Adding a Neck Angle

A

A_Cold_1

New member
I’m building a guitar for myself from scratch, and I’ve chosen to use the Gotoh Floyd Rose, (1996 I believe) and it’s going to be surface mounted. Because of this, I need a slight neck angle.

How many degrees would I roughly need on my neck?

For me, routing an angled neck pocket isn’t possible, is it alright if I make the angle in the heel of the neck?

Note that recessing the Floyd Rose is not an option for me. I hate floating Floyd’s with a burning passion, and I also don’t wanna recess it and block it.

Anyone’s knowledge and opinions are welcome, thanks!
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

You can also put really thin washers around the bottom two mounting screws for the neck.
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

Yea and those shims are kinda nominal or middle of the road that stew mac has, so Id suggest if you get one to get the thickest one and shave it on a flat surface on a sheet of sandpaper to fine tune it to your guitar or what you need to get some travel in your Floyd.

I use cardstock for shims if I need to get a little more pull up from my topmount OFR guitars, so you can try that or what Christopher suggest which is essentially the same concept which is you want to get the rear of the neck up a tad. Sometimes both and a little more on the rear.. depends.
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

metalchurch79 said:
Yea and those shims are kinda nominal or middle of the road that stew mac has, so Id suggest if you get one to get the thickest one and shave it on a flat surface on a sheet of sandpaper to fine tune it to your guitar or what you need to get some travel in your Floyd.

I use cardstock for shims if I need to get a little more pull up from my topmount OFR guitars, so you can try that or what Christopher suggest which is essentially the same concept which is you want to get the rear of the neck up a tad. Sometimes both and a little more on the rear.. depends.
Click to expand...

I was thinking about a shim, however, how steep of an angle would I need? This guitar is basically an Ernie Ball Music Man Axis, same shape, body thickness, and all of that stuff. Also would it be possible to just add the angle in the heel of the neck?
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

I would not shave the neck's heel because well many reasons.
As far as angle I'm not sure because you're setting it up to personal preference first of all and every guitar is different.

Id grab the thickest wooden shim from stewmac or grab a few of each thickness and try them out. It'll be more trial and error really but its pretty straight forward and you seem to know what you want already so go for it.
 
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Re: Adding a Neck Angle

If you are building the guitar from scratch yes, you can angle the neck heel. That is how I got the neck angle on my home-built to use a TOM bridge.

As for how much angle, I think you will have to do what I did: assemble your bridge on your body, decide how high you want your fingerboard to be, and then use a yardstick or other straight edge to get a rough angle. Once your neck is mostly done you can fine-tune it with some sanding. That's how my Gibson Marauder is built (flat neck route, angled neck heel) so I copied that.

Or you can just make them both flat and use a shim like everyone is suggesting.

Or you can just make the neck sit high in the pocket like Rickenbacker does.
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

You can work out the required neck angle
what you need to do is to get a large piece of paper, and mark on a 1:1 scale,
the nut, where the body joins the neck, where the end of the fretboard is, and the bridge position. this will be the scale length.
then subtract the height of the fretboard with frets, from the bridge height.
draw a perpendicular line up from the bridge position,
now join that line to the end of the freboard position, creating a right angle triangle.
measure that angle..

thats it....
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

Peter Crossley said:
You can work out the required neck angle
what you need to do is to get a large piece of paper, and mark on a 1:1 scale,
the nut, where the body joins the neck, where the end of the fretboard is, and the bridge position. this will be the scale length.
then subtract the height of the fretboard with frets, from the bridge height.
draw a perpendicular line up from the bridge position,
now join that line to the end of the freboard position, creating a right angle triangle.
measure that angle..

thats it....
Click to expand...

The correct answer
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

I would make the neck normal and use shims. They are ideally full-pocket wedges, but they don't have to be. Just don't over tighten your neck screws, and you won't have any problems with typical old-school Fender factory type shims.

If not that, my second choice would be routing the angle in to the neck pocket, which you said you don't want to do. I have a few guitars like this, and the angled pocket is great. All you have to do is put a wedge under your neck pocket routing template.

I would not ever rout the angle into the neck heel itself.
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

metalchurch79 said:
I would not shave the neck's heel because well many reasons.
As far as angle I'm not sure because you're setting it up to personal preference first of all and every guitar is different.

Id grab the thickest wooden shim from stewmac or grab a few of each thickness and try them out. It'll be more trial and error really but its pretty straight forward and you seem to know what you want already so go for it.
Click to expand...

Can you please tell me why I wouldn’t want to angle the neck heel? I’ve heard some people say to not do it but not say why.

Also I’ve heard someone say that for a surface mount Floyd Rose I would
need a 3 degree angle. Even if that’s not entirely accurate for my build, I feel like it’s a good basis to have.
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

Cut a piece of card stock, put it in the neck pocket. Put the guitar together. Play it. If you need more angle, make a thicker shim. Likewise, if you need a more slight angle, use a thinner shim. In all the time you’d spend calculating it, you could have it together and apart and know what it really needs, as opposed to what it should need.
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

The same thing you want done can also be achieved with a shallower neck pocket rout.....if you need extra room.
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

I did an angled neck pocket on my first guitar. I also wanted the neck to sit deeper in the neck pocket. This was back in the 1980s. I still have that guitar and it still plays and sounds great.

This guitar was a pearl white Aria Pro II RS Classic with three singles and a v-trem.
0AFfdiP.jpg
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

Chistopher said:
Without the angle the action will be too high on the upper frets.
Click to expand...

Incorrect. Clearance (or height off the body) can be gained either from an angle, or the neck sitting further off the body. Either way the result is the same
 
Re: Adding a Neck Angle

AlexR said:
Incorrect. Clearance (or height off the body) can be gained either from an angle, or the neck sitting further off the body. Either way the result is the same
Click to expand...

But then while my high frets would have good action, my lower frets would be too low, right?
 
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