Baritone Jazzmaster- First Build

[DieterDeux]

And so it begins. Excited to get this going.

Spent about 4 hours working on the neck today. Sanded the back up to 1000, then taped off and attacked the fret ends and gave them a polish. Feeling and looking good. Unfortunately was unable to drill the pegs for the tuners today as I discovered my bit was bent. Aw, shucks. Guess I'll have to go to the hardware store and buy tools. Don't you hate it when that happens?

Haven't decided how I feel about the pick guard yet. I had been warned this particular one looks different in person than in the builder. I'll probably stick with it for now and swap out the guard later if it's bugging me.

 

[DieterDeux]

This is my first time shielding a cavity. You’re supposed to do the whole pickup route, right? Sidewalls too? It’s made it REALLY snug when I put the pickup covers in, to the point where it’s scraped or compacted some of the shielding.

 

[BeagJon]

This is my first time shielding a cavity. You’re supposed to do the whole pickup route, right? Sidewalls too? It’s made it REALLY snug when I put the pickup covers in, to the point where it’s scraped or compacted some of the shielding.

I'm here for the answer to this... unsure if I need to shield the pickups on my rear-rout body.

 

[DieterDeux]

Finally received my missing neck screws and completed the assembly. Looks and sounds pretty good, but definitely needs some setup work. Still need to put on the string tree too.

My first Jazzmaster, but I know I’m not doing something right. Have a .5° shim in the neck and the bridge up about 3.5mm above the body (which i think is the Mike Adams spec) but the pickups are too close to the strings. When I put them any lower the covers start warping like below, so thats a no-go.

Some alignment issues too. The nut seems slightly (but not horribly) off, but it’s definitely noticeable on the other end.

Tomorrow I’ll start on the setup, but it’s playable now, albeit with a bit of bridge buzz.

 

[stratamania]

It is not the nut. You need to loosen your neck screws slightly and pull the neck into alignment then retighten the screws.

 

[mayfly]

Yep - it's not the nut.  It's how the neck is sitting in the pocket.  Just needs a tweak.

Can't speak about the pickups though, I've no experience with those.

 

[elstoof]

Is the shim making the neck sit weirdly in the pocket? Does it even need the shim?

 

[DieterDeux]

It is not the nut. You need to loosen your neck screws slightly and pull the neck into alignment then retighten the screws.

Hmm. That's the first thing I tried and it didn't want to move anywhere. Tried the trem too to see if that could tweak. Does this mean I might need to shave something off the neck or pocket? That sounds sketchy.

And after watching loads of videos on offset guitars, it seems that lack of neck angle and bridge being too low are the primary causes of people's complaints with offsets.  Jazzmasters were created to cater to hollow body Jazz players so the geometry is supposed to be familiar to them. They were designed with shims in mind, and many modern ones have angled neck pockets. So yes, I think it's necessary, and with the pickup clearance I think I might need to raise the bridge and that'll mean even more shimming.

 

[stratamania]

How tight is the neck pocket? If it is overly tight it may need a little finessing.

Also if the pickups are not sitting in the pockets correctly perhaps there is too much thickness of paint and copper in the cavities.

 

[rauchman]

Really interesting build.

Is a Jazzmaster body preferred for a Baritone neck?  Are there balance issues with the longer neck?

OP, you guitar is looking great!

 

[DieterDeux]

How tight is the neck pocket? If it is overly tight it may need a little finessing.
Also if the pickups are not sitting in the pockets correctly perhaps there is too much thickness of paint and copper in the cavities.

I'll have to give it another shot tonight, but it wouldn't budge at all laterally when I loosened up the neck screws last night. If I did have to do a little shaving, would I do it on the neck or on the pocket? I'm kind of nervous to do either. Will have to check if it's maybe the pickguard, but that was installed after the neck...hmm...

I was thinking the same thing on the pickups, but since it starts doming in the middle when I tighten down that means the edges are actually going lower than the middle of the pickup where there's less flex so it's the magnets and windings are bottoming out. The middle of the cavity/shielding is nice and flat- it's only the edges where I have any bunching issues. I can't imagine the paint is THAT thick on the flat under the pickup that it's causing problems. I think this is a matter of raising the bridge and shimming the neck a bit more.

Is a Jazzmaster body preferred for a Baritone neck?  Are there balance issues with the longer neck?

Don't think it's necessarily ideal or anything. I just didn't own an offset and wanted to try something new. As a guy who grew up playing bass, the increased length and weight are a non-issue for me. I was slightly concerned with the all rosewood neck that there might be some balance issue, but it's totally fine with the mahogany body. I don't have an ideal scale for weighing this, but my bathroom scale says it's ~8.3lbs all in and it's comfortable on strap.

 

[stratamania]

It requires some pressure to move a neck. I am not sure of course how you are doing this.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Sj9OkMYkg4[/youtube]

Have you cleaned the paint out of the neck pocket before you assembled it.

You really should not have to be using lots of shims (or any). Paint can build up quite thick - also are your pickups simply too deep dimensionally for standard routs?

 

[DieterDeux]

I've been reading a lot of articles and watching videos by Mike Adams aka Puisheen on youtube/instagram. He's recognized as one of the leading experts in offset guitars, gets tons of features in guitar magazines and by Fender themselves. He's worked on thousands of JM/Jags. If he says I need a shim, I'm going to shim. And from this one isolated experience I have, I think he's totally right. Had all kinds of bridge buzz going on until I raised the bridge. It's great now, but the action at the end of the neck is too high.

Here's one of the many great articles out there, but he's also doing a few videos on his channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChJ0WLQ0wwkmj_6tUSJb1oA) right now that are really great (including one on building a partsmaster).
https://www.premierguitar.com/diy/guitar-bass-mods/jazzmaster-setup


[EDIT] Thanks for the video, Stratmania. That's how I was doing it, but good to have the confirmation. I did manage to get it to tweak a little more. Maybe not all the way there. Once I removed the neck to take a look, the pocket itself was pretty clean. There's no real dimension to the clear coat in there, though I scraped at it a touch just to be sure. There was a touch of overhang from the pickguard though, so I carefully trimmed that back before putting in my extra .25º shim. That gives me a total of 0.75º shim in there and that seems to be about perfect. The neck is still slightly off straight (towards the treble side), but it's definitely playable. Apparently the pickguard wasn't the issue. Will have a tech look at it at some point and let them do any shaving/reshaping.

Just have to do the string tree and intonation and I think this bad boy is ready to go.

 

[DieterDeux]

OK, she’s all ready to rock! Swapped out the original chrome knobs for the white and it’s feeling more balanced. Threw on a string tree and did a quick intonation (more precise one will have to wait for me to get the good tuner back from a friend). Really happy with how it plays. Action is great, zero fret buzz, and that Mastery trem is just awesome. Super expressive. Still very much in the learning phase with the baritone: most things sound fantastic, but some chordal stuff starts getting a little muddy on the very low end. There’s lots of tone variations on tap with the Jazzmaster wiring so it’s just learning the instrument’s strengths and quirks. Having lots of fun with it!