Iceman neck

[AWILDTravis]

Hello, I’v pre fit everything on my new iceman build and everything thing just seems so high


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[AWILDTravis]

and should there be a gap at the back of the neck?

[Fretworn]

Hi and welcome. I've no experience with this particular kit, but some guitars do have necks set that high. The gap may be caused by some blockage or misshaping in the neck cavity. The first thing to check is the that the scale length is correct. It may be that you need to slightly reshape the cavity to get a tight fit to get better intonation.

[wazkelly]

I have had same issue on both my Tele builds and ended up sanding down between 5mm to 7mm to drop the fret board level lower to deck level. Intonating them with such a ridiculously high action at the bridge end was impossible.

If you have another store bought guitar suggest checking the distance from top of body to top of fretboard as that is what I used as a reference point.

Very fiddly and time consuming job if you don't have a router or dremel, or not brave enough to use one. I made up a timber block a fraction smaller than neck pocket and used 80 grit. A very sharp chisel was also used to define the edges in the vertical plane whilst sanding done in the horizontal plane.

Hope this helps in some way.

Cheers, Waz

[Simon Barden]

For reference, here's a picture of an IC100 with a bolt-on neck.



Comparing it to yours, your neck seems to be sitting about 2mm higher. It looks like the neck pocket could be a bit deeper, but if you don't want to try routing or sanding that back (and I don't blame you), then I'd try and reduce the bottom on the neck heel. It looks pretty thick to me. You'll need to be careful to keep the heel at the same angle it is now, so always sand using a flat sanding block. And keep checking with a long straight edge between the top of the frets and the bridge. If you adjust the heel angle slightly, it can have a big effect on the resulting height the bridge needs to be. Also keep in mind that the pickup rings need to fit under the line of that straight edge, so don't reduce the heel too much.

Just check the length of your neck fixing screws against the overall body + heel depth. There shouldn't be any issues but you don't want to reduce the thickness of the neck heel too much so there's a danger of the screws poking into the fretboard itself.

Also check that the screw holes in the body are large enough for the screws to slide in without catching the sides. If they have to be screwed in through the body, then they can't pull the neck down onto the body properly, so widen them. I just had to do this on a friend's Squier Tele.

Also, with the strings on, just try loosening all the screws slightly by 1/4 to 1/2 turn (you'll probably hear a slight creak that indicates some movement). That should allow the string tension to pull the neck towards the body, and that gap may close up. Then tighten the screws again.

You'll also be putting some finish on the end of the neck (not normally in the pocket itself though), so a bit of the gap will be filled by that.

[AWILDTravis]

Okay thanks heaps for the quick detailed replies i mite give sanding the heel ago

[AWILDTravis]

That’s dropped 3mm, so much better amazing what 3mm can do!


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[FrankenWashie]

Great result there Travis. That looks much better!

[Simon Barden]

Good work, Travis. Hope it wasn't too nerve-racking for you.