What’s to do

Now we are heading off-piste. The neck that came with the kit is, in my opinion, too narrow for “modern hands” leading to a somewhat cramped string spacing. Plus, when I cut the original fail of a join (I really didn’t know what I was doing back then) it meant the remains of the old neck no longer fitted the neck joint. Oh well! This will also mean I have to make a new peg box but we’ll leave that for a later time.

Off to the wood collection to grab some Queensland Maple (Flindersia brayleyana) that I have in stock, run it through the planer then the bandsaw, then drilling a few holes (at the top for a hanging hook, and at the bottom neck binding screw). Here’s what it looks like:

Shaping and gluing the neck

I haven’t shown the shaping simply because there is nothing much to see when you spend an hour or so in close company with a chunk of wood and a Shinto saw rasp, then attack it with some sandpaper. After many goes of fitting and marking, then doing some more shaping, we get to the end result:

One of those build secrets is shown in this photo: those two small tabs. Travis uses some custom-made perspex versions but I’m going to make do with a pair of steel ones. The purpose of these pieces is to align the top of the neck to the top of the neck block. These little guys will also keep the alignment when it comes to glue time (we really have to avoid glue creep).

And here is the side-view:

Now that have the fit good and tight we get to make up a goodly batch of hide glue, slop it on good and thick, then bind it all up with a deck screw (I’m going to replace the screw later with a blacksmith’s nail but for now the screw will do the job).

This is the glue-up, top and back:

Following along from Travis’s blog, I have layered lots of glue around the joint. As the glue dries it will tighten the joint. Hide glue really is excellent stuff! After it is well and truly dry I attack the excess with a bit of water and a sharp stick.

And then we get to hang the sucker up ready for the next operation, working on the belly.