New member, low skills, need advice.

[Gravity Jim]

Hello, all.  My name is Jim Bordner, and I am a commercial music producer.  I do not have the level of expertise in guitar building that I see demonstrated on this board, but I am capable of doing my own set up, pickup swap and nut installation work.  For over 12 years my primary guitar has been a Warmoth Strat-style guitar that I truly love.  This weekend, I experienced what may or may not be a major problem while working on the guitar.

When it was first assembled, I didn't have even basic maintenance skills and had the guitar out together by a professional luthier (a highly respected guy who builds from scratch).  He improved the guitar's set-up by slightly deepening the neck pocket and placing a mahogany shim in the deep end in the pocket.  As a result, there is not enough room between the body and the fingerboard overhang (22 fret neck) for a standard pickguard, so he also trimmed the pickguard.  But the guitar plays perfectly, just exactly the way I want it, and over the years I have dialed the setup in to a razor's edge.

This weekend, as part of a pickup upgrade, I decided to replace the pickguard.  It looked to me that the new pickguard would fit under the overhang, so I measured, and slipped a corner of the guard under the overhang, and finally decided I didn't need to trim the new pickguard.  But when I assembled the guitar, it fretted out against the 22nd fret, and I figured the pickguard was making the neck tilt back just enough to screw things up.

So I removed the guard and trimmed it down to match the e profile of the old guard with a Dremel grinder (and did a smoking job of it, too... It's even better than the old one).  BT when I resembled the guitar, it STILL fretted out.  It wasn't as bad as before, but still unplayable.

I know this might be an optical illusion, but it appears to me that I somehow bent the overhang upward by screwing it down against a too-thick pickguard.  Frankly, I don't see how this would even be possible, as I don't think I could generate that much force screwing the neck on.

So, you guys are experts, so tell me please.... Is it possible I've damaged this neck (in which case, I will hang myself), or can removing the neck a couple of times screw up the set-up enough that I just need to go through the process again?  And how can I check to see if the overhang is curved upward?

Yes, I know this is a totally newbie question.  Your expertise is greatly appreciated.  I have a huge emotional attachment to this guitar - it has my name on the headstock - and if I harmed it I'm gonna throw up.  Thanks in advance.

 

[Cagey]

You can check for fretboard geometry with a good straightedge. If you lay the edge along the frets, you'll be able to see if there are any slopes that shouldn't be there. Sometimes, a set of automotive-style feeler gauges can be helpful...

They usually range from .001" to .025" thick, and you can stack thicknesses to get even larger values. If you don't see a slope under the straightedge but suspect one is there, you can try sliding a feeler under the straightedge to expose it.

If you don't have a set, you can get them just about anywhere for between $6-$12.

 

[Gravity Jim]

Thanks, Cagey, I have a set of those for setting relief.

So it IS possible I ruined the overhang?

 

[AutoBat]

It is possible, but to a qualified luthier even that is salvagable.  The worst case scenario I can think of will result in you losing the 22nd fret overhang. I doubt it's that bad, but the possibility is there.

 

[Cagey]

What he said ^^

 

[greywolf]

You probably need to adjust the shim , no worries it is fixable

 

[Gravity Jim]

I took out the shim.  No dice.

I found my six inch rule.  If I lay it across the last three frets, no gap.  But if I lay it across the frets from the 17th up the 22nd, I can slide a .004 feeler gauge under almost all of them.  Incredibly, that was enough force to bend the overhang.  I've ruined the neck.

I'm sick to my stomach over this.  I told my kids to remove the metal parts and burn this guitar with my body when I die, and scatter both our ashes over the Marin hills.  I can't believe I did something this stupid.  I know it can be fixed, but right now I could just about cry.

Thanks for your help.  We now return to your regularly scheduled posting.

 

[Cagey]

It's not ruined. .004" isn't that much. You can fix that by grinding the frets down a bit and re-crowning them, and you probably won't even notice it's been done. If you want to send it to me, I do that sort of work all the time.

 

[AutoBat]

The overhang on my Warmoth Pro neck sits pretty much flush with my 3 ply pickguard (with minor warp that's always been there)

I'm probably not as picky about my action, but I play .009 - .042s, so they bend quite easily.

 

[Gravity Jim]

Cagey, that's really nice of you.  I know a guy here who is really good (builds great acoustic guitars from scratch) who has offered to fix it.  I can tell you I'll never point a tool at a guitar again!

 

[VinceClortho]

It does seem odd that you were able to put a permanent bend in that short an area of the fretboard.  Is there any chance you delaminated it slightly from the neck rather than bent it?

I agree that if it is just tweaked, a simple fret level and dress should fix it no problem. 

 

[Super Turbo Deluxe Custom]

Just file the 22nd fret a bit, or clap (without applying pressure to the frets) the heel portion of the neck to undo the damage.

 

[Gravity Jim]

Vince is correct... We found a crack in the fingerboard.  My extremely skilled luthier friend fixed the crack and filed down the 22nd fret... Nw I just need to do a complete set-up in the morning.  I think we're gonna be okay.

 

[AprioriMark]

I did this to a neck myself a few years ago in similar fashion.  My solution was... less elegant.  I pulled it up further, used a thin nozzle on a bottle of wood glue, and sat on it, pushing an extra bit on the overhang with my properly calibrated buttocks.

To be fair, I have since done a bit of fretwork to the neck, but my hind end seemed to return the overhang to a state within acceptable tolerance. 

-Mark

 

[TBurst Std]

Hello Gravity Jim, welcome and glad it got worked out.
Know you from TFF where my nick is blackonblack

 

[line6man]

When it was first assembled, I didn't have even basic maintenance skills and had the guitar out together by a professional luthier (a highly respected guy who builds from scratch).  He improved the guitar's set-up by slightly deepening the neck pocket and placing a mahogany shim in the deep end in the pocket.

Not to be negative, but what luthier in his right mind would deepen your neck pocket and then shim it? The proper procedure for what you're describing would be to route for an angled pocket. This is no more or less difficult than having deepened it to begin with.

 

[Gravity Jim]

The guy who did the original assembly is an electric guitar tech who started a shred-guitar company and now works for an internationally-know retailer as their head guitar tech.

The guy who fixed it yesterday is, on the other hand, a builder of acoustic guitars and mandolins.  I realized that my storytelling could make it seem as if both luthiers were the same guy.

TBurst, howdy!  I only have one this one Warmoth guitar and don't have the skills to make assembling them a hobby, so you won't likely see me around here, but nice to bump into you!  TFF is pretty well dead, I think... Even Kap'n doesn't seem to post much anymore, and most the interesting people seem to have moved on.

 

[Gravity Jim]

Well, it's still screwed.

Options:

Remove the overhang and convert it to a 21 fret neck. (Yes, it would work, no, I never play that note, but it still would bug the crap out of me.)

Buy a new neck.  (I'd still be bolting it on to this possibly screwed up body with the too-deep pocket.)

Sell off what's still of value and start over with similar Warmoth parts, resigned to the fact that the best guitar I ever owned will never exist again.

Sell, etc., and buy something really nice like a Gibson 336.

What would you do, if you were me (that is, somebody who does not have enough guitar building skills to fix this problem)?

 

[Jumble Jumble]

I'm not sure what's happened here. If tightening screws force it up, couldn't you get a little glue in there and then clamp it hard and tight to get it back to where it was?

If those really are all the options then the first one sounds like a no-brainer - except, before you do that, I'd post the neck to Cagey if it were mine.

 

[mayfly]

Hmmm.  If I were confronted with this (assuming the fingerboard was already glued up), I'd do a fret leveling on that fret, dress the rest of them, then call it a day.  Should not be that hard.

If I were you, I'd take it back to my acoustic guitar guy and let him have another go at it.  I would not introduce another person at this time.  He's presumably familiar with the problem and is motivated to help.  I'd let him have another shot.