Sand the Neck or the Pocket?

[EdSherry1]

Hi Everyone,

I just signed up and first time posting here. I'd bet this topic would be discussed quite a bit but couldn't find any posts easily discussing this question.

I just ordered a roasted maple baritone tele neck with no finish, (none needed with roasted maple) & stainless frets. The fretwork and quality are absolutely gorgeous.
I have a few tele bodies laying around. I was going to mount this neck onto a GFS Tele Body with dual humbucker routes I have ready to go. I tried fitting it and the neck is way too large for the pocket. I also tried the neck on a super high quality Musicraft Tele body I have and also too large for the body; this leads me to believe the constant is that the neck is a little wide for a standard Fender pocket.

I am wondering what the opinion is on sanding to get a neck to fit properly. Is it customary to sand just the neck, or the pocket, or both?

I've assembled roughly 15 guitars in the past and if there were fit issues I was generally sanding the neck (trying to be even on both sides) and the pocket as well a bit. Also, 9 times out of 10 the necks just fit without any alteration needed. I have some experience but I do not consider myself an expert at all. I was wondering what the expert builders do in this case and if there is a preference of just sanding the neck or just the body to fit. This is one of the nicest necks I have ever laid my hands on and want to make sure I am doing this build the right way. The neck may not be married to the GFS body for ever either so I would like to be careful not to do anything regretful if I wish to mate this neck to another body in the future. In the past none of the necks or bodies I have used have been to this level of quality.

Also, I called Warmoth to ask and they didn't have a canned answer; they actually suggested I look at the forum. To be radically transparent I am not calling the baby ugly with Warmoth and saying the neck is the wrong size; I realize the nuances of working with wood and that wood is a unique building medium that does expand and contract. Just trying to do my due diligence on this subject and try to make sure this neck is preserved for years to come. Also, I have left the neck out of the packaging roughly 7 days to acclimate to my house's environment. I am in no rush to assemble this project, I'd rather take my time and do things the right way.

Also- one other side topic. For all those out there building Baritone guitars or using conversion necks. I am interested in hearing feedback on your tuner choices. I have a beautiful set of Sperzels laying around (used but nice) and wanted to use those but the 6th String tuner hole size will not fit the 72 gauge baritone strings. Has anyone ever drilled a Sperzel out for this? I'd bet that violates the warranty- i a plan to call Sperzel and ask if they have a Baritone sized tuner you can but for this purpose or if they endorse drilling knowing it will violate the warranty.

Any info is really appreciated. Thanks in advance. ~Ed

 

[mayfly]

Hi there,

All the warmoth necks that I've had (~20 or so) fit fender (and warmoth) bodies perfectly. I've found that some fender necks error on the side of slightly smaller than their published standard (although with Fender 'standard' is a loosely defined term ). I'm guessing that this is because they don't want any hassles in final assembly so they design in a little slop. But that's a guess.

Back to your question, definitely sand the neck pocket. I've had some GF bodies as well, and I've found that they need extensive work. Some I had to re-route the neck pocket to get it to intonate (!).

So, yea, sand the neck pocket.

 

[DuckBaloo]

If you have a set of calibers, you can figure out which is off, or if its just a matter of 0 tolerance. But I would go with the neck pocket of the affordable GFS body and not the neck heel of the expensive Warmoth neck.

 

[Rick]

Assuming it's the width of the neck, I'd go to home depot and get one of those super accurate calipars. Don't you want to know for sure? Yeah, what Duckbaloo and Mayfly said.

 

[EdSherry1]

Thank you all for responding. I do have a digital caliper and a few traditional vernier calipers (I used to work as an apprentice machinist many years back). At the end of the day the measurements were kind of irrelevant to me being that there wasn't a fit I knew I had to address either the neck pocket or the neck itself. Its disappointing to order a new custom neck and have it not fit any standard bodies. I think I am going to sand the GFS body to fit in this case. I have seen some QC issues with the GFS bodies but most of them have been the position of the string thru holes. Also important top note this is an XGP body which is GFS's flagship line and they are usually a better quality.

 

[EdSherry1]

 

[EdSherry1]

The baritone neck is a bit wide at the bottom and you can clearly see the machining where the fingerboard sits proud of where the neck pocket begins. My guess is that Warmoth probably should have taken a few more passes on the pocket width during this machining process. this may be a Baritone issue.. perhaps the DWG file used for CNC process or an oversight perhaps.

 

[Rick]

If you have the calibers, what's stopping you from measuring? You can't complain if you find out its 56mm. Get crackin' bro', measure it or hold your peace.

 

[bruzanhd]

Yeah 99% of the time warmoth neck widths are almost exactly perfect. Probably gotta sand the pocket. Check the width though on the neck heel. Literally no reason to wonder when you can check and be sure.

The baritone neck is a bit wide at the bottom and you can clearly see the machining where the fingerboard sits proud of where the neck pocket begins. My guess is that Warmoth probably should have taken a few more passes on the pocket width during this machining process. this may be a Baritone issue.. perhaps the DWG file used for CNC process or an oversight perhaps.

Also I’m sure you know that this is not how a CNC machine works, you don’t just “forget a couple passes”.

 

[stratamania]

The neck heel should be 2 3/16" wide at its widest point.

 

[EdSherry1]

Thanks again everyone for your replies. I had to handle some things for my day job earlier and was away from the forum. I went ahead and measured the neck and the pocket just now - results below (not the caliper is upside down on the body)

 

[EdSherry1]

The Neck:

 

[Jebberz]

Seems to me thant neck is to specs, as 2 3/16" = 55,5625 mm

 

[EdSherry1]

I'll be sanding that XGP body to fit this beauty of a neck.. Thanks again to everyone who helped me with this.
Happy woodworking...