Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Wade on March 7, 2009 at 3:53pm

I haven't had any problems with guitars that have 3 or 4 strings with an oak or maple fretboard yet. I read where the wood is stronger if the grain runs perpendicular to the fretboard. It also is important that a good amount of the grain runs the entire length of the neck.I bought a few truss rods from bezdez on ebay for less than $10 each. I also found some heavy steel stock from the frame of an old bed- I thought maybe my father in law could cut it into strips with a plasma cutter and I could somehow laminate that inside the neck.

Permalink Reply by Matte Resist on March 11, 2009 at 5:28am

I've been wondering the same thing. My only thought is some very tricky work with the circular saw. I'm thinking it would involve making some kind of jig to hold the neck, so I could use the guide to make a straight slot down the center.

Permalink Reply by B K on March 13, 2009 at 3:48am

who says the truss rodd has to be internal

Permalink Reply by Mike Patterson on May 13, 2009 at 12:07pm

Multi laminate necks, three pieces, would be much more stable, also both the Gibson and Fender method of truss rods are fairly simple to set up for----Dremel time!

Permalink Reply by Kevin Lawton on May 22, 2009 at 3:20am

If you don't have a router, then a table-mounted circular saw can be used to ut a deep slot down the centre of the neck. You can either dothis from the front, before you put the fretboard on which will then hide it, or from the back Fender-style and then fit a contrasting strip of wood 'shunk-stripe' in the Fender-style fashion.
If the neck is already made, then fitting from the back is probably the easier answer - so you might have to make a jig out of scrap wood to hold the shaped neck in the right place for cutting.
There is no law that says a truss rod has to be adjustable - a long blade of steel, say maybe 1/2" wide and 1/8" thick can be bonded into a slot in the neck with epoxy resin glue and does the job fine.

Permalink Reply by HOGS GRUNT on August 21, 2009 at 8:39am

I have made truss rods from a piece of steel hyraulic tube with a lenght of 5mm steel rod inside. I wrapped the rod with insulating tape to stop any chance of rattle and fixed one end to the bottom end of the tube (weld) with a threaded section on the top end of the rod with a washer then 5mm nut at the top to adjust.
Works quite wel and is really stiff when tensioned.
I have also used flat steel as Kevin Lawton describes and works well to.
On classical/spanish, nylon strung, guitars a three piece neck with a centre section of a piece of very straight grained timber makes a strong neck as well.
Just my ideas. Hope it is of use.

Permalink Reply by Outhouse Instruments on September 4, 2009 at 2:54pm

Make a multi-laminate neck. Make the center piece of of the same width as the truss rod and "inset" it when you glue it up.


Matt

Permalink Reply by Michael Gajeski on September 10, 2009 at 10:26pm

rip a channel down the center of the neck with a table saw and insert a length of flat steel from home depot. There's a guy on youtube named parksart that does this in his videos. hope this helps.