Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi everyone …I just received my dinky template to hopefully make some 24 fret guitars…….only thing is I’m not a fan of a pointy headstock, Keep in mind I do not own any Jackson guitars to get any specs off of… I took the template & duplicated it & cut a strat heel in the neck pocket lining up with the exiting heel since I see pointy necks have more of a square heel…now I measured from my strat neck template were the nut would be to the dinky template Floyd posts holes (should be around 25 1/8 )& I see the neck difference is about 1 ¼ longer give or take…so I made a longer strat neck template for this …the problem I’m having is when I lay a 24 fret fretboard on top of the neck template that has the nut area marked on top of the dinky body template; & I measure form the nut to Floyd posts again, I’m noticing my 24th fret is higher on the neck& cuts short of the heel of my neck template…which would kind of be cool considering all 24 frets would be accessible more so then the standard dinky, I would just leave the blank wood at the edge of the fretboard or add another fret so it doesn’t look so odd…not sure where im went wrong on my measurements trying to make this happen… my questions are if anyone can help:
Are dinky bodies neck pockets still 3 inches long from top to bottom?
Dinky’s are all 25.5 scale yes?
Does anyone know the measurement from the nut to the middle of the neck heel on a 24 fret dinky neck?

Thanks in advance…
-Mark

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I have made jackson/Charvell necks, I used a Jackson neck as a pattern for my templates . My fret template is 25.5 scale. It should also be noted that the neck pocket (and neck) are wider than a typical fender strat pocket. The fret board should be about 5/16 longer than the 24th slot. Typically the last fret slot is the end if the actual neck heel. Also remember that the landing for the nut is much larger for the locking nut. Hope these pics help.

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Brian

You never know what you are capable of until you actually try.

https://www.howardguitarsdelaware.com/

Thanks Brian, the issue im having is when I lay the new strathead neck template i made onto the top dinky body template, then i lay a slotted stew mac fretboard were the nut should be on the nck template, i measure from the nut to the floyd posts & im at 2 1/8 which is correct....problem is the last fret is just shy of the end of the heel...ifigured the last fret should be were the heel is like you said......im like a fret off somewhere...if i move the fretboard down a notch my floyd posts will be to close to the cavity...not sure what to do to make this project work...

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OK, let's see if I got this. Your measurments from face of nut to center of pivot post should be as follows;
Floyd Rose
Floyd Rose II & Schaller Floyd Rose
Schaller Floyd Rose Locking Tremolo Complete Set 24.937" (±0.030")

Floyd Rose Original
Double-Locking Tremolo
25" (±0.030")

Is that correct? Your entire fretboard looks a little far north to me in the pic, the center of the 24th slot should be no more than 1/2" away from the top pickup cavity. Position the fretboard to the dimensions needed as related to bridge mounting position and adjust the neck template you made accordingly would be my suggestion..

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Brian

You never know what you are capable of until you actually try.

https://www.howardguitarsdelaware.com/

Hey Brian, before I say anything THANKS SO MUCH FOR HELPING!!!
OK,
The correct measurements from nut to ctr pivot posts on floyds is 25 1/8, stew mac says 25 1/16 & floyd rose says 25 1/4...every cnc guitar i have bought & taken measurements off of is 25 1/8 & Ive always got it to intonate with no issues on the few builds ive done to those specs....i had one i tryed 25 1/16 when i first started & i had to slightly pull the neck out of the pocket & redrill the holes to get it to intonate......Now, like you said it would be obvious to just move the fretboard down which in the pick is 25 1/8 away from were the posts would be....but if i move it the fretboard down anymore the posts would would have to go down as well & they will start going into the block cavity...
I bought these templates from guitarbuilding templates.com so im sure they are on...only thing is it came with a pointy neck template which im trying to replace with a strathead...
SO...LOL
in conclusion im guessing that a strathead would maybe make me have to reconfigure the body to move the spring cavity south a notch to compansate so i can move the fretboard down along with the posts...
OR
maybe it will just have to have a small blank area after the last fret at the heel area
OR
maybe i can do what i had to do above on one of my earlier builds & pull the neck out a notch away from the end of the neck cavity...but i dont think i wanna do that...
i dont know of any other choices to get this done....

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Mark,

I think your template might be off. I have used the same supplier of templates and not had a problem, but they could have missed on this one. The neck pocket to the neck pick up distance looks a bit short. You know the distance from the nut to the center of the bridge posts is 25.125", the nut to the 24th fret (the end of the neck) is 19.13". Subtracting the distance from the nut to the 24th from the nut to the bridge posts gives you a value of 5.995" which is the distance from the bridge posts to the end of the neck pocket. Check that and get back to us.

Steve

The numbers I posted for post positions were pasted straight from the stew mac fret calculator by entering 24 frets, 25.5 inch scale on an electric guitar. I use their calculator quite often and have not had any issues with intonation either. Changing the shape of the head should have nothing to do with it. So if you use the template you have for a jackson neck, how does everything line up? I also agree with Steve, now that I look closely the neck pocket does look too close to the pick up cavity. I have not made any of these bodies but based on what I can see in this pic there should be about 1/2"- 9/16" between the neck pocket and the pickup cavity. But that still doesn't line up the FB. So, did you check the slots on the board? are they cut at the correct scale?

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Brian

You never know what you are capable of until you actually try.

https://www.howardguitarsdelaware.com/