. In this case the neck blank can be as narrow as the fingerboard end.

Plane the blank down to the right dimensions, leaving it a bit longer than needed. One edge of the board has to be planed flat and square to the surface (1). Picture 2 shows a piece of flatsawn birchwood which will be used for making a one-piece neck, provided no hidden knots or defects appear during planing.

If a piece of wood is not free from such knots or defects, I recommend that you glue together two or more strips, making sure that the curves of the annual rings of two strips placed next to each other show in opposite directions. Picture 3 shows two pieces of mahogany, both from a more than 30-year-old window ledge which had been lying in the loft for years and was therefore

particularly dry when I used it for making a neck. This example just goes to show how well wood can be recycled. Another possibility would be to combine two different types of timber to make a so-called “sandwiched” neck - by gluing in two strips of one type of wood between three strips of maple for instance. This “sandwiching” method is very stable and unlikely to warp. If you make a guitar without angled-back head, this is about it as far as preparations are concerned. If, however, your guitar is to have an angled-back head a few more preparations are required.

Options for making a angled-back head

I quite like guitars with angled-back heads as these increase the downward pressure of the strings on the nut so that no string retainers are needed, which are an additional source of friction during tuning. The angle can be anything between 4 and 15 degrees.

Cutting the peghead from the neck blank is a good example of how little material can be used most efficiently (4,5). If you choose this approach, I recommend a peghead angle of 15 degrees. Because the neck blank and the peghead part have the grain running along their length greater stability is gained. The fibers run through the whole length of the peghead, contrary to the peghead shown in figure 6. It is obviously also possible to make the peghead from a separate piece of timber.

Industrially-manufactured guitar necks with angled-back pegheads are often cut from one thick piece of wood so that a lot of wood is unnecessarily wasted (6) if you just cut one neck from it. A further drawback of this method is the reduced stability and greater likelihood of the peghead breaking as a result of the short-grained structure of the peghead. Use a peghead angle below 10 degrees with this method.

Less material is wasted when you make a neck with angledback peghead by cutting several strips of wood from a blank of hardwood and by gluing them together, as shown in figure 7.

Most electric guitars, however, do not have an angled-back peghead at all. Instead, they have a neck made from one straight blank and a peghead face that is lower than the fingerboard surface (8). Such Fender-style types of peghead need string retainers (as long as you don't use a locking nut) in order to achieve a sufficient amount of string pressure on the nut. Even though to an industrial manufacturer gluing on an angled peghead is additional work which only increases manufacturing costs, an angled-back peghead is none the less the better solution.

4

5

Short grain

6

Waste

7

8

2

3

4

important to maintain a line parallel to the nut line. If the latter should have been planed off, draw it on again slightly further back.

Check the progress you make at regular intervals by measuring along the length and width as well as diagonally with a straight edge. This is best done against some source of light such as a window or a lamp. Mark the areas where no light shines through; these are the spots that are too high and that require further planing. Finally, any marks left from planing are removed with a scraper and the surfaces are flattened with a sanding board (5, a small, flat board with sandpaper that has been glued on with spray glue). After this remove the peghead part from the neck blank with a flat tool.

As already mentioned before, the flatness of the surface should be checked very closely. Lay a straight edge on at different angles and in different places (6).The peghead part is ready for gluing on if there is no light that shines through between the straight edge and the wood. Take your time and prepare the surfaces as best you can.

Next the peghead part has to be planed down to a thickness of 13mm (1/2") so that it is not too thick for mounting the tuners. Make the peghead part thinner by planing it down (7) or by sawing off a piece with a bandsaw (8) and planing and sanding the surface afterwards. Together with a 2mm-3mm (3/32"- 1/8")- thick peghead veneer which will later be glued on this will make the peghead 15mm-16mm (19/32"- 5/8") thick. It should never be thicker than 17mm (21/32") altogether as this would make it impossible to mount the tuners.

Mark the required height all around the peghead part before clamping it. Set the plane rather coarsely and then move it over the wood diagonally (7), as when planing the slanting surface. To prevent planing off more on one side than on the other turn the workpiece by 180 degrees after a few passes. When the drawn line is only just visible fine-set the plane and remove the rest until the line has completely disappeared. Finally, smooth the surface with sandpaper.

The peghead part can also be made thinner by cutting off a “slice” with a bandsaw (8). If you choose this approach, use a push stick. Smooth up the bandsawing marks with a beltsander or a sanding board.

A few preparations are necessary if the peghead is to be glued on successfully. Unless you do something to counteract the clamping pressure, the two parts will not remain in position. Five clamps will solve the problem. Before you apply any glue check that everything is fine and that the two parts are pressed against each other well. Fasten the neck blank on a workboard, using two clamps. Make sure that the workboard and the neck blank are

5

6

7

8

Sawing off the peghead part with a tablesaw

The peghead part can be sawn off with a tablesaw if the blade diameter is large enough (If you glue “ears” onto the peghead later, the neck blank is at this stage narrow enough even for smaller blades).

A simple jig consisting of a plywood base with a screwed-on or glued-on fence is needed to allow making this cut. For a 15-degree peghead angle the fence angle has to be 90-15=75 degrees. The neck blank is held in position by two clamps and the whole jig is guided along the tablesaw fence.The small peghead part that is sawn off should additionally be fastened with double-stick tape. Being 75mm (3") high, the neck blank should not be sawn off in one pass but in two passes. Fastening the peghead part with double-stick tape ensures a clean cut which requires hardly any or no more planing at all. When sawing through the neck blank the fence will have to take a little cut as well.

Smoothing with the router

Routing the surface smooth with a

Sawing off the peghead part with a bandsaw

I now use a bandsaw for sawing off the peghead part. The principle is exactly the same as with a tablesaw, but bandsaws also allow sawing through wider neck blanks.

1

2

square to each other (1). Put some newspaper under the gluing area. Use a third clamp to hold a stop block on the lower end of the neck; this stop block is supposed to keep the neck blank from slipping away.

Lay the peghead part onto the neck blank so that the beveled neck blank area and the peghead form one long slant (2). Another clamp placed there serves as a second stop block. A fifth clamp on the head part keeps it from slipping upwards. Check that the head part is perfectly square to the workboard. The angle can be adjusted by moving the position of the clamp. The two parts are pressed together with two more clamps and two clamping cauls cut so as to fit the gluing area.

When you have made sure that all parts are held in place safely and there are no gaps between them you can start applying glue to the surfaces. Remove the two clamps and the clamp used for holding down the head part and spread glue thinly and evenly over the beveled head part area. Then gently move the head part up and down the neck blank slant. The friction thus produced will spread the glue and squeeze out any air contained in it. After that place the clamps again and check once more that the workboard and the two parts glued together are square to each other. Tighten both clamps and remove them after an hour. If any glue should have been squeezed out, scrape it off after ten minutes.

Use C-clamps

If you buy two C-clamps with 4" opening and normal throat depth and two with a greater throat depth of at least 3" (or more, which would be even better) the peghead part can be glued on more safely. With four C-clamps it is possible to put one clamp on each of the four corners of the gluing area. Fasten the clamps one after the other and tighten them, moving clockwise from clamp to clamp. It is important that the stop blocks are fastened very, very well as otherwise the clamping pressure will cause these blocks to wander away. I would even suggest that you screw on the two stop blocks with at least two screws instead of clamping them down.

Yellow glue

Before switching to hide glue for all guitarbuilding purposes I successfully used “normal” white PVA glue for gluing on peghead parts. American guitarbuilding books recommend the use of yellow glue for this task because it has greater strength and durability. I have never tried yellow glue simply because it's not available in my part of the world. Yellow glue (also called aliphatic resin or AR glue) is a higher grade of white glue with some color added. I don't know if white European PVA glue is superior to white American PVA glue.