ESB-4 - first build - ultimate newbie

[fender3x]

I can appreciate the creepiness. I had a lot of problems with my ESB-4 too, BTW, and got a lot of help from folks here. That’s what everyone here is for ;-)

It sounds like the problem is in the pocket since you seem to have done the glue up right! Vinegar was a good idea. I would recommend doing as little sanding as possible right now. Any material you take off might make the neck fit more loosely. That can be fixed with some veneer, but the less of that you have to do the better.

So, now that you have the neck off, you now have two problems. One is string rise. Strings need to be lower where they meet the bridge. The other problem is string alignment. The E and G strings need to be about equally distant from the sides of the neck.

First string rise…

When I look at this pic:
http://www.buildyourownguitar.com.au...6&d=1524061613


It looks about the way it should. The bridge end of the neck does not look too high at all. You can safely bring it down a bit, but not too much. What it really may need is to be raised a little bit at the headstock end of the pocket.

The simplest way to do this is with a shim. I know you can get these from Stew Mac:

http://www.stewmac.com/Materials_and..._for_Bass.html

http://www.stewmac.com/How-To/Tool_D...eck_Shims.html

Your shim will go in the opposite way from the one in the video. The thinnest part should be at the bridge end of the pocket. You may be able to get shims from other places, but the ones from SM are maple and that should be pretty good quality.

You can make a shim too, but it’s more work. You’ll need to experiment a little bit with a straight-edge to see where the angle is right. It does not take a very big angle to make a big difference. The 1 degree shim sold by Stew Mac should move the strings down by about ¼ inch. If that’s not enough, you can glue in another.

Test dry fitting a lot before gluing. ;-)

Ok, will send something on the alignment problem later...

[fender3x]

I took a hard look at the pictures you posted. The neck pocket fit where the sides of pocket meet the sides of the neck look pretty good. There doesn’t look like there is a lot of play in the pocket, so I am guessing that when you get the neck seated it wont move much. That’s good for the glue up, but it means the bridge is probably what’s out of alignment rather than the neck. I put some lines on your pic to demonstrate…



I don’t know any other way to do this other than to fill the holes with wood dowels or plugs, sand, fill and re-drill.

One thing to watch out for is that the center block in these guitars is not very wide. You want to make sure you know where the edge so that you drill into the block and not into empty air under it. In my pic it looks like you won’t need to move it far, so you should be OK.

Here’s a tutorial on how to do it…

http://projectelectricguitar.com/how...-bridge-posts/

They are showing a guitar in the tutorial and a two point bridge, but the principle is the same with the three point on a bass.

[Roger79]

Hey there !
Me again, not giving up (yet).
Finally, I sanded the neck's pocket and the high seems good.

Before gluing anything, I clamped it and checked with a string : it's way better, and playable (I hope).
I've a question about two gaps between the neck when I insert it in the pocket :



I don't really want to work on it, using filler and everything.. my question is : can I leave it like this ? I plan to use a good amount of glue on both sides to be sure it'll hold, but I care about the result (how it'll sound, not look )

What do you think ?

Thanks
See ya !

[wazkelly]

Gaps look very thin, maybe less than 1 mm?

Possibly a very thin veneer could be inserted on either side to help fill the gaps. Not sure if glue alone acting as a filler will provide enough strength and suggest waiting for others with more expert knowledge to drop by and add their comments.

[Simon Barden]

I had to fit a strip of maple veneer on both sides of the neck pocket on my ESB-4 to get the neck fit tight enough. I'd suggest putting veneer on at least one side, though you may be better off fitting it on both sides and then sanding it back to get the neck to fit snugly without gaps.

[Roger79]

Ok thanks a lot for this tip.
I don't know where I'll find a small amount of maple veneer tho..

I have a kind of hard filler "to knead" (I'll use it to fill my bridge's holes to redrill), I suppose I can't use it (spread) then sand it until the neck fits properly ?

[Simon Barden]

I've found it's difficult to get that epoxy putty to stick to a flat surface. I've tried to put some in a corner of a control cavity on a Strat where a new pickguard had different hole spacings. but it just kept falling off.

I find eBay is a good source for small pieces of veneer.

[Fretworn]

Ouch! That's a bit of a nasty ding on the front there. Are you going to try and steam that out?

[fender3x]

Veneer is good stuff for the neck pocket. I like Simon's advice.

On the holes, I would see if you can find hardwood rods the right diameter to insert and glue. I would not use filler. You will be moving the bridge, but not very far, so you'll probably drill into whatever you fill with, so you want it to be wood.

A Japanese saw works great to take the tops off the dowels. Then you just sand to make it flush with the top. I found a Japanese saw cheap. There's a cheap tool store here called Harbor Freight. If you have something similar where you are Japanese saw is a good investment ;-)

Sent from my ONEPLUS A3000 using Tapatalk

[Simon Barden]

I agree with Fender3x about not using filler. Use some hardwood dowel, cut it roughly to size first, then glue it in place. I did something similar on my EX-1 kit where I've routed the body for the selector switch in the standard location on the lower horn, filled the large hole for the old selector switch with dowel, then cut the excess height down with a chisel and then sanding, then redrilled it to fit a standard potentiometer.

Epoxy filler won't have the compressibility required to hold the inserts firmly. Try and force an insert in to a hole drilled in epoxy filler and it will probably crack.