Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

There is a difference. Which one is preferable is a matter of preference.
 
Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

A set-thru neck is essentially a really long tennon. A neck-thru is actually where the neck goes all the way from the headstock to the strap button with wings glued on the sides to form the body (a top is sometimes also glued on).
 
Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

I have played neck-thru, but not set-thru. I have sometimes heard that tone is lost in neck-thru guitars. I guess set-thru could help this problem.
 
Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

I have a neck through bass, a set neck bass and a few bolt ons. My favorites are the bolt ons.
 
Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

I could care less what joint a guitar has myself. If it sounds good, it sounds good!
 
Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

There is a tonal difference as well, neckthru construction adds a nice punchy Low-midrange spike to the fray.

BTW, I know the Info was second hand, but the tone is far from "lost" in a neckthru... I´d really be curious as to what the original statement was meant to say...
 
Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

"lost" probably refers to the diminished role the body sides play in the overall electric tone. The neck block (usually maple) governs the body vibrations to a much greater extent. It's not bad, I just prefer it when the bridge of the guitar is surrounded by a large mass of body wood. So I make deep tenons instead. But it's personal. I don't have an agenda, or think it's better.

To me the "low end spike" is actually a high mid muting. It's a net reduction in resonance, not a spike or boost. The NT construction combs away the open, upper midrange (that agreeably sometimes makes a guitar sound thin or bright) you get from a bolt on. Acoustically, with otherwise similar guitars, strumming a bolt neck unplugged will be louder than the NT. But that means more energy is being left in the string, and that's not a bad thing.

Traditional set necks are actually totally different from deep sets or bolts. They're not like an "in-between" tonally. The tenon is small enough for the glue joint to stifle the vibrations from both pieces, but not enough to really transfer neck vibrations strongly into the body. Again, not a bad thing at all, millions of LP's and other guitars can't be wrong.
 
Re: Set-Thru or Neck-Thru-Body?

Bah, I don't believe any of it.

Unless I'm mistaken, all of these comparisons are done with necks that are a different wood from the body (e.g. maple neck, mahogany body). In essence, you've got the ratio of the two types of wood compounded with construction technique.

My hunch is that if you used neck and bodies of the same wood (e.g. mahogany), you'd find little or no difference between a otherwise identically constructed neck-throughs and short-tenon guitars. Heck, you may even find no difference between a bolt-on and a guitar constructed out of a single piece of mahogany (body & neck -- and I'm assuming that the shapes are identical in each case).

I think most of these ideas came from people comparing Fenders and Gibsons, which also differ in wood types, scale lengths, and pickups.
 
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