Yes I bought a case and bag to be shared between the PB tele and this one. I like the look of a guitar in a nice case with the fancy fur - but tbh they are a bit of a pain… I find that a good gig bag is way more convenient in nearly all aspects!
But I agree - an empty guitar case needs to be filled!
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Things have taken a bit of backwards step with this project.
The company I got the neck and body from specialise in vintage style guitars. So the neck only has a single action truss rod. At the time I was too naive to consider the implication of this.
Anyway I spent a good while last week working on the setup but I couldn’t get any relief into the neck despite the TR nut being loose. So I was getting a ton of buzz from the low frets. My go to strings are 9-42 so I tried 10s which gave me about 0.002”.
I also tried forcing the neck into relief by putting a book under the headstock and putting all my body weight on the 6/7 fret. The neck did bend doing this but it always went ironing board flat again.
I contacted the manufacturer and they taken it back to investigate.
Digging around it seems your supposed to make single action rod neck with a little relief in it so that the rod still has something to do when there is no string tension. That way your able to have full control over the neck. I’m not sure this happened in this case. I’m not sure there’s anything I could have done to cause it?
The annoying this is they have just started selling a double action TR option!
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A flat neck should be pulled into sufficient relief under string tension, so it must have had a significant reverse bow to start with.
Either that or the neck is very very stiff indeed, so that the string tension hardly bends it.
When I’ve fret l levelled a neck, I’ll then normally give it about 1/2 tightening turn on the truss rod which ends up a good starting point for the relief as I like it (using 10s) before stringing it up.
I'd say that's very unlikely. If the frets are too large they generally won't seat properly. If they are flat to the fretboard then the slots should be the right size. Overly large frets would in theory cause a back-bow if installed on a straight neck, but you said the neck was flat. Unless it's a custom order, I'd assume the company will be using the same fretwire and slot saw they always use.
There's a lot of bad information around on the web, and I really don't think anyone deliberately makes necks with a little neck relief built-in (unless you are making say carbon-composite necks that are remarkably stiff). Double action rods are a fairly recent innovation, and I can't see Fender or Gibson factories making necks that were constructed with anything other than a flat fretboard when using single-action truss rods. Original string gauges were thicker, typically 0.012"s, so there was more than enough tension to provide relief on the neck to start with. But when people fitted 8s and 9s on those vintage instruments, they still played OK.
So unless the neck is so stiff it doesn't need a truss rod, I'd say that they are all made flat.
What double-action truss rods allow is the use of less seasoned timber, and non-quarter sawn wood, so that if the neck does develop a back-bow as the wood ages (which with fairly young wood might only take a few months) then it can be corrected. The drive towards ever-cheaper guitars has given rise to the necessity for double-action truss rods in lower-priced models.
There are certainly 'decent' guitars where a double-action truss rod would have been an advantage, as you will get the odd neck using good wood that will still develop a back-bow. But mainly it's too much neck relief that's an issue with guitar necks.
Hmmm... This is a head-scratcher, and I'm interested to hear more.
So what does happen when you turn the truss rod nut?
If nothing, my first thought is broken rod or not properly anchored.
As Simon posted, single action rods have been around and working for a long time for a lot well known guitar brands, so there's definitely something hinky with the neck you have.
I have to admit that I did not know about the reason behind the development of the two-way truss rod relative to new timber and mass production requirements. That's interesting. Thanks Simon!
Making the world a better place; one guitar at a time...
Thanks both - yeah with my level of experience it’s hard to know what’s good and bad information. But it sounded logical to me that you’d need some relief to engage the rod.
When I tighten the rod I get back bow so it seems like it’s doing the right thing.
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A single action truss rod will straighten the neck and then introduce back-bow, so if the neck is already too straight, you won't want to tighten it at all.
A double-action truss-rod obviously caters for both types of bow, so isn't a bad thing to have at all in any guitar. The reason for them being fairly ubiquitous in cheaper guitars these days is my own reasoning, but having had two Pit bull necks with an inherent back-bow and needing to use the rod in order to level the neck for a fret-level, whilst people like Gibson and Fender are still generally using single-action truss rods, does point at lower quality wood /manufacturing methods as the main reason for their introduction. And once someone makes a low cost double-action truss rod, you might as well use one.
IMO, a lot of hardware developments have been made to allow for looser manufacturing tolerances or less installation time. e.g. the Gibson Nashville bridge allows for a coupe of mm extra saddle travel over the previous ABR one, so fore/aft bridge hole placement can be a bit sloppier.
Guitar looks great! How did the inlay in the headstock end up? I recently did my first inlay in my first guitar, and ran into the same trouble as you did. I ended up carving a "stroke" line around it that I filled with epoxy.
The reverse controls seem like a great idea too, I might do that on mine!
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Originally Posted by Simon Barden
