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July 13...Today was a nerve-wracking day....the day I would cut the neck slot, fit the neck, and glue the neck into the body (so far, only a top and sides). Gulp! This was a step in which there would be no turning back.... I spent the morning checking and rechecking my measurements, the instructions, and then transferred my measurements to the neck block. To cut the slot, I didn't trust myself to do it with the bandsaw, as Siminoff suggests, so I used my dozuki pullsaw to cut the two sides of the slot. Then I used my Dremel with the router base to rout out as much of the slot as I could. I cleaned up the rest with a small woodcarving chisel. That done, I checked to see if the bridge I had was the same height as the one in the Siminoff book. It was, so I followed his instructions and made a cradle that would hold the bridge location of the top 1/2" higher than the board. I placed the neck surface flat on the board. I set about checking my neck fit. For some reason, the bottom of my neck slot wasn't quite right, so I had to fit a couple of shims in there (hopefully, they won't be too noticeable). That all figured out, I then glued the back kerfing onto the sides and went to a movie. (I couldn't take the tension anymore!) |
When I returned from the movie, even though it was late, I couldn't wait. I double-checked everything again, committed myself (gulp!), took a deep breath, and glued that neck in. There it is, above, all clamped up. I won't be able to breathe easily until I unclamp it tomorrow and see what I have done..... |
