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Comment by Richey Kay on March 22, 2014 at 7:13pm

Hmmm... this is what I've done with smaller boxes:

This way I've kept the 630mm (24.75") scale I use for all my full size builds, and have all 21 frets easily accessible... so I guess it depends what scale you wanted to use. You could have a longer fretboard, but definitely decide on your scale etc. before taking any length off the neck :)

Comment by Sean Oliveira on March 22, 2014 at 7:12pm

This is looking good man!  In answer to your question, I guess a couple of things have to get settled first…or considered at least.  What scale do you want to have (length from bridge to nut)?  I like 24 or 25, but that's just me…you can get a fret calculator to calculate any length and give you a blueprint to use for marking the frets.  Yours would probably correspond with end of the fretboard to the bridge placement and I can't tell how far that is from your picture alone.  The other issue is tension and bowing once strings are on.  If you use steel strings and you have a long long neck then you increase the chances of bowing (you do have a brace and are adding a fretboard all of which add to the strength overall and if you only use three strings this is not necessarily a problem, but something to consider if your neck is particularly long).  I buy 1 x 2 x 6 pieces of Poplar, glue red oak to the bottom to add strength and cut the whole thing in half to get two 3 foot very strong necks that hold four strings no problem, even without a brace.  Do you have the headstock marked already and drilled and cut?  I give myself about five inches for that and then the rest of my neck before the box is my fretboard with three inches out the back.  My box is usually around ten inches so that leaves me with an 18 inch footboard and that puts my bridge about 4 inches in from the back of the box and I get 24 inches or 3 inches in from the back for 25 inches.  Having said all of that, I think, from looking at this picture alone, I would buy a longer fretboard, at least, just long enough to give myself 5 or 6 inches to work with at the head for the tuners (unless your whole stick is larger than three feet and then I would trim it to three feet and then go from there).  Sorry for the long winded answer.  I miss building these and just finally got the go ahead from the doctor and am now excited as all hell.