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Alright, so within the coming weeks, I'm going to start ordering the supplies for my new guitar. I was going to use a template for the '57 Strat, (link below), and with a solid black walnut body w/ carved top (explanation for this odd approach for building a strat also below), black walnut neck and macassar ebony fingerboard. I was planning on using the strat template to get the rough shape of the body, but I recently came across a luthier company known as Ran Guitars, and I've fallen in love with the Crusher model (link below), so I've decided that I'd sharpen the horns on the guitar (I'd probably make my own template for that) and do that beautiful route inside the horns, and make it a string-thru body (not a huge fan of tremolos). But my biggest concern is the headstock: I don't think a stratocaster shaped headstock would look very good on the guitar, so I've decided to take a leaf from Schecter's book and use the headstock design you can see on their Hellraiser model. However, this headstock goes back at a tilt (I'm not sure of the exact angle), but I'm not even sure it'd work? Would it even be possible to get a strat neck and and custom build a new headstock with a tilt, would another template set be better for this overall build, or are there certain considerations I'm overlooking.

Many thanks to all those who reply and help me out, and I hope you enjoy the upcoming build.

'57 Strat Template: http://www.guitarbuildingtemplates.com/Shop-now.html

Ran Guitars Crusher: http://ranguitars.com/ran_models/crusher

Sounds like an interesting project - please post pictures as you go on. I like to think of electric guitars built in two completely different fashions (Fender and Gibson, but of course there are many examples). Leo Fender designed his guitars for ease of construction and assembly - flat bodies with bolt on neck that stand slightly proud of the body to establish the string line. The neck and headstock were designed to be cut out of a piece of standard hardwood - in order to get the strings to break over the nut they use the little "tees" (on two or four of the strings). Gibson, on the other hand, carves the tops into beautiful and elegant arch, sets the neck into the body at a slight angle (which again, sets the string plane), and angles the headstock. I've built both - my preference is the Gibson style.

A variation on the set neck (Gibson) style is a through neck - according to the specs on your Crusher that is what they use (however they also refer to bolts and most of the pictures seem to show a bolt on neck). Note that the Crusher also seems to use control cavities routed into the back (like a Les Paul)

You can incorporate any or all of these into your design, but the important thing is to think about how the neck angle, strings, pickups and bridge all lie in relationship to each other. It will help you a lot to lay that out carefully (or to find an established design and stick with it). Get your pups, bridge, etc or get accurate dimensional information and lay it out carefully - you have a little bit of adjustment when its complete but not much.

Fender headstocks have pretty low break angle on the strings but one nice thing is the six on a side tuners mean its pretty easy to get the strings to line up well. With other headstocks you might need to do some layout to make sure they don't hit tuner posts or run at funky angles. Fender style necks are pretty simple to build - for a Gibson style I prefer scarfed joints for their strength. Most Gibson headstocks are angled at 16 or 17 degrees. Also, of course, think about your truss rod design, where it will adjust and how you will route that channel.

As far as the body shape - obviously you can do any shape you want. Balance, access to frets, stuff like that is important. My only caution here is that sticking to a more or less established shape means you can find off the shelf cases to fit - I have built some odd ball guitars and had to pay over $300 for custom cases.

If you don't already have it, I highly recommend Melvyn Hiscock's book "Make Your Own Electric Guitar". He discusses the three main neck designs (bolt on, set and thru), has a good section on laying out the string line, and covers most of the other parts of design.

Good luck, keep us posted

Alright thanks, I'll have to take some measurements from other guitars and find a scale length that can fit 24 frets. I have one question about the carve top, on the Crusher models, from what I can determine at least, it slopes up and the carve blends into a flat top, but the overall guitar looks carved. I'd like to do that for my first build so I don't need to worry about routing the neck at 4.4 degrees or something. So in essence, I could have a 'carved' top, but not have to worry about a neck with a tilt on it.

Scale length is one of the very first design criteria. Scale length has a lot to do with playability and a certain amount on the tone of the instrument. Next is to decide which fret gets the body junction (often 16 but I'm building an ES335 right now that is 19). Do you really need 24 frets? Can your design access them, can your design support the neck? Once you have the neck to body joint, scale length then sets the location of bridge and pickups (I've heard arguments that the ideal location for the neck p/u pole pieces is at the 24th fret).

You will still need to lay out the profile relationship between the pickups, bridge and neck. Whether you make the neck stand proud of the body and the strings be parallel to it (ala Fender) or angled (Gibsons), that needs to be one of your early design criteria. You can futz around with the neck later (look at all the Fenders with some sort of shim in the pocket, usually a pick) and you can certain change neck angles on a set neck, but you are best to be close when you start. Fwiw, most Gibson necks are set at somewhere between 2-1/2 degrees and 4.

Some other things to think of if you are deviating from a standard design - most Fenders have the pups and electronics hung from the pick guard (some Tele's don't), it looks like the Crusher is build like a LP with cavities routed in the front and back of the body. That is much easier with a cap on the body. Obviously a flat Fender pick guard won't work if you are going to carve the body.

Also, the templates will give you the general shape of the body and are critical for the pickups and neck pocket, but you will carve the actual curves of the body pretty much by hand. Ran does it with a cnc or at least a duplicarver - most of us will use planes and chisels. Hiscock covers all of this, he also has full size drawings of many pickups which can be used to make your own templates. At the expense of offending some people, I will say that building a Fender style guitar is pretty easy, carving a LP or PRS is a lot more work. Plan accordingly.

It might help to look at a few build threads - here is a fairly detailed one of my LP clone

http://www.harmonycentral.com/forum/for ... 1/1104633-

and here is a pretty brief one of a tele

http://www.harmonycentral.com/forum/for ... barncaster

Two completely different guitars, two completely different ways of building. Hope it helps.

You've been more helpful than I can properly elaborate, and I thank you for that. Perhaps I'll do my best to clarify a little, I would initially attach the template to my body blank and simply route out the standard shape for a Stratocaster. After that, I'd just quickly freehand a drawing onto the horns of the body, mainly to sharpen them, and do another drawing for the inside route on the horns (I'd most likely create my own templates for these out of MDF). After that, I'd use some acrylic pickup routing templates and attach them to the centerline of the body (only once having decided the appropriate pickup location of course), and then route out for dual humbuckers, not single coils. Furthermore, I'd forgo routing in the front, and use another purchased rear cavity routing template, similar to a Les Paul, but I wouldn't have to worry about the inside of the cavity being at an angle, because my volume and tone knobs will be (hopefully) on the flat top of the guitar.

I do have a question regarding both the scale length and the headstock design of the guitar: Firstly, the scale length of any guitar is the distance from the nut to the twelfth fret and doubled, correct? My question is, would I have to make any changes for that because there are 24 frets, or would it be okay as long as I only altered the pickup position, not the bridge position? And secondly, I mentioned using Schecter's Hellraiser headstock design in favor of the traditional Stratocaster. I'm still debating the whole scarf joint technique, I'm rather new to all of this, so I'm wondering if it would even be possible to use the Hellraiser shape, but on a flat Stratocaster-esque headstock design, rather than a tilted headstock.

Last question for now, there are bound to be more however, concerning the carved top, isn't it possible to route off 1/16" inch increments, sloping towards the center of the guitar, and then sand them smooth, giving the carve?

1 - If you go thru the LP build thread you will see how I first band sawed, then cleaned up the outside shape of the guitar. After that I did use my router table to take away little shelves of wood - kind of like a contour map - after which I finalized the arch with planes and chisels.

2 - You can buy very good router templates for things like pickups or you can make them. I do both.

3 - Scale length is the distance from nut to the twelth fret, doubled. However we normally add some "compensation" for the sharpening of the strings so the bridge is located a little farther away. Here is a really handy calculator for both the fret distances and then when you are all done, plug in the bridge that you want to use and it will tell you where to place it

http://www.stewmac.com/FretCalculator?g ... fgodCicFZw

The calculator will tell you the spacing for the 23rd and 24th frets - all you have to do is extend the f/b by that much. Pickups are usually put at the end of the fretboard and fairly close to the bridge - I really don't know how important that is.

btw - scale length does have a lot to do with playability - longer scales have slightly more tension, a bit harder to bend notes, some will say a "blusier" sound.

4 - There is no reason the headstock couldn't be flat like a Fender but a different shape - remember that Strats and Teles are slightly different shape. My concern would be getting enough break angle from the nut to the tuner - its pretty shallow on most Strats so they need the little tees to hole them down. I would do a layout drawing for both plan and profile and double check. Most Strats have one tee, I needed two on my tele to get the string to break over the nut.

An angled headstock does have the advantage that the truss rod adjuster can be located there (some Fenders are, some are in the heel). I think its a real PITA to adjust relief on a Fender - fortunately you don't need to do it very often. However that is also the weak spot for Gibsons - how many have you seen broken right at the adjuster. Again, think this thru, both designs are valid (Hiscock will help).

With body routes and things like that, just think about how you are going to do it (attach templates, etc) and how you will get from one cavity to another (long drill bits?). How you mount the pickup (most humbuckers hang from their rings), a string ground to the bridge or tailpiece - lots of little details if you don't go with established design. I think you are on the right track and its good that you are asking here - I'm sure many others will chime in.

Many thanks, look forward to the upcoming build!

I just completed my first build so I'm not an expert but my guitar does look, feel, and sound good. Here is what I can tell you: I built the entire guitar of my own design without any templates at all. I did cut out my body shape in 1/2" plywood and used that to cut the basic body shape, but absolutely everything else was done by eye and by hand.
It takes a lot longer that way, but I did not know any better when I started.
So the short answer to your questions is that you absolutely can do everything as you describe. It just dictates the order in which you have do things: I had to build the neck and neck pocket in order to locate the bridge and pickups, for example, and once that was done I then located my controls.
Templates allow you to quickly cut and route several things at once, but you can certainly deviate from them at any step of the process. But the changes affect each other: going to 24 frets means moving the neck pickup toward the bridge OR moving the bridge and bridge pickup closer to the neck, depending on whether or not you change the neck pocket.
There is no shame in building the basic body shape & neck first, and then putting everything else where it needs to be based from the nut & fingerboard position.

Just a quick question about the conversion from 21 to 24 frets, would a change to the neck pocket be necessary, or could the fingerboard overhang onto the body a little bit, or is that to fragile?

You could leave the fretboard hanging over but I think you'd want some maple supporting it from underneath. If you look really closely at Warmouth 24.75" "conversion" necks you will see what I mean. They are made to bolt right into a standard neck pocket but let the finger board hang over by nearly an inch. There is a shelf of neck wood under the fingerboard wood to support it.

Thank you very much! Ordering the templates this second, and once they arrive I'll start drawing out the blueprints, and then order my supplies!

You probably need to deepen the cutaways to allow access to the additional frets (assuming you are still having the neck to body joint at 16). That might change the pocket - on a normal Tele/Strat the treble side isn't supported very well. I would suggest that if you don't already have either a Strat to take measurements from or a good set of plans that you buy plans from any of the sources - there are lots of measurements that you wont get from your templates.

Let me take that one step further - if it were me I would get a set of Strat plans, get a couple of copies at Kinkos and then sketch your modifications onto them. You'll see very fast whether it will work or not. I assume you have already bought Hiscock and done the layout that he suggests.

Last comment, don't just let the fretboard extend farther over the body, support it somehow. When you fret the board you will get a little bit of backbow from the compression fretting - you may get a hair of drop off. Either extend the neck itself or put a little wedge under it like so many Gibsons

Personally I would make the neck longer to allow for better access to the frets with the original neck pocket, but that would mean moving the bridge and pickups the same amount. At that point plans and templates might not be as helpful.

Freeman and Dave have given excellent advice. There's not much I can add, except to encourage you to draw out full scale plans to check your string paths, neck angle, etc. Don't be afraid to build a neck from scratch if that's where your design takes you. Do come back often for help along the way. Don't get discouraged by the few inevitable setbacks that you'll experience. They happen to everyone--even the most experienced builders. The experienced guys have gotten fast at fixing them through lots of practice. Best of luck!

I question why the OP thinks he needs 24 frets - frankly my fat fingers probably couldn't play them if I had them (and I do play mandolin so I'm used to the spacing). Hiscock has a pretty good discussion on number of frets, pickup locations, neck to body location, balance, yadda yadda. He says it is possible to make a playable 24 fret guitar with careful attention to these details, but it's not trivial.

I've built both Tele's and LP's with 22 frets and a body joint at 16, and currently an ES335 with 22 and joined at 19 (double cutaway). 335's have a reputation for neck joint problems - I've used a long tenon on mine to try to minimize that.



Note that the tenon extends into the front pickup cavity. Those are humbuckers - the front pole pieces are at the 24th fret location. Imagine shifting everything a couple of inches towards the bridge.

24 frets is pretty standard for metal shredders. I personally don't have any but I owned one once. Depending on how you build the guitar, it can give easier access to the lower frets that would typically be buried in the body. And I don't suppose a bolt-on neck cares if there are 16, 18, or 20 frets free of the body.
But I agree with you that it's a lot of trouble for dubious benefit. But on the other hand, why build a guitar from scratch if you're not going to give it some feature(s) you can't just walk into any music shop and buy off the wall? (Like, for example, the longer tenion on your 335.)
If 24 frets and sharp cutaways make him happy I say go for it!

Beautiful 335, by the way. What are your plans for the finish?

Thanks Dave. Not to hijack this thread - I'll post a few pictures when its done. Finish will be translucent red, customer does not want a 'burts.

And I agree with you about building whatever he wants - was just trying to caution him to really think thru the design first.

I do agree that the closer one sticks to a standard design the less difficulties are likely to arise. He will have to decide which aspects are important enough to warrant going off the beaten path for.
But the Beaty of a bolt-neck design is you can always scrap the neck and start over.