Chapter 40: Find The Ideal Guitar Neck Angle Every Time! — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00[Music]
2. 0:08we are now done with routing the truss
3. 0:12rod slot so at this point most of these
4. 0:16things on the neck can be done in a
5. 0:18slightly different order but the truss
6. 0:20rod slot was really the one thing we
7. 0:22needed to do especially before we put
8. 0:25the peg head veneers on because that
9. 0:27would alter the way that this sat on the
10. 0:30routing table and probably the way that
11. 0:33it bumped up the fence as well now that
12. 0:35we're done we can shape our Peg head we
13. 0:40can get the angle correct on here we can
14. 0:44we can do several things but I am going
15. 0:48to take care of the neck angle right now
16. 0:52doesn't have to be done in that order
17. 0:54but that's what I'm going to do next so
18. 0:56we are going to take a look at
19. 0:58calculating the neck angle and getting
20. 1:01that set and getting the uh mortise and
21. 1:04Tenon bolts in so let's take a look now
22. 1:07when we talk about neck angle we are
23. 1:10talking about the angle that the neck
24. 1:14sits in relation to this part of the
25. 1:18guitar that we have nice and
26. 1:21flat and most likely that's going to end
27. 1:24up around somewhere between 88 to 90° um
28. 1:28but we will figure that out more
29. 1:30precisely right now the things that we
30. 1:32need to figure out are where is our
31. 1:36saddle so where's our saddle going to be
32. 1:39inside that bridge down here we are
33. 1:41going to get our saddle location
34. 1:46by taking our total scale length and
35. 1:50subtracting the nut to 14th
36. 1:54fret now we have a total of 645
37. 2:005.16 mm for our total scale and if you
38. 2:05remember we are at
39. 2:2237.774929
40. 2:277.39 MM which is going to get us from
41. 2:30the neck back here to our saddle but we
42. 2:35also want to uh account for some
43. 2:38compensation which we will get to later
44. 2:40but we're going to add about 2 mm for
45. 2:43that so we're going to end up at
46. 2:4628939 from here to
47. 2:49here so let's get that measure we're
48. 2:51going to do that right on the center
49. 2:54line
50. 2:5828939 and and getting that 39 is going
51. 3:02to be a little tricky right all right
52. 3:07two
53. 3:0989 we want to look
54. 3:12for about 3 and 1 12 millim right here
55. 3:16here is our saddle
56. 3:18location and what we want to imagine is
57. 3:23if we had a line coming off of our neck
58. 3:27straight through this top part hitting
59. 3:30here what is this Gap here we want about
60. 3:353 and a half millimeters right here now
61. 3:38you can take
62. 3:39that with
63. 3:41a uh ruler or if you have a
64. 3:46shim which I do made a shim especially
65. 3:49for this that is where I sit it if I
66. 3:53didn't have the shim I would have to
67. 3:55have one hand here measuring it and get
68. 3:58another hand back here and try to
69. 3:59measure this and get this angle so if
70. 4:02you can get a shim and shave one down to
71. 4:043 and2 mm it works out much better
72. 4:08so what I want to do is figure out what
73. 4:14this Gap is I do want to have a little
74. 4:17bit of air right here at right at this
75. 4:21Leading Edge of the sound hole and the
76. 4:24way I can measure that is by finding
77. 4:26something that has some sort of
78. 4:28measurable thick thickness card stock
79. 4:32heavy fiber
80. 4:34paper maybe one of your veneers um one
81. 4:37of your your very thin veneers and I
82. 4:40will put
83. 4:43that right
84. 4:48there so I'll slide it back along the
85. 4:52ruler or my straight edge until I
86. 4:56feel that there's some resistance there
87. 4:59and I don't want to force it underneath
88. 5:01and artificially Force this end up I
89. 5:04just want to see where that's kind of
90. 5:06where that tension is where that's tight
91. 5:08and then I will mark it with a
92. 5:13pencil and in this case it is right
93. 5:16along that outer edge of the purling so
94. 5:19it's super easy to keep track of I will
95. 5:21take my sliding bevel I'll use this to
96. 5:25find my angle so that I can duplicate it
97. 5:27on the neck I'm going to put my piece of
98. 5:31fiber exactly where I had marked it
99. 5:35before I have that angle in
100. 5:39place tighten the bevel
101. 5:42down and that looks to be just under 90°
102. 5:49on the back just a little bit so let's
103. 5:51take a look here is
104. 5:55our cut off line right there which means
105. 5:59all this is is waste right so that still
106. 6:01has to get cut off and then this 7/8
107. 6:05here is our Tenon that means that this
108. 6:09is going to be our shoulder line which
109. 6:12is where I want to um put the
110. 6:14measurement for the new neck angle which
111. 6:16we just got I'm going to lay that on top
112. 6:19of the
113. 6:21neck hopefully you can see
114. 6:24that this angle is just under 90° so if
115. 6:29it's probably around 89 88 and2
116. 6:33somewhere around there what it is
117. 6:36isn't exactly important it's not vital
118. 6:40to know the precise angle but it is
119. 6:43vital to repeat that angle from the neck
120. 6:47joint over to the neck so we can get
121. 6:49this
122. 6:51correct you should have gotten something
123. 6:54that looks like these now these are
124. 6:56going to be the mortise and Tenon nuts
125. 6:59and bolts so these barrels are going to
126. 7:03go into the Tenon here well about there
127. 7:08and here and then the bolts slide
128. 7:13through the guitar body through the
129. 7:15Tenon into the
130. 7:18Tenon and hold it like
131. 7:22this now in order to get these in we are
132. 7:26going to drill some holes into the Tenon
133. 7:30straight down through it I measure about
134. 7:33an inch and an E from the top of the
135. 7:39neck
136. 7:44there
137. 7:46and
138. 7:48there and the reason that I want to get
139. 7:51the neck angle prior to putting these in
140. 7:55is so that I don't end up with with a
141. 8:00hole that's too far out and especially
142. 8:04here if this neck angle was too drastic
143. 8:09this way then I would have to move this
144. 8:12Tenon back to match it because I don't
145. 8:15want this nut sticking too far towards
146. 8:19the end of the Tenon because the grain
147. 8:21that's out here is relatively weak
148. 8:24because that's going to be ingrain that
149. 8:26the stress is on and um it's just not as
150. 8:29strong as as the long grain so we want
151. 8:31to have this pretty far back towards
152. 8:35this shoulder line and I keep mine about
153. 8:382 mm
154. 8:39off which means that if these are 10 mm
155. 8:46wide which is what we're going to
156. 8:49drill so the radius is 5 mm from the
157. 8:53center plus two so that's 7 millim so
158. 8:57I'm going to measure at these inch and
159. 8:59an eighth lines here and here 7
160. 9:02millimeters off of the shoulder and
161. 9:05that's where I'm going to put my center
162. 9:10line for um drilling these so it's going
163. 9:14to be
164. 9:18here
165. 9:21and
166. 9:23here let's take a look just double
167. 9:26check yeah that looks about right I
168. 9:29don't need to get right up close to this
169. 9:31line cuz that's going to potentially
170. 9:33impact the shoulder and could ding it
171. 9:37put a a notch in it I don't want to do
172. 9:40that I want this shoulder line to be
173. 9:42nice and crisp and clean when it meets
174. 9:44that guitar body so this looks good to
175. 9:48me the final measurement on my
176. 9:52neck height plus my heel cap I usually
177. 9:57put it just below where the purling line
178. 10:01is on the back so that it's not quite
179. 10:03even with the back of the guitar but
180. 10:06there's a little bit of a step here
181. 10:08maybe 4 mm or so just so that the neck
182. 10:13comes just under the purfling
183. 10:15line if I cut
184. 10:17this somewhere in the middle of the
185. 10:20binding that will leave me enough room
186. 10:23to come back sand this a little bit more
187. 10:26put a heel cap on um and get my final so
188. 10:30if I cut this off now um I can get rid
189. 10:33of some of this excess material and then
190. 10:35I don't have to uh deal with it when we
191. 10:38are in the mortise anten and jig as well
192. 10:41so I'm going to take this off I'm going
193. 10:43to take this material off and I am going
194. 10:46to drill these
195. 10:53holes now I am also going to take off
196. 10:57this line here
197. 11:00this extra material on the front so be
198. 11:03sure you don't cut back here on this
199. 11:07Tenon line or the shoulder line I should
200. 11:10say only cut
201. 11:11up right here not here make sure that
202. 11:16you have
203. 11:20357.00 from the front of the
204. 11:23nut out
205. 11:26to this 14th fret line and 7/8 of an
206. 11:31inch in front of that for our Tenon so
207. 11:3735777 from the nut to the 14th fret and
208. 11:427/8 of an inch in front of that for the
209. 11:44Tenon double check that before we cut
210. 11:47this off if you cut it back here or have
211. 11:50something screwed up on your scale
212. 11:51length and you cut this you're going to
213. 11:53have to make a new neck so let's not do
214. 11:56that I just double checked everything
215. 11:58I'm good I'm going to cut off this
216. 11:59excess and then get outside to the drill
217. 12:03press to drill
218. 12:08these okay now we are going to drill
219. 12:13these barrel nut holes for the Tenon
220. 12:17joint and we are going to use a 10 mm
221. 12:22drill bit you can use a 3/8 but you'll
222. 12:25end up having to ream it out quite a bit
223. 12:27we may still have to a little bit with
224. 12:29the tin but it's going to be much closer
225. 12:31and much more
226. 12:35accurate now we do not have to go all
227. 12:40the way through and as a matter of fact
228. 12:42most drill presses if you're using one
229. 12:45and a drill press is going to be much
230. 12:47more accurate than a um hand drill but
231. 12:50the drill press is not going to go all
232. 12:53the way through and punch out the other
233. 12:55side but that's okay we don't need it to
234. 12:57all we need it to do is come down and
235. 13:00get through this Tenon so somewhere
236. 13:03around here which most drill presses
237. 13:06will get to and we just need to get past
238. 13:10that um past that Center Line right
239. 13:12around here to get that through the
240. 13:14other side of the Tenon and then once we
241. 13:17route out the Tenon you'll see that that
242. 13:20hole is exposed just
243. 13:22fine I've got my marks I'm using a
244. 13:26bradpoint
245. 13:28bit with a drill press it's a little
246. 13:30less Critical with the Brad point but I
247. 13:32still like to use one to line up my
248. 13:34holes better and it just lets that bit
249. 13:38track
250. 13:42[Music]
251. 13:49[Music]
252. 13:53better now the last thing I want to
253. 13:56touch on um in this this video is the
254. 14:01heel
255. 14:04cap so what I'm doing right now is just
256. 14:06bringing this shoulder line all the way
257. 14:12across this allows me to get a better
258. 14:15look at what this heel shape heel
259. 14:17pattern is going to look like where the
260. 14:19heel cap goes this heel cap you
261. 14:22mean you can make this heel just about
262. 14:25any shape that you want you can do a
263. 14:29kind of a D shape you can do one that
264. 14:33is super
265. 14:36pointed you can do one that's really
266. 14:39wide and
267. 14:41flat I mean you can really do just about
268. 14:44anything you
269. 14:45want the considerations are that you
270. 14:50want it to be at least 78 wide so that
271. 14:55you can get wider than your 10 and I
272. 14:56like it just a little bit wider than
273. 14:58that and about an inch deep at least I
274. 15:04go a little bit further inch and an eth
275. 15:07to at least start with and I may make
276. 15:10that smaller bigger um you know it can
277. 15:13make changes really anytime you want
278. 15:16but this allows me to at least get a
279. 15:19good look here and see what kind of
280. 15:21shape I'm looking at here on this you
281. 15:25can come back in you know come in and
282. 15:28back out that gets a little too extreme
283. 15:31on something um this short we want to be
284. 15:35sure that we don't cut into this
285. 15:40blank we can come right up to it just
286. 15:43leave ourselves a couple millimeters at
287. 15:45least so we want to go from here to
288. 15:47about
289. 15:56here there we go
290. 16:00I'm good with that and then I'll cut
291. 16:02this out on the band saw and you don't
292. 16:05need a band saw to do this you can do
293. 16:07this with a handsaw if if you do just
294. 16:10use a handsaw one technique is to just
295. 16:13make like a cut here cut here cut here
296. 16:17and almost like a featherboard you just
297. 16:20keep cutting into it like that and you
298. 16:23can chip those out or you can make a big
299. 16:25straight cut up here and a big straight
300. 16:27cut up here um chisel it carve it and
301. 16:30you actually don't need to do any of
302. 16:32this right now I just like to make give
303. 16:34myself a little bit less work when it
304. 16:37comes to shaping the neck and if I don't
305. 16:40have to take a file or a rasp or
306. 16:44something and chunk out all this
307. 16:45material that's much better so I'm going
308. 16:48to cut this on the band saw and then we
309. 16:51will move on
310. 16:59taking all this out with a file or a
311. 17:02rasp or sandpaper would be a lot of work
312. 17:05I just want to avoid that now we've got
313. 17:07our holes for our um the nuts for the
314. 17:10mortise we've got our Peg head thickest
315. 17:15we've got the truss rod slot we've got
316. 17:18the heel somewhat shaped we've got quite
317. 17:22a bit done thus far now next we are
318. 17:26going to take a look at actually machine
319. 17:29in the mortise and Tenon so we're going
320. 17:32to be making the mortise inside the
321. 17:36guitar body and the Tenon on here so
322. 17:41let's get on to that in the next video
323. 17:49[Music]
324. 17:50[Applause]
325. 17:58w