LP-1S nearly complete, set up ?

I have nearly finished my 1st kit guitar LP-1S its been a great experience. I have a few small wiring issues to sort out as I only have the bridge pick up working.

I have a question about the bridge height. to get the action so you can play with light buzz I have to raise the bridge up quite a way. both pick ups are at full extension and still too far away from the strings which I think is making it quiet.

to get around the problem with the bridge height has any one shimmed the neck pocket to reduce the angle to allow for lower bridge height and lower action, allowing for the pick ups to be adjusted correctly ?

thanks in advance.

Hi Adam nice looking build. My guess is the neck has some forward or back bow and this is the reason you need to wind the bridge height up to lower the fret buzz.
Has the neck had a fret level ? It could be that the frets aren't level causing buzz. Also if the nut is too high that will create issues too.
You shouldn't have to shim the neck if it is setup correctly.
When the guitar is tuned put a straight edge along the neck to see if it's level or has some bow.

Thanks and thanks for the info . I have adjusted the truss rod once the strings have been up to tension for a few days. I have not leveled the frets but did run a straight edge over them to check non seemed to stand out as being high.

I would unbolt the neck and make sure its seated in the pocket nicely and there is no debris affecting the neck angle in the pocket. There should be a 3-4 degree taper of the neck pocket to compensate for the height of the tune o matic bridge height.
Might take some more time for the neck to settle under string tension and more hours of playing it.

No worries thanks

The bridge height doesn't seem excessive (have you seen the bridge height on a lot of Gibsons lately?), though lower is always better. Looks like you could bring the stop bar down a few turns.

Your bridge pickup doesn't appear to be that far away from the strings, so I can't see that being an issue for the guitar output being low. But I don't know anything about the stock pickups that come with the kit, and what output they should have.

My first inclination would be to go with Woks' suggestions, and look at the amount of relief in the neck, and then to check for one or two high frets. If you lower the action, do you get the strings starting to choke on all the frets, or is it only one or two that do it at first? If just one or two, then that indicates it's those frets that are slightly high and are preventing the overall action from coming down. If basically all the frets at the same time, then the frets are fine and it's mainly a neck angle issue.

Shimming the neck is an option, though it's normally done at the back of the neck pocket to increase the neck-break angle. You'd need to do it at the front of the neck pocket, which would leave a visible gap. In this case, one option would be to simply take off 2mm from the bottom of the neck heel so the whole neck sits lower in the pocket whilst keeping the same neck angle. A minimal amount of refinishing would be needed to the neck if you did this.

But before you do that, what's the action at the nut like? If the slots are higher than necessary, then that will be raising the action over the whole fingerboard with no strings fretted (but it doesn't affect the action of fretted strings). How big is the gap between the stings and the first fret? It should be just enough not to buzz on the fret, but low enough so that you can fret the string with very little force required to push the string down. It's normally a fraction of a mm, so any gap between string and 1st fret that looks higher than 1mm is certainly higher than it needs to be (unless you are setting up for slide playing, where a higher-cut nut can be useful). If undecided, can you take a picture?

Ive went over a few things you both mentioned. thanks for the advice.

I found some of the routing was preventing the neck from seating properly, so I cleaned this up with a chisel.

I tried putting a straight edge on the neck to check fret height and nothing jumped out as being too high but when I used a short razor blade that would only go over 3 or 4 frets it high lighted that frets 12,14, 19 are high as the blade would rock on the high frets. ill level these with the other frets and see how it goes.

I included a photo of the nut height let me know what you think if I need to lower it or not ?

good work Adam you are heading in the right direction. The nut does look too high so I would carefully remove it and sand it on sandpaper that is on a flat surface and I try and lean it up against a square block of wood so it remains as square to the sandpaper as possible. I'd put a pencil mark try lowering it about 1mm and see how it goes after that. It may need to be lowered further.

There is a thread somewhere setting up your guitar on the forum is worth a read

Adam I have just finished an LP-1MQ and have not had any trouble setting it up. And I am rank amateur. The LP-1MQ also has a bolt on neck so I assume it is similar to yours.

If you check my build diary you will see some dimensions I put on the forum when I panicked very early because I was not aware the fretboard should be high of the cap. They may be of some use. I can send you any other measurements that you require.

The nut height is 7mm in total and 3mm protrudes above the fretboard.

Good luck

Ive levelled the frets and done a little more cleaning in the neck pocket. while I had the chance I measured the neck angle. it started out as 6 degrees as in the photo, after a little more cleaning its to 4.5 degrees. I also took the advice to lower the nut height by 1mm. this has reduced the action at the first fret to about 0.75mm. So after setting it up a again and testing it out the bridge I can get slightly lower but not much. Both E strings is where my buzz comes from now, all of the other stings ring out really well its just the Es that sound a little dampened mostly higher on the neck. I could fix this by raising the bridge height but im trying to get it lower as the neck pick up is at full extension still. I take it upgrading the stock tune-o-matic bridge is the only way to adjust the action in each string independently ? over all im really happy with how its turned out. a new set of heavier stings to match my other guitar and play it for a while until I learn a bit more. thanks for you help guys.

love your angle finding device Adam, I presume you have to get the guitar body level first ?
Maybe the neck still needs to be played in a bit more and I suspect a tweak of the truss rod should lessen the string buzzing.
Also changing gauge strings can change the bow of the neck with heavier strings putting more tension on the neck. see how you go with the heavier gauge strings. I also suspect your nut may still be a little too high. You may need to widen the nut slots a bit for heavier gauge strings or they may sit too high

HAHA yes double checked the table with a spirit level and this angle tool adjusted a few areas to make it spot on then checked the neck angle will keep you posted cheers