New Ash Bodies due Sept

[stan]

Cool Adam, I know you are looking after us

[Scott J.]

New Ash-body EX-1 arrived the other day and have just got around to excitedly unpacking it - a couple of very minor issues, one not-so-minor and one serious concern but overall very happy!

Here's a synopsis ...

Body - lovely timber, no major figuring (which is what I was after for this project) just a nice consistent grain. A couple of glue spots (front, top wing and at the base of the body - see pics) but nothing major that a few minutes with a soft wire brush wont fix) ... and most importantly its all timber - not a spot of filler in sight!

Neck - again a lovely piece of maple with some nice subtle figuring and very clean. Just one small "knot burn" on the headstock face (which'll be covered with a veneer cap anyway) and a glue smear on the back of the head (how'd it get there! 8O ) but again easily removed with wire brush.

Fingerboard - very nice, however still has some light lengthways scoring down the centre from about the 5th to 13th fret (but much less than my SG started out with!), I can only this might be due to not-quite-sharp-enough machine blades - but no big issue with this one.

Now here's the main issues ...

Truss Rod - WHOA! on first sight, my reaction was "I don't think it's supposed to be like THAT!" - the truss rod was sticking way out into the head! (see pics) ... and rattling about loose! Seem someone might have forgotten to secure (glue) it in place. Anyway, a quick consultation with "Dr. DB" and pushing the truss-rod back into the neck and putting a bit of tension on it seems to now be holding it in place ... hoping this solves it but time will eventually tell.

Neck Socket - 1. not nearly as tight as the recent SG build, with some room to wobble laterally (side-to-side) - when lined up lengthwise with the body to sit square with the bridge position there's about a 1.5mm gap on the top side of the neck socket (see pics)
2. Neck socket doesn't seem to quite line up with the body outline - socket is cut a few mm of to the side of the squared off section of the body where it sits and there's also a small crack along the glue-line of the body-blocks - not much I'll be able to do about this but I think it'll hardly be noticeable and shouldn't effect playability.
3. Rocking in the neck socket - with the neck placed in the socket there's some noticeable "front-to-back" rocking - I think the back of the body socket may not have been cut flat and has created a pivot, because the back of the neck heel IS flat.
... I think some packing is going to be necessary to set this one right, but should work out fine.

All in all, as the guru's mantra says (there's no problem that can't be worked around!) and I don't think that they're really big issues, so I'm confident of another successful build.

Body shots ...

[Scott J.]

Neck & Head shots ...

[Scott J.]

Socket rocking, gaps and split.