7 String Baritone

[bostjan]

Hello.  ccasion14:

I had been eyeballing a 7 string baritone neck for a long time and finally placed the order.  Added a body to match.

Has anyone else ever ordered one?

I'm totally unclear about a few things, but I'm flexible and ready to work it out:

What are the dimensions of the pickup route?  I'm assuming it'll fit something like a 7 string Dimarzio or Seymour Duncan, not any of the larger soapbar style, like EMG.

They didn't have any hardtail 7 string bridges in stock, but only one routing option.  I ultimately decided to mark the only option for HT bridge, but left a text comment asking if they could just route out the strings-through holes and supplied a link to the bridge I would like to use.  If they had the bridge, I would have added one to the order, but it looks like they have been out of stock for a very long time.  If the mounting holes don't match the bridge I want, it shouldn't be a big deal to fill and redrill.  But I have no idea what Warmoth would be willing to accommodate.

Now comes the waiting.

 

[stratamania]

Hi Welcome to the forum.

I assume you have ordered a 7 string body which offers three pickup routs, 7 string Strat or 7 string Humbucker in wood or ring mount options.

The dimensions of the routs for these pickups as far as I am aware are not published on the current website but these pickups fit the respective routs.

https://warmoth.com/hardware/guitar-pickups/7-string

And dimensions of the pickups can be found at Seymour Duncan.

https://www.seymourduncan.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Strat-7-String-Staggered.jpg

https://www.seymourduncan.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/HB-7-String-Uncovered-Short-Magnet-Short-Leg-Bottom-Plate-1.jpg

So P90 styles would not fit.

I cannot help a lot on the bridge as you did not mention what you plan to use etc.

See also this thread on the 7 string hardtail. You might want to check with Warmoth sales if the hardtail rout is even still available. I know the website offers the rout but it may be the option has not been removed.

https://www.unofficialwarmoth.com/index.php?topic=33506.0

FYI - Gotoh discontinued the hardtail bridge we rout for on the 7-string a few years ago but we only just recently ran out of stock. I recommend ordering the body with either Floyd or no rout for the time being. I don't know that anything else is actually compatible with the Gotoh rout. I'm hoping to get a new 7-string hardtail in place, but there are a lot of factors involved and it will take a while longer.

 

[bostjan]

Ok, I hope they'll just do with no routing then.

 

[stratamania]

Ok, I hope they'll just do with no routing then.

What bridge do you plan to use?

Perhaps if they are readily available it might be worth contacting Warmoth to see if it could be a viable alternative.

 

[bostjan]

Ok, I hope they'll just do with no routing then.

What bridge do you plan to use?

Perhaps if they are readily available it might be worth contacting Warmoth to see if it could be a viable alternative.

AllParts SB-5100
https://www.allparts.com/products/sb-5100-7-string-non-tremolo-bridge

 

[stratamania]

Ok, I hope they'll just do with no routing then.

What bridge do you plan to use?

Perhaps if they are readily available it might be worth contacting Warmoth to see if it could be a viable alternative.

AllParts SB-5100
https://www.allparts.com/products/sb-5100-7-string-non-tremolo-bridge

Okay according to the allparts UK website these are the dimensions.

Bridge plate size: 85.5mm x 37mm

String spacing: 65.5mm

Includes mounting screws (4)

Perhaps contact Warmoth sales to see what their take is on it. (I don't work for Warmoth so cannot speak for them)

 

[bostjan]

Would it be better to call or email through their site?

 

[bostjan]

Just spoke with the CSR.  Going with no rout.  I'll either borrow a drill press or use a small jig to drill the string-through holes.

 

[stratamania]

Okay, glad you got it sorted out.

A drill press (pillar drill) is the better option for drilling such holes.

Post some progress of your build when you have the body etc.

 

[bostjan]

I have a small jig for drilling holes.  It's not as good as a drill press, but I used it a few times on other projects now and I feel fairly confident with it.

I'm a lot less certain about how to deal with the intonation line, though.  Maybe that's worthy of a new thread?

Anyway, I took an old guitar and transformed it.  The last step was going to be installing a new bridge on a freshly pained body without the previous bridge's location marked.  I measured the distance from the nut to the 12th fret.  Measured the same distance from the 12th fret toward the body.  Marked a dot along the bass edge of the fretboard.  Repeated along the treble edge.  Drew a line.  Tried to line up the bridge, such that the middle of the bridge's travel would be around the middle of the line.  Screwed in the bridge.  Strung it up, and went to set intonation.  Almost all of the strings had to be backed way the heck toward the far end of the bridge.  The low E is all the way back and is still fretting sharp.  I pulled it off and reset it several mm back and it's better.  I tried the same thing again with a different bridge on a different guitar, only, this time, it was a short-scale kid guitar.  I thought, between being short scale and how I had to reset the bridge farther back the first time, I should go ahead and leave and extra 1/4" right off the bat.  I did the same method, but this time, the new bridge is one of those ones where the saddles are staggered, so there's not really a center-of-adjustment.  I failed again.  Same thing - Low E back all of the way, still not in tune.  The G string is also all of the way back and is doing something super weird where the 12th fret is in tune, but the lower frets are all noticeably and annoyingly sharp and the higher frets are flat.  The nut seems to be slotted perfectly, but I'm guessing the slot might need to be deeper or the action maybe is too high (but I can't lower it because maybe the neck is a little humpy).  In this case, because of the staggered saddles, I had to tilt the bridge so that the bass side was farther back.  It looks bad, and the E string is still not entirely in tune, even with the saddle all of the way back, but it's only about 5 cents off at the 12th fret.  It's a short-scale kid guitar, so whatever - just practice mostly.

I figured I'd try again, though, before I get to work on my pricier Warmoth parts.  This third time, I am just going to install the bridge onto a scrap 1x4 I have lying around.  I routed a crude neck pocket, and I've bolted a neck on.  The pocket actually fits great, even though the bass side of the pocket is a little curved, I'm guessing from the workpiece wobbling whilst I was routing.  Anyway, this time, I left a little extra space again.  I'm not sure why, but I just decided.  And I'm still backing the saddles way back toward the far end of the bridge to get in tune.

I've looked for tutorials online about bridge placement, and I'm not seeing anything about leaving extra relief space, so I must be doing something wrong with my technique.  None of the tutorials I've come across are very thorough, though.  They typically just say "measure the scale length and place the center-line of saddle adjustment over the line that is the scale length away from the nut."  I realize I'm losing a little length by measuring along the edge of the fretboard rather than the center-line, but I've measured along the center-line as well, and the extra 1/4" fudge factor is way more than the difference from that.  I'm using regular light strings, so I don't think that's the issue.

Maybe someone here can clue me in on what concept I'm missing here.  I mean, what I've done this last attempt worked, but I'd rather have this figured out perfectly, so that I can get my average saddle position as close as possible to the center-of-adjustment on the bridge and not have everything cranked back over the last half of the adjustment range.

Is there a way to *temporarily* affix the bridge to the body securely enough to intonate at least one of the strings?  I'm going to bet not.

 

[electric__steve]

The information I've seen online for bridge placement suggests that the high E should be 0 - 1/8" back from the scale length, and the low E 1/8 to 1/4" back.  If you placed the bridge 1/4" back and couldn't intonate, could there be an issue with the way you're doing the intonation?  If the action is too high, the fretted note at 12 goes sharp, which impacts your intonation.  Similarly, if you're pressing harder when intonating than you normally would when playing, the note goes sharp, especially with jumbo frets.  It also could be an issue with your tuner not being accurate enough.

 

[bostjan]

The information I've seen online for bridge placement suggests that the high E should be 0 - 1/8" back from the scale length, and the low E 1/8 to 1/4" back.  If you placed the bridge 1/4" back and couldn't intonate, could there be an issue with the way you're doing the intonation?  If the action is too high, the fretted note at 12 goes sharp, which impacts your intonation.  Similarly, if you're pressing harder when intonating than you normally would when playing, the note goes sharp, especially with jumbo frets.  It also could be an issue with your tuner not being accurate enough.

Hmm.  I know I'm supposed to set the action with a gauge, but I generally find it more practical to straighten the neck and then adjust each saddle down until it just barely buzzes as I run up the fretboard in playing position, then take it back up a minimal amount.  My first attempt guitar is the lowest action and is the only one that worked out (on the second attempt to place the bridge, though.)

Perhaps the kid guitar is such a disaster because the neck is hilly and the scale length is too short, meaning that intonation adjustment is generally more challenging.

Maybe what I'll have to do is to route a neck pocket into a scrap piece and mount my Warmoth neck, then mount the bridge and string it then take note of how it works out.  It'll be quite a bit of extra work, but if it saves me from having to drill mounting holes twice, it'd be well worth the effort.  I can practice all day with poor quality short-scale necks and, I guess, it won't necessarily translate to experience with a high quality baritone Warmoth neck.

 

[raystankewitz]

Okay, glad you got it sorted out.

A drill press (pillar drill) is the better option for drilling such holes.

Post some progress of your build when you have the body etc.

Wow! I haven't heard a drill press called a "Pillar Drill or Pillar Press" since I was stationed at Lakenheath Royal Air Base with the USAF. The blokes down in the machine shop had names for things that were not what we called them in the USA.

 

[mayfly]

There's a guy in the midwest of USA who works on interesting cars.  His youtube channel is called 'this week with cars'.

When working on British cars, he makes a point of referring to things using British terms, such as 'Bonnet',  'Boot', 'Petrol' and so-forth.  It's very endearing.   

[youtube]https://youtu.be/2k7evMcWmxQ[/youtube]


How's that for a total thread hijack!  :headbang:

 

[bostjan]

I was raised in a household where we used both US and UK vocabulary.  It seemed normal to me, but my classmates thought I was barmy as a bedbug.

Back to the other side-topic, though, my last attempt a bridge placement went much better, and the saddles are just about in the center, on average.  There does seem to be a static offset of about 3/16" the way I've been measuring, that is to say, that, the 12th fret to the intonation line seems to be about 3/16" (~4.5-5mm) farther away from the 12th fret than the nut.  With any luck, my Warmoth parts will ship soon-ish and I'll be ready for them when they arrive.

 

[stratamania]

Okay, glad you got it sorted out.

A drill press (pillar drill) is the better option for drilling such holes.

Post some progress of your build when you have the body etc.

Wow! I haven't heard a drill press called a "Pillar Drill or Pillar Press" since I was stationed at Lakenheath Royal Air Base with the USAF. The blokes down in the machine shop had names for things that were not what we called them in the USA.

That is in Surrey, if memory serves me correctly. I am British, although I live in Europe now. I put the additional terms as quite a few members are not based in the US. I like the Dutch term for a pillar drill which is kolomboormachine. It is a compound word kolom similar to column and a machine that well bores holes.

Back to the topic Stewmac has a scale calculator which includes suggestions for bridge placement.

https://www.stewmac.com/fretcalculator/

 

[bostjan]

Okay, glad you got it sorted out.

A drill press (pillar drill) is the better option for drilling such holes.

Post some progress of your build when you have the body etc.

Wow! I haven't heard a drill press called a "Pillar Drill or Pillar Press" since I was stationed at Lakenheath Royal Air Base with the USAF. The blokes down in the machine shop had names for things that were not what we called them in the USA.

That is in Surrey, if memory serves me correctly. I am British, although I live in Europe now. I put the additional terms as quite a few members are not based in the US. I like the Dutch term for a pillar drill which is kolomboormachine. It is a compound word kolom similar to column and a machine that well bores holes.

Back to the topic Stewmac has a scale calculator which includes suggestions for bridge placement.

https://www.stewmac.com/fretcalculator/

Since I speak high German and standard English, I love Dutch.  It sometimes sounds like one and sometimes like the other.

Example 1:

Wie heeft dat glas daar gebroken?
Who broke that glass over there?

Example 2:
Welke jongen heeft je geslagen?
Which boy hit you?
German: Welcher Junge hat dich geschlagen?

Also "eekhoorntjesbrood" is a mushroom, whose name is a compound word meaning "tiny squirrel's bread."

Plus, Jan Akkerman is one of my biggest guitar influences.  Listening to him also got me first exposed to the lute, and now my main guitar has a high A string, like a lute...

But anyway, I highly doubt a high A would ever work on a baritone seven, so I'm going to tune ADGCFAD with a drop tuner on the 6th string.

Actually, Sperzel told me that their D-Thing won't work for any other application than dropping a low E to a low D at standard scale length.  I figured that it's the same string gauge at the same tension, so it ought not to matter, but I guess we'll find out.  I'd also like to test it on the 7th string, but I have some expectation that it might not work.  If it does, though, I guess I'll be ordering another D-Thing.  It's really a pretty simple and compact device.

 

[stratamania]

Cool, to see others with an interest in languages  :icon_thumright:

 

[bostjan]

Just opened my parts and I'm impressed!

I have a nut blank on the way (the first one I ordered is too rounded), and I still need strap buttons.  I'm going to get started by trying to piece everything together before finishing, then take it apart, and then finish it, and then final assembly.

This is my first real partscaster, so I'm sure I'll be posting a bunch of questions asking for help.

 

[bostjan]

Well, that was an adventure, but I'm all done building it, and I'm quite impressed!

Big question: how do I find a hardshell case that will fit this thing?

The Sperzel D Thing definitely doesn't work on the 7th string for dropping a whole step. It will drop a major or minor third. With longer screws, it would work, but, for now, I'd like to keep it at a major third, and then get another DThing to drop the 6th string down a whole step.  So, my tuning is (A/F)DGCFAD. F is pretty darn low, but with 28 5/8", it still sounds pretty darn good, which is crazy.

But yeah, I have a bunch of hard cases for both basses and guitars at home, and nothing fits!