TL adventures

[JohnH]

Oh, looks like we posted at the same time. Sorry McCreed!

[Simon Barden]

Your pic shows a nut to centre-of-saddle distance of roughly 648.5mm. As the design scale length is 25.5” or 647.7mm, you are a lot closer than you think to being spot-on. It’s the nut to 12th fret distance that appears to be 1mm too short for the design scale length and is throwing your measurements out.

Can you take a photo of that measurement to double check?

[McCreed]

Oh, looks like we posted at the same time. Sorry McCreed!

Too easy! I almost mentioned checking that the heel was seated all the way, but didn't.

Glad it's sorted. Now get back to sanding!

[JohnH]

Your pic shows a nut to centre-of-saddle distance of roughly 648.5mm. As the design scale length is 25.5” or 647.7mm, you are a lot closer than you think to being spot-on. It’s the nut to 12th fret distance that appears to be 1mm too short for the design scale length and is throwing your measurements out.

Can you take a photo of that measurement to double check?

Here is a pic at the 12th fret...

Too easy! I almost mentioned checking that the heel was seated all the way, but didn't.

Glad it's sorted. Now get back to sanding!

Honestly, this is the problem with working on projects over such long periods. I could have sworn I'd already done it - I was so sure that I didn't even think to check!

[Simon Barden]

The rule really needs to run along the path from the top E nut slot to the top E saddle position, as the widening nature of the string spacing from nut to bridge means that the string takes a slightly longer path than if it ran straight down the middle of the neck.

It also means that each fret should in theory be curved to compensate for this, with each fret having a different radius curve. This is impossible from a practical point of view (unless using laser cutting tools and a one-piece fretboard + frets arrangement) and is one of the compromises involved in fret spacing and intonation adjustment.

Even so, 1/2 of 647.7 mm is 323.85mm, and you look to have about 323.1mm to the 12th fret as shown, so it's less than 1mm out. But to get the string intonated, it's probably going to be nearer a total 327mm than 328mm.

I wouldn't be surprised that on a lot of kit necks, the inter-fret spacing is probably correct, but the nuts may have been slightly misplaced. Though I have seen photos of some necks where the fret spacing was way out! It would be nice to be let lose on a whole lot of kit necks to analyse their construction and see what the most common issues are.

[Dikkybee007]

Let me first say that in no way am I having a go at anyone but I am hopefully trying to give you an insight into how to measure as accurately as you need to when making a guitar. I seem to see a lot of people having problems with measuring where the bridges are to be positioned and while the advice is helpful it seems to be a little over the top and people are trying to polish a turd, excuse the French, and some of the figures have me falling off my chair laughing. My background is in Toolmaking so measuring accurately is pretty important. The above picture of the rule over the frets has a parallax error as your have to be directly over the middle of the fret and that picture isn't as it seems to be over roughly the 11th fret due to where the focus is best. Other little bit of advice is when you use the 1mm scale you can only measure plus or minus 1mm, any size smaller than that is not a measurement but a guess. If you want to measure finer use the 0.5mm side but again you can only measure to plus or minus 0.5mm. Guessing a size is not measuring, if you want a finer measurement you will need another device, just use a steel rule as it is more than accurate enough. We all know that these kits are not the most accurate and we are hoping the nut is parallel to the frets but are the frets parallel to each other? No one checks but we are trying to tie down a bridge position to the second decimal point, Why? You cannot measure it with a steel rule any more accurate than plus or minus 0.5mm in reality. That is why the bridges have adjustment and the adjustment is more than enough to cover what you need as long as you are pretty close, plus or minus 0.5mm is heaps. Then you have the position of the 12th fret which is where you intonate but if the position is, like the rest of the kit, not accurate then the scale length is then tied to that measurement and not the kit size. Here is how I measure my position as told to me by a luthier and after I was told I used common sense to try and prove/disprove why the procedure was correct. I use a slotted straight edge and adjust the neck flat, hopefully there are no high frets between the nut and the 12th fret, if there is then take off the high spots so the rule is touching the top of the 12th fret or in a pinch just adjust the neck so the rule touches the 12 fret. I adjust my bridge saddles in the middle 2 slots to their maximum and minimum positions. To measure where the 12th fret I put the guitar on its side and place the rule against the nut, shine a light from underneath and see where the rule touches the fret and read off the measurement from the rule. Double that and that is the scale length. I then place the rule against the nut and with the size obtained from the 12th fret measurement I then place the bridge so that size is, as near as possible, in the middle of the 2 saddles. You can use a 150mm rule along with the metre rule, place some tape on the measurement you got from doubling the 12 fret measurement and use the smaller ruler to measure each side to the 2 saddles. I use some masking tape on the top surface of the guitar and mark the front edge of the bridge and then you can mark where the holes are to drilled to mount the bridge. That is how I do it and after 14 guitars I have never had a problem. All my guitars intonate correctly which is all you can ask from this quality of kit. Don't get flustered about trying to obtain any measurement to a second decimal point as more than likely you wont be able to measure it accurately and it is not necessary.

[Simon Barden]

I take your point about not trying to measure too accurately with a 1mm interval ruler, Dickybee, but there is still room for some common sense as to whether you are on the mark, just over the mark, roughly midway over the mark or almost at the next mark in seeing how long (based on the nut to 12th fret position) the real scale length is. And yes, I fully agree the real scale length is determined by that 12th fret position.

When checking the bridge position there are considerations as to whether either a) the kit has pre-drilled holes, and you are checking whether they are well enough positioned to use, or b) whether you need to drill all the bridge mounting holes yourself.

Situation b) obviously gives you some latitude as to bridge placement, but you are still often limited on a Telecaster kit by where the bridge pickup rout is located and how it affects any necessary fore or aft movement. If you are used to enlarging existing bridge routs, or are confident at woodworking then it's not a problem if the bridge needs to go forward a bit.

But a lot of people pick these TL kits as their first-time kit and aren't used to building anything or working with wood at all. These people will want to know they can just fit their bridge without having to do any work over and above drilling screw holes. We know that the bridge pickup rout is generally positioned about 2mm further back than it should be for comfortable bridge fitting, and with the length of adjustment screws provided with the kit bridges, the top B/E saddle almost always needs to be positioned right at the end of the screw to get it far enough forward to intonate.

Situation a) is the case on some of the PB kits, but even then you still do need to check and be reassured that you'll be able to intonate the guitar as there is no guarantee that the holes have been drilled in the right place and you may need to fill them and drill your own.

There are also the two types of bridges that come with the kits; the 3 x barrel saddle and the 6 x cast saddle types. Obviously with the 3 x barrel types you couldn't use your method of setting the two middle saddles fully forwards and fully aft method, as with this style they are one and the same saddle.

Technically there is no reason to have the scale length falling between the fully forward and fully aft bridge positions. The top E saddle will be the furthest forwards towards the neck, and the other saddle positions back from that. So as long as the scale length can be achieved by having the top E saddle somewhere between all the way forward and say 1/4 of the way back, intonating the guitar won't be an issue.

There is the danger that with the saddles too far back to achieve the nominal scale length, the front of the bridge then sits too far forward and clashes with the pickguard. You want to try and achieve that approximate 2mm gap between the bridge and the pickguard if you want to achieve the classic Tele look. And with the saddles set at their mid point, there is always the risk of the low E and A saddle spring being too compressed to be set far enough back to compensate correctly. You can cut the spring up to help, but there should really be no need to.

Once you've done these things a few times you generally know what will and what won't work (though it's still easy to get caught out with aftermarket bridges for Teles as they come is such a wide variety of lengths and screw-hole positions, despite being advertised as a "replacement for..."). But for the inexperienced first-timer building what is really a less than ideal kit, they need all the help and reassurance they can get to make their kit work.

[McCreed]

I agree with the points Simon set out.
Especially these two:

But a lot of people pick these TL kits as their first-time kit and aren't used to building anything or working with wood at all.

+1

There are also the two types of bridges that come with the kits; the 3 x barrel saddle and the 6 x cast saddle types. Obviously with the 3 x barrel types you couldn't use your method of setting the two middle saddles fully forwards and fully aft method, as with this style they are one and the same saddle.

+1


Lastly, @ Dikkeebee, I really wish you'd use paragraphs in your posts. Long flowing text without breaks makes it really difficult to read. The English language developed paragraphs for a reason.

There have been times where I haven't even bothered to read your posts because it hurts my brain to get through it. I'm sure I may have missed some good input from you in the past as a result. In fact, I struggled to get through your post above and probably missed some critical points.

BTW, I'm not having a go at you, just offering constructive criticism.

[JohnH]

Oh, it seems my photo has generated some confusion! It's what I get for posting in haste.

I should have mentioned that I do measure from the e-string nuts to the bridge, but for the photo I measured down the centre so you can see the 12th fret dot. I was going for illustrative rather than precision, sorry. It is probably closer to 323.5 from the nut to the 12th fret when measured along the e-strings, but my eye-sight isn't very good at 0.5mm distances.

@Dikkybee - thanks for the comprehensive post, though I must admit I also find blocks of text extremely hard to read. I did persevere and read through your post twice and I may be wrong, but it seems to me everyone is in agreement with you? I don't think anyone was advocating measuring to the second decimal point (it was only mentioned when talking about the scale length design, which seems reasonable), or that anyone seriously suggested you could measure any more accurately than 0.5 mm with a steel rule (anytime Simon mentioned a decimal he also prefaced it with 'roughly' or 'about', which also seems reasonable).

Perhaps you are expecting a level of precision when discussing measurements that others (or I at least) don't expect - understandable given your background in tooling.

It also seems to me that everyone agrees that the kits can be out of whack, and that the scale length on the kits should be determined by the 12th fret rather than the theoretical scale design. On this kit the pickup route makes that difficult, and so the question was whether anyone had suggestions for how far forward the pickup route needed to be moved to accomplish this.

In any case, with the neck seated properly and the pup route enlarged I now have plenty of room for intonation adjustments, and have spent a very productive morning sanding. The body is flat now, and just needs some work around the sides before I start the grain filling.

As I mentioned previously, I hate grain filling. It's definitely operator error, but I haven't been able to get timbermate or the other one I bought (which I forget the name of) to work. Seeing as I'm following Phrozin's spraying instructions (here) I'm going to give CA a go. I have a lot of it around, so it isn't costing me anything to try.

[McCreed]

Seeing as I'm following Phrozin's spraying instructions (here) I'm going to give CA a go. I have a lot of it around, so it isn't costing me anything to try.

I've yet to try CA, but have been tempted a few times. Makes sense if you're painting a solid colour too. Be sure and wear a good respirator that protects from fumes.