Grandsons guitar

[Bod]

Having been roped into "helping" to build an electric guitar, for said 13yo grandson, I have a question.
Does the pick-up have to be exactly beneath the strings?
He's helpfully chewed out the holes for the tremolo bridge, and pick-up, now I've fitted the neck, it is clear the pick-ups won't all be directly under their respective strings.
Short of filling his holes in/starting again from scratch, is this worth continuing with?
The effect of artistic design before function....

Thanks
Bod

 

[NazNomad]

Enlarge the hole so that the pickup is under the strings.

Mount the pickup on the scratchplate and you'll never know.

 

[Bod]

The major problem is he's not left enough length, from the base of the neck, to the bridge. Meaning the pick-up has to be too close the bridge, where the string spacing is greater than the pick-up spacing.
I've had to get "Make your own electric guitar" fine for making, but not so good for sorting out problems.

Bod
(Who can only play the Fool.)

 

[nev]

If you do need to start again heres an idea for the current one (and gives him something to practice the finishing on ...

 

[Claymore]

........

 

[thick_mike]

Strings passing directly over the pole pieces isn't critical. You can't hear a drop off in output when you bend a string away from being above the pole piece..

I assume the strings are wider than the pickups? Is there much in it?

There are a couple of options, blade pickups which don't have one magnet per string, or many manufacturers have F spaced pickups which have a wider spread

 

[Bod]

Hi Mike
If the first string is on the pick-up, the sixth, is just off the pick-up.
Strings I have are thin, about a quarter of the pick-up dia. at most.

Bod

 

[thick_mike]

Hi Mike
If the first string is on the pick-up, the sixth, is just off the pick-up.
Strings I have are thin, about a quarter of the pick-up dia. at most.

Bod

I wouldnt worry too much. I assume you mean off the pole pieces (the circular magnets) rather than off the pickup (the whole unit)? That should be fine, try to place it so that the spacing is as even as possible. You might have to fill the hole a bit one side and extend the hole the other side which wouldn't be a problem if you are painting the guitar

I'm sure aesthetics are far more important than ultimate sound fidelity for your grandson anyway...as long as it looks cool and he can say he made it with his grandad, job's a good 'un!

 

[Bod]

Thanks, I'll carry on.
At least I don't have to make the hole smaller, the pick-up will be mounted in the scratch plate, which I have yet to fit.

Bod

 

[thick_mike]

Ah! If it's a strat or telecaster style guitar, the hole won't matter much. They sometimes do swimming pool routes, pretty much removing the whole of the area under the scratchplate to allow for maximum flexibility with which pickups you can use. Bridge pickups with tremelo blocks are often F-spaced as the trem spaces the strings wider.

 

[Bod]

He's got a 2nd hand Fender strat neck, Floyd Rose type tremolo (the 2 pivot screw type) a 6 pot pickup with 2 variable resistors.
His design has meant that the bridge is much closer to the neck, than I think it should be, is there a distance from nut to bridge, that is a minimum for playability?
Thanks
Bod

 

[thick_mike]

Fender Strat scale length is usually 648mm. If it's not an original fender part, you can't rely on that. Measure from the nut to the twelfth fret and double that distance to find the scale length of the neck you have. The scale length is critical, if the nut to bridge length is incorrect, it will not play in tune.

In reality the bridge will need to be slightly longer than twice the distance from nut to 12th fret due to the extra tension in the string when it is fretted. Google guitar intonation.

 

[AJB Temple]

Mike is spot on. Without correct scale length, e.g. bridge too close to nut, the guitar will be unplayable. The pick location also has a marked impact on tone. Typical 3 pickup strat design shows a huge difference in tonality between neck mid and bridge picks when selected individually.

Personally I am not wild about floyd rose tremolos and for a first guitar I would always choose a fixed bridge design. Much less to worry about when dealing with tuning stability and intonation. Also easier to set a consistent action height.

 

[thick_mike]

Mike is spot on. Without correct scale length, e.g. bridge too close to nut, the guitar will be unplayable. The pick location also has a marked impact on tone. Typical 3 pickup strat design shows a huge difference in tonality between neck mid and bridge picks when selected individually.

Personally I am not wild about floyd rose tremolos and for a first guitar I would always choose a fixed bridge design. Much less to worry about when dealing with tuning stability and intonation. Also easier to set a consistent action height.

But a 13 yo boy wants to be able to shred and dive Bomb!

 

[profchris]

Fender Strat scale length is usually 648mm. If it's not an original fender part, you can't rely on that. Measure from the nut to the twelfth fret and double that distance to find the scale length of the neck you have. The scale length is critical, if the nut to bridge length is incorrect, it will not play in tune.

In reality the bridge will need to be slightly longer than twice the distance from nut to 12th fret due to the extra tension in the string when it is fretted. Google guitar intonation.

Note the last point, it's important.

I make acoustics, not electrics, so I don't know the Floyd Rose bridge. But I'm guessing that like most electric guitar bridges it's adjustable fore and aft. If so, you might want the thickest string's saddle to be up to 2mm further away from the nut than the nominal scale length (nut face to 12th x 2), and the others to be a little less far away.

If you can, set the closest point of adjustment on the bridge at the nominal scale length, so you have maximum adjustment backwards. If the body is too short for that, make sure the rearmost point is at least nominal scale + 3mm.

 

[Bod]

Nut to bridge length is going to be a bit under 600mm.
The pick-up will be 50-60mm in front of the bridge.
It's going to have a unique sound....
At least the parts will be salvageable for the MK.2 version.
He's done the artistic design, with no thought to technical requirements, then gone ahead cutting wood.
Having said that, he's done a respectable job on the cut outs, with only a small tenon saw and one blunt chisel. (20p the pair from a carboot sale, both of which have come up nicely, S&J 8inch tenon, Robert Sorby 1inch firmer chisel worn down to the last 1 1/2 inches)
Thanks for the explanations, I'm no musician, so things like "scale length" could have more to do with fish, for all I know!

Bod
Could I help with attaching the neck?

 

[thick_mike]

Nut to bridge length is going to be a bit under 600mm.
The pick-up will be 50-60mm in front of the bridge.
It's going to have a unique sound....
At least the parts will be salvageable for the MK.2 version.
He's done the artistic design, with no thought to technical requirements, then gone ahead cutting wood.
Having said that, he's done a respectable job on the cut outs, with only a small tenon saw and one blunt chisel. (20p the pair from a carboot sale, both of which have come up nicely, S&J 8inch tenon, Robert Sorby 1inch firmer chisel worn down to the last 1 1/2 inches)
Thanks for the explanations, I'm no musician, so things like "scale length" could have more to do with fish, for all I know!

Bod
Could I help with attaching the neck?

Sounds like it's going to be more of a wall hanger than a player then!

Neck is screwed on from the rear for a Strat.

 

[Bod]

Firewood.

Bod