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From: Ross
Remote Name: 76.101.10.136
Date: 22 May 2007
Time: 09:02:56 -0400
Luthier’s Weblog 5/22/07 The neck design of the finger style guitar continues. More or less conventional thickness for the neck starts at .775” at the thinnest point continuing up the neck .9” just before the heel. The heel itself is undergoing some revisionist thinking by the builder. He feels that the heel has often been overly large and overbuilt for it’s purpose. It’s purpose, of course, is to provide a stable connection interface with the soundbox. He has been building a glued mortise-and-tenon joint, but is considering omission of glue in favor of two steel bolts with inserts mounted in the heel. This joint has much to recommend it, but inertia causes the builder to carry on as always. He wishes to see one of his guitars require a neck reset before making the switch. The heel is about 5/8” thick against the body, and makes a very sharply radiused curve into the neck shaft at the 13th fret. The gradation from .9” near the heel to the thinnest point by the nut is expressed in a straight line. This line culminates in a sharply delineated volute behind the nut. The luthier intends to place his truss rod adjustment nut in this end of the neck so that he will not damage the strings when adjusting neck relief with the strings at pitch, as is proper. The volute serves to provide added reinforcement to allow for wood removal at the headstock for the truss rod nut. A small ebony plate will cover the adjustment nut mortise. And so to the headstock. I should probably add bogus headstock design to my list of irritants. This functionally simple component is commonly enlarged and contorted to serve as a billboard and excuse for artistic excess. The function is often, indeed generally, compromised toward this end. A paucity of design originality requires builders to emblazon their name or message in this space to differentiate their instrument from others that are built from seemingly the same template. My robot luthier, endowed with a pleasing modesty, chooses to exalt function first, and labels his creation by autograph and date written on the underside of the soundboard, visible through the side port. The headstock is large enough to hold the tuners with enough room for the player’s fingers to easily manipulate the tuning keys. And no larger. Ross Teigen 8:26am