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Are there any rules for laminated necks? That is, how wide the laminations should be.

I have an approx. 7/8" wide board of nicely figured maple. I cut out 3 pieces and placed two 1/4" wide pieces of Peruvian walnut between the three maple pieces. That gives me enough to cut out a headstock that doesn't require wings. You see many folks using a 1/4" center piece flanked by two thin pieces (maybe 0.080" - 0.100"), which gives a narrow lamination in the center. The arrangement I have here will reveal more of the walnut because of the curvature of the back of the neck. ...and depending on how I carve the heel, the walnut could have a (visual) curve in it, which might be appealing. I typically put on a backstrap so you wouldn't see the laminations on the back of the headstock.

I guess some of these decisions are up to the builder, but if it will look funny maybe I should reconfigure the laminations...

Any thoughts or comments would be welcome.

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

...oh yea, its not glued up yet...

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

It looks fine. My only concern is the tip of your heel/heel cap? The couple of Martin necks I have access too are right at 1 inch, so your center maple strip is 7/8" and peruvian walnut 1/4" x 2 = 1-3/8" just depends on your taper from the fingerboard to your heel and what look you want.

The only problem that I can see, assuming a 1.75" width at the nut, you'll only have 3/16" of maple showing on either side, and depending on your heel design, there might not be any maple left at the heel cap.

Alex

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"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

Just a quick question for you , Steve. What are you using for a break angle between your neck and headstock? I know you know what you are doing but it , by the pic, it seems that there is a very shallow break there.

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Blue Ring Acoustics
blueringacoustics.ca

Alan, I have used 14 degrees in the past and these pieces were cut out using a blank I have used before. The picture may be misleading...

Another approach I was thinking that may work using this same board... I could cut out another maple piece and use the 1/4" walnut in the center. Then I could place the other maple pieces together with no lamination in between? Do you think that would work okay?

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

I think it would look better (especially at the heel) with a narrower maple piece in the center. You would have to add wings on the headstock, but with a face veneer and a backstrap on the peghead, the wings would not be all that visible.

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John

+1

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

You could taper the center lamination so that everything is roughly parallel to the edge of the fretboard.

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A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

If you opt for a narrow center stripe, be careful not to have the width result in a glue line coinciding with the vertical walls of your truss rod cavity, at least if you are using epoxy or other glue with the possibility of cold creep.
This can result in the downward force of the truss rod bearing on what ends up being a very small area of glue and the shear force on the glue can cause it to gradually creep, resulting in a bump sticking out the back of the neck 22 months down the road. (damhikt <g>)

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Cheers,

Frank Ford

FRETS.COM
HomeShopTech
FRETS.NET

Wow Frank! That is amazing! So much for rules for laminating...

My intent was to try to use the highly figured maple board work for a neck. Looks like I'll try to reconfigure it. I'll probably just use it as the center of a mahogany neck. Although I was trying to show more maple figure... It occurred to me to just glue together 4 pieces of maple without laminations, but I'm not sure how that would look. Has anyone done that?

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

4 pieces glued up is a laminate.... but no right or wrong you just need to think about what your heel will look like when you have finished carving, I would prefer to have a walnut center strip 3/8" to 1/2" then you would have maple from your fingerboard to your heel, the heel on the martin is probably 3/4" wide.

Here are a couple of necks Kenneth Casper did. The design at the heel is done by spacing the laminations a little differently. Might not be to traditionalists tastes, but I kinda like it...

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

Nothing wrong with those two heels, Steve!

Alex

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"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

Wow Steve! I would have avoided having lams run out of the heel due to their width until just now. That looks really cool! and carefully selected wood combinations add another layer of decorative flair. I may have to steal this!

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.