Les Paul build issues

[Murph847]

Hi all, I am new here and based in the UK. I have a Les Paul kit which I'm having some issues with. I emailed Adam at customer services and he asked me to post the issues here, and that someone would let him know if they're factory issues or not. Anyway, I got the kit back in January and due to work it has taken me this long to nearly finish it. The issue I am having is that I don't believe the neck sits perpendicular to the body and bridge. The neck didn't sit correctly in the body pocket when I first received the kit, and by sanding I have made a better fit, but it still isn't fully right. Also, the pocket itself isn't correctly formed, and has a gap between part of heel of the neck and the body. I have added some pics below, hopefully someone could help me out here with advice, or pass on the issue to Adam? The first pics show the neck gap and pocket gap, this is after I sanded the neck heel a bit to make a better fit. The pics with the ruler show alignment issues. Using the book match as a reference you can clearly see the neck is angled, using the neck centreline as a reference the bridge is angled. Lastly the bridge pic shows that the bridge is off centre compared to the book matching.
Thanks in advance for any advice and help.

[wokkaboy]

Hi Murph, welcome to the forum. So this is a bolt on neck so looks like it needs a few tweaks. Does the neck pocket have much play in it ? Looks like the bass side of the neck needs to be moved further to the bass side so the centre of the neck aligns with the bridge and pickups. Also don't assume the bookmatch line is always dead centre, it may vary a bit. Also looks like the bottom of the neck heel or the neck pocket isn't flat hence you have a gap on the treble side. Have you done much sanding to both and what was the fit like out of the box ? THe neck is supposed to have a rake angle back about 3-4 degrees so shouldn't be parallel to the body. Also the bridge is supposed to be angled to allow string size compensation. Have you drilled the neck screw holes or is it sitting in the pocket ?
Once you answer these questions we'll figure out if you can modify it so the neck aligns better. Also putting both E strings on will give you a better idea than using a ruler and guessing the centre lines.

[Murph847]

Hi, thanks for your reply. I have only sanded the sides of the neck heel, not the flat bottom. The pocket has always had the "sloped" fit, hence the gap. I had drilled the holes, using the body as the template, but since finding this issue I have filled the holes to get a better fit after sanding/working the wood. I thought the bridge should be perpendicular, and that the tune-o-matic was on the angle for intonation? I haven't done any sanding to the pocket, as I was advised on a Facebook group to leave that alone and only work on the neck heel. I'll fit some strings and get more pics. Thanks again. **I realise my terminology may have confused things. I referred to the stop bar as the bridge. There is an angle to the stop bar when compared to the neck centreline**

[WeirdBits]

As Wokka says, the bookmatching does't always align with the actual centre-line of the body (unfortunately). Can you post an overhead pic of the ruler along the centre-line of the neck to show its alignment with the bridge. Also, is the gap at the treble edge of the neck pocket caused by an uneven base of the pocket or a curve/uneveness of the neck heel? More pics needed.

[Murph847]

As Wokka says, the bookmatching does't always align with the actual centre-line of the body (unfortunately). Can you post an overhead pic of the ruler along the centre-line of the neck to show its alignment with the bridge. Also, is the gap at the treble edge of the neck pocket caused by an uneven base of the pocket or a curve/uneveness of the neck heel? More pics needed.

The gap is caused by the neck pocket, not the neck heel. Happy enough about the book matching not being centred, I can accept that.

[Murph847]

More pics showing the E strings fitted. The high E is definitely closer to the edge along the neck than the low E. I fitted a new nut and I believe that is central in position. I know the neck pup looks off, and can probably re-align that, though I think it is about centre, although slightly skewed.

[Murph847]

Looking at my pictures I think I have caused some of these issues. The nut appears to be closer to the high E end, though it is aligned centrally with the truss rod access point; and the neck pup is aligned with the book matching, but not the neck pocket, which has exasperated the issues I have found. I can't explain away the gap in the neck pocket though, the neck simply isn't a square fit.

[Murph847]

OK, I think I have managed to sort a couple of issues out now. I have moved the neck pup over about 1mm and it aligns better with the neck and strings, and also moved the nut slightly (about 0.5mm) to make it more central on the neck, as opposed to centrally with the truss rod access point! I'll go for a rebuild as it is, and see how it looks. Thanks for looking at this for me, always learning with these kit guitars!

[Simon Barden]

Hi Murph.

Have you tried screwing the neck on yet rather than just using clamps? If the body holes for the neck screws are small enough so that the screws have to be screwed through them, then I'd open them out to the same size as the neck screws so that they slide in (but with no excessive side-to-side movement). This allows them to pull the neck into the pocket with maximum force.

Yes, your strings do look a bit skewed. You may need to do a bot of sanding in the neck pocket (selector switch side & end) to allow the top of the neck to be pulled slightly to the right (when looking at the guitar like in the photos) to get the stings to align a bit better.

Yes, your nut may be slightly skewed as well, but it's easy enough to remove the nut and stick it back again. It looks like it's slightly oversized as well. If you can remember what you ordered, then if you've bought a 43mm wide nut then you might be better off with a 42mm one as the guide string slots will be slightly closer together and further away from the edge I haven't had any problems with fitting 43mm wide nuts to slightly narrower necks and sanding the edges off a bit, but it all depends on where you get your nut from and how they cut the string slots.

Your neck pickup doesn't seem to be sitting square in the ring, which is possibly why it's looking a bit skewed to you. It may be because it's catching on the edge of the rout (I had this issue on an ES-1 that l fettled) so you may need to expand the rout slightly, or it could just be the output cable getting in the way. A small sanding drum on a Dremel (or Dremel copy) is an easy way to expand the rout size in a controlled way.

Edit: Slight post crossover!

[Murph847]

I have managed to refit the neck and tighten it down. The sanding I did seems to have helped rectify the small gap that was between the heel and socket. The nut is a bit more central now, so the strings sit better, though still slightly towards the high E. I have also re-aligned the neck pup, though I have gone too far the other way, but it will be fine, certainly better than it was before at least. Thanks again for your comments and help, really is appreciated.