Thread: Les pauls, Help?

Im an acoustic builder but the way I check for correct neck rake is to lay a straight edge up the fretboard and see how high it lies at bridge position. I woulodnt think thered be a huge amount of neck rake on an electric but Im sure someone more experienced with same will provide some input.

Okay Im wrong...Les Pauls have up to 4 to 5 degrees of rake on the necks. Quite a bit but when you take into consideration curve of top and how high the fretboard appears to sit above the guitar body its probably about right. On my acoustic steel strings theres rarely more than 1.5 degrees of rake on my necks...the exact figure dpends on how square the front of the body is and how much arch I have in the top (typically 25' radius). The Les Paul obviously has a tighter arch in its top.


See this link for discussion on neck rake.

http://www.gibsoncustom.com/cgi-bin/...id=7&tid=34619

Les paul top can be carved with a router.
You will need the full size profiles and a jig that will allow you to route the top in sections going towards the outside.

You finish up by using gouges, curved chisels, tiny planes and scrapers. Work till you get the top to fit the profiles.

You will need a detailed set of plans which you can buy from MIMF in the US. The neck angle, profiles etc will all be explained in the plan.

By the way a les paul is a pretty demanding piece.
Have you completed any other projects? If not I would suggest a Tele is an excellent 1st project. The body to neck join is way simple compared to the necke rake angle and tenon set neck style of the LP. If you want a paulish kind of sound use, mahogany/maple slabs for the body and a mahogany tele neck. Use a couple of duncan vintage buckers and and a strat hardtail bridge or maybe a schaller roller bridge [no stringthrough holes required]. You will have an awesome guitar,

Hey jimi_lp
Welcome to the forum
What sort of tools (power and hand) do you have access to?
Going back a few months I had the same dilemma but I found a tutorial on Project Guitar that helped
http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/in...howtopic=16098
I used a router and did mine in a similar fashion to the authors May 24 post
I didnt make the jig (I will though for any future builds) but did it freehand with the router, then sanded out the terraces with 80grit paper
Patience is the key
Check out the .pdf. It is a guideline on how the top is carved
I carved the top and then sorted out my neck angle
I hope this is of some help to you
dayvo

I don't know if this is possible, but I noticed that gibsons carve the tops with blades that follow a wheel, does anyone know if there is something similar to this that you can buy? or does anyone know if this would be easy to make, obviously a trimmed down version, like...manually roll the wheel
thanks

I doubt very much that making yourself a piece of machinery would be very usefull, feasable and/or cheap just for one guitar. Make the top like everyone else out there with a router and you'll be set.

Use finger planes. When you finish the Les Paul well get you onto making an archtop. Theres an acoustic builder inside every electric guitar builder!!

Originally Posted by Phil Mailloux

I doubt very much that making yourself a piece of machinery would be very usefull, feasable and/or cheap just for one guitar. Make the top like everyone else out there with a router and you'll be set.

It wouldnt be for just one guitar, I'm hoping to make these and sell guitars, no electric guitar luthiers in scotland so I'm getting in there first lol
I wasnt thinking a piece of machinery, I was thinking a sort of cut down version of it, I have a general idea but knowing if it will work aint easy

How would I do this with a router anyway?, The bit im worried about is where the neck is, cause the shape of the curve changes around there and its hard to see exactly how it goes on my epiphone LP

Hi Jimi,

By looking at the questions you ask I would say you're probably just starting up building instruments and this would be the first. If that's not the case, don't get insulted.

If I were you I'd go and buy Melvyn Hiscock's "make your own electric guitar" This is the electric guitar builder's bible. He teaches you how to build instruments in all different types (bolt-on, glued-in and neck-through) all the answers you're looking for are in this book. I would also spend A LOT of time on www.projectguitar.com reading up on all the tutorial on the main site and then read up some more on the online forum.

To give you an answer to your questions:
Neck angles - http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/in...&hl=neck+angle

For the top rout read Dayvo's link, that's already a pretty good start. In fact all your answers are there.

Ok I'm going to ask yet another question lol
Does anyone know if Primavera is a good alternative to mahogany and whether it would give a good LP tone?
I've found a place to get mahogany but the price is high and the place is running out, so I'm worried by the time I go to buy it they won't have it, or it'll be really expensive, but Stew Mac are doing primavera for a great price

I saw a post re primavera on alt.music.makers.builders re primavera.
The conclusion was that it was cheap because it was readily available but no substitute for honduran mahogany.

There are many mahoganies. I use "fijian" which is nothing like honduran but a nice timber to work with. Not appropriate for a neck but real nice for bodies. It has a similar density and hardness to the real thing. I personally feel it is much prettier than honduran and a lot easier to finnsh.

f you are looking to buy honduran mahogany read this LINK

I have posted the 'Setchell' Carve top jig in the Router, Jigs section. I have used it on my build off a 336 (unfinished) and it works OK. Given that I'm a stone motherless newbie I'd say it works very well.

For the neck angle some people use shims (bolt on) or carve an angle into the heel of the neck (set neck and bolt on) and some carve an angled plane onto the area above the neck pickup and then use a 'flat' template & router on the angled area giving an angled neck pocket. I did the last method.

To get the angled plane I went to a friend who has a planer, figured out the angle with blocks & pushed it through. Again it worked.

I lost your question halfway through. I hope this is useful.

Also see MIMF.com (register) & search the library for John Catto stuff and also Anthony Setchell stuff. They're both great builders & pass on their knowledge.

Jimi!

Ive come across a website that sells plans to make a carver. Its called a Copycarver. Here is the website

http://www.copycarver.com/

Here is a link to one of their Ebay auctions, shows a Strat's curves being cutout.

http://cgi.ebay.com/DIY-Wood-Carving...QQcmdZViewItem

Its pretty basic design, and if you can make one, all you need is access to a Les Paul Bod to copy from and carve out the top.

Wondering what everyone else thinks?? Im gonna use it to help build my strat, well Im building a frankenstrat.

Pappy