Copperhead soloist build

[Fat Pete]

Nice job! I'm a bit surprised that even done like that, you can fit 23 frets in, but it's a very cool look.

 

[BigSteve22]

Did you have a Luthier do that or a Mohel?

A fretboard Bris, who'd of thought. Guess it won't be long now......  :icon_jokercolor:

 

[macegtr]

Then some bodywork Originally I was planning to use the traditional neck plate for neck joint but then I started to investigate ferrules for this purpose. To me those look neater and also with contoured neck, screw heads will sit nicer in ferrule holes than with neck plate, where screw heads will not be perfectly in flush with angled plate.

As this body has screw holes already and located in those "standard" locations, there is not much room for ferrules. After some measurements I decided to order 12mm diameter black ferrules for this purpose. Enough wood will be still left around the holes with these.

Although alder is not a so called hard wood, it is still dense enough for this application. Masking tape will be preventing possible cracks on finish.

12 mm Forstner drill bit is used for recessing those ferrules into the body.

Ferrules in place and screws dropped in  :icon_thumright:

 

[macegtr]

Looking good. I just put steel inserts in a neck and like them a lot. I doubt I'll ever install a neck with wood screws again. Nice job on those.

Thanks Rgand, I would recommend these also for any bolt on necks. Sound wise I have noticed that the bottom end especially sounds more defined, probably related to the fact, that the neck can be squeezed more tightly into the body.

 

[macegtr]

Some additional wood insert work. M3 inserts and bolts are used for attaching neck and middle pickups into the body, this approach works great for this kind of purpose. Height of these brass inserts are 8mm and 4mm pilot hole will be enough to get them screwed in.

Pickup positions tested also, 23-fret fretboard and neck pickup are actually touching  ccasion14:

Neck is now attached first time into the body:

720-mod lowers the neck, fretboard is almost touching the body:

 

[macegtr]

Nice job! I'm a bit surprised that even done like that, you can fit 23 frets in, but it's a very cool look.

Thanks Fat Pete. As we already touched this topic with stratamania, I have found the traditional neck pickup position for single coils important for my needs. Not going into theoretical details, just based on my personal experiences with 24-fret guitar, where the neck pickup is pushed towards the bridge about couple of centimeters, there is a definitely a sound difference. To me 24-fret guitar has a snappier, little bit thinner neck pickup sound and this traditional position provides little bit fuller and almost hollow sound, which I prefer. Both are useful sounds. But yes, the debate on this topic will continue

 

[stratamania]

Sure a pickup a little further from the bridge will sound a little warmer/different.

It is just the idea of it being on a harmonic node at the 24th fret position that is responsible for the change of sound that is held up by some that is contentious. That holds true for an open string but fret it somewhere and then it is as likely as not on any harmonic node. But because a pickup positioned at where the 24th fret would be is further from the bridge than say where the 25th or 26th would be it will sound different. I suppose the other alternative is exploring pickups that work well with a 24 fret guitar that still gives a desired tone in the neck position.

I do have a couple of other questions.

Do you plan to scallop the 23rd fret?
Any reason you went for Stratocaster pickup routs versus EMG routs?
Do you plan to darken the 24th fret markers or leave them as a talking point?

It certainly is interesting to see how deep the dot markers go when you sawed the board. I wonder if Warmoth has them that deep on all necks or just the ones that will be scalloped.

I am still curious of course on the bridge positioning but I am sure that will be coming up. Well documented so far  :icon_thumright:

 

[macegtr]

Did you have a Luthier do that or a Mohel?

A fretboard Bris, who'd of thought. Guess it won't be long now......  :icon_jokercolor:

Yeah, maybe I could make a career in the circumcision business also  :sad1:

 

[macegtr]

Sure a pickup a little further from the bridge will sound a little warmer/different.

It is just the idea of it being on a harmonic node at the 24th fret position that is responsible for the change of sound that is held up by some that is contentious. That holds true for an open string but fret it somewhere and then it is as likely as not on any harmonic node. But because a pickup positioned at where the 24th fret would be is further from the bridge than say where the 25th or 26th would be it will sound different. I suppose the other alternative is exploring pickups that work well with a 24 fret guitar that still gives a desired tone in the neck position.

I do have a couple of other questions.

Do you plan to scallop the 23rd fret?
Any reason you went for Stratocaster pickup routs versus EMG routs?
Do you plan to darken the 24th fret markers or leave them as a talking point?

It certainly is interesting to see how deep the dot markers go when you sawed the board. I wonder if Warmoth has them that deep on all necks or just the ones that will be scalloped.

I am still curious of course on the bridge positioning but I am sure that will be coming up. Well documented so far  :icon_thumright:

Thanks stratamania and totally agree with your comments on neck pickup position. Quite probably I will scallop the last 23 fret also, one of the latest actions if/when it happens. About the strat routings, just wanted to preserve an option for that also, you never know...

I have started to like those half dots, probably they will stay

I was also surprised, how deep those fret markings go. Clearly related to the fact, that Warmoth offers scalloping only for cream or black phenolic dotted fretboards. Personally I would have liked the mother of pearl for these, but I assume Warmoth cannot guarantee the adherence of those.

Yep, that critical LB63-installation will be the next one  :icon_scratch:

 

[stratamania]

That makes sense on the pickup routs for future options.

Another option for fretboards would be no inlays I suppose.

Looking forward to that LB63  :icon_thumright:

 

[Cagey]

I know the inlays I've been dealing with are only 1.75mm thick. Those look like they're 3 or 4 times that. I buy them as dots but I imagine the material is manufactured in dowel/rod form, so you could cut any thickness slice off you wanted. If you knew you were going to scallop, you'd adjust.

 

[stratamania]

That's what I was thinking as if you scallop a neck it's easy to go through the dots. So if they are deeper to start with its a lot easier.

 

[macegtr]

Next step, LB63-bridge install but some background info first. Have been using these bridges already before and I like them a lot. The bridge itself shares lot of similarities with the Gotoh Floyd Rose -version, which generally is considered as one of the best licensed Floyd Rose-bridge. LB63 has those piezo saddles, which can be utilized for acoustic sounds or MIDI, I use those just for acoustic stuff. That was the reasoning, why I originally started to use these. Stays great in tune but quite expensive because of those piezo saddles, additionally those saddles are teflon plated. It is in theory a drop-in-replacement for original Floyd Rose, actual reality can be little bit different. Personally I don't like the fact, how the original Floyd Rose and most of the licensed ones need a quite big routing area, when they are recessed into the body. Main contributor for this are the long string saddle locking screws, which to my opinion are unnecessary long. Schaller tackled this issue already long time ago with their great Floyd Rose-version, which is much more compact especially because of the different string saddle locking design.

So my approach to this project was to utilize the Schaller recess design, which Warmoth prepared for me but without the stud holes and change the original locking screws in LB63 to shorter ones. Leaving those holes out from the body had some extra cost but was necessary as with the default hole locations, this bridge would have had big challenges to intonate properly. Problem here are the piezo saddles, which are longer than the original ones, apparently GraphTech needed some extra space to fit piezos in. So in practice this longer design pushes the actual string crossing area of saddle forward, actually this difference is 3mm. To compensate this, you can try to move the saddles back or move the whole bridge. It is totally up the original bridge position, will there be enough intonation range. There seem to be at least two different measurements used for the anchor locations for original Floyd Rose and the licensed ones. 25 inch (635mm) and 25 1/8 (638mm), 635mm is not enough for LB63 but this 638 would work. Clearly for example Warmoth bodies are drilled for this 25 inch location.

Here are the first alignment studys with LB63-bridge using 34mm long locking screws and the Schaller routed body. Only the outer strings are used:

So it seems to fit nicely, although not pictured here also the sustain block has space inside the body and the piezo-wires are not blocked.

Here is a measurement from the nut, there seem to be enough room for correct bridge location, 648mm is the center intonation location.

So placing the anchor points exactly to the center of the shelf, we could gain this extra 3mm and the location would be about this 638mm from the nut. Here are some strange hieroglyps

What is nice with this LB63-design, the upper pivoting area is straight. So although the default distance between studs should be 74mm, this design allows also some tolerances in this area.

For drilling 10mm bradpoint bit is used, depth 20mm. Drill press definitely needed, as we are moving closer to the edge.

Studs and inserts are not actually from LB63, these are Schaller ones, which are to my opinion more robust and because of the finer threads, more precise to adjust. Also the pivot area is little bit thicker=bigger diameter, although the difference is small. Still allowing an additional adjustment possibility.

Those recommended 10mm holes with the maple top are actually too tight, I needed to enlarge those very carefully using 10mm Forstner-bit and push those studs in with drill press and candle wax.

Some pictures with the actual bridge:

This works

 

[macegtr]

I know the inlays I've been dealing with are only 1.75mm thick. Those look like they're 3 or 4 times that. I buy them as dots but I imagine the material is manufactured in dowel/rod form, so you could cut any thickness slice off you wanted. If you knew you were going to scallop, you'd adjust.

Thanks for the additional info, makes perfect sense.

 

[stratamania]

Looks like a plan came together...  very well done for posting all the photos and info  ccasion14:

 

[macegtr]

Looks like a plan came together...  very well done for posting all the photos and info  ccasion14:

Thanks stratamania Some heart-pumping moments involved but yes, clearly this plan worked. Regarding those shorter string locking screws, they are very hard to find, couple of years back I ordered those from Ebay, now they seem to be nonexistent. Those Schaller-specific locking screws cannot be used, as they are thicker and need also the Schaller base plate. Of course those can be made from longer ones by cutting and filing the bolt ends.

Nevertheless, hopefully this information will serve other builders also  ccasion14:

 

[macegtr]

Preparations for electronics. Pilot holes drilled for humbucker frame, also the tremolo spring plate installed and conductive paint applied for control cavity. When dried, need to check the conductivity and maybe apply another layer.

Also drilled additional hole to body from bridge rout to control cavity for piezo-wires.

 

[Logrinn]

I'm loving this thread!

(I like pictures ...) :icon_jokercolor:

 

[rgand]

Boy, some fine work going on here.  :icon_thumright:

 

[macegtr]

Thanks guys  :toothy10: