Warmoth Pro Adjustment

[SoundAsAnOldEngineer]

I hope someone can provide a bit of advice on the set up procedure for a Warmoth Pro neck. Advice from Warmoth is to remove the string tension, reset the side adjuster, and then set the heel adjustment so that the neck is flat.

Here's the first problem: my Telecaster neck is convex (in other words, it has a back bow) when the heel adjustment is slack. There's no point in tightening the heel adjustment at this point, because that simply makes the back bow more pronounced. Is this normal?

Fortunately, the string tension is enough to to take the neck concave (I have a set of 11's in normal tuning). I can then straighten the neck by winding in the side adjuster.

What about if I had a set of 8's? I don't think it would pull the neck back to straight.

Here's the second problem: this neck really isn't very stable. When I built the guitar I adjusted the neck and all was really good for a while, but after couple of months the neck was concave, and the action was way too high. I reset the heel tension, again it was okay for a while, then the neck went convex and strings were buzzing all over the place. It's a really nice neck, I love '59 profile and it feels, looks and sounds lovely. But, I really expected a bit more stability.

Any ideas?

 

[mayfly]

Hmmm.  What is the wood? Finish?

 

[Updown]

:dontknow:  This help.

Shows the reset procedure 

 

[SoundAsAnOldEngineer]

The neck wood is Flame Maple, with a Rosewood fingerboard. It's finished by Warmoth in vintage tint gloss. All fairly standard stuff.

The instructions referenced by Updown say "Tighten the slotted heel adjust nut (A) until the fingerboard is perfectly flat (no forward curve)". In my case, the fingerboard has a backwards (convex) curve when the heel adjustment is slack, and tightening the heel nut can only accentuate this. If I was foolish enough to follow the instructions, it would end with the truss rod broken, or the adjusters stripped.

The instructions lead me to believe that the neck should somehow have a forward curve built in to it. Mine hasn't.

 

[stratamania]

It's a dual action truss rod, loosening it should take it away from convex and toward flat towards concave.

http://www.warmoth.com/guitar/necks/WarmothPro_Strat_infoPop.aspx


You might also want to reset the side adjuster as described in the doc Updown linked.

 

[mayfly]

Well, if it's a warmoth Pro, it should have a dual action rod.  Which means you should be able to turn that convex into a concave with no strings on there.

The other thing to try is to get in touch with the tech support at warmoth.  Sounds like a stable wood with a good finish, so they should be able to help.

 

[Cagey]

I hope someone can provide a bit of advice on the set up procedure for a Warmoth Pro neck. Advice from Warmoth is to remove the string tension, reset the side adjuster, and then set the heel adjustment so that the neck is flat.

Here's the first problem: my Telecaster neck is convex (in other words, it has a back bow) when the heel adjustment is slack. There's no point in tightening the heel adjustment at this point, because that simply makes the back bow more pronounced. Is this normal?

Fortunately, the string tension is enough to to take the neck concave (I have a set of 11's in normal tuning). I can then straighten the neck by winding in the side adjuster.

What about if I had a set of 8's? I don't think it would pull the neck back to straight.

Here's the second problem: this neck really isn't very stable. When I built the guitar I adjusted the neck and all was really good for a while, but after couple of months the neck was concave, and the action was way too high. I reset the heel tension, again it was okay for a while, then the neck went convex and strings were buzzing all over the place. It's a really nice neck, I love '59 profile and it feels, looks and sounds lovely. But, I really expected a bit more stability.

Any ideas?

I don't know about "ideas", but I'm a little concerned to hear you're having this problem. I'm currently working on the third Warmoth neck in the last 6 months or so that doesn't want to relieve. You sorta expect some variation, wood being what it is, but I'm beginning to think Warmoth is machining the things a little too close to perfect so there's little adjustment needed. Problem is, that doesn't leave much room for adjustment to taste. Normally, you build some relief into the neck then pull it out as needed with the truss rod. If there's no relief to begin with, unwinding the truss rod will only take the thing back to flat at best, and relies on the string tension to pull it back. That's NFG,

What I've been doing is putting the necks on a jig that lets me bend the hell out of them and letting them set for a few weeks under that tension. It works, but I'm concerned about the long-term. As long as there's string tension on them once installed, they'll probably be fine. Still, seems wrong.

As far as your stability issues, I don't know what to say. In my experience, the "Pro" series necks are freaky stable. Hot, cold, dry, humid - they're just as stoic as the palace guards. Pretty much a "set it and forget it" design.

 

[SoundAsAnOldEngineer]

Thanks very much. I hadn’t previously appreciated exactly how the dual-action truss rod is supposed to work. Now I’ve seen a picture of the mechanism inside the neck I can see how the rods can provide either a convex or a concave shape. I suppose I should have taken more notice of the “dual action” part. I’ll start again.

 

[fdesalvo]

Had the same problem with my pro neck.  Couldn't adjust its way out of this. 

 

[BigSteve22]

Has anyone gotten a response from Warmoth about these samples that won't adjust properly? Sounds like a QC problem.