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Post by ninworks on Jan 14, 2021 19:18:03 GMT -5
I pulled out my Danelectro 12-6 doubleneck today because a friend of mine who lives in Tokyo wants me to record some electric 12 string on some songs for him soon. I hadn't had that guitar out for over a year so I thought I'd tune it up and see how it sounded.
It still sounds great but the neck needs adjusting. It has bowed forward enough to where it's hard to play because the action is too high. It's not terrible but bad enough that playing it will give me some grief. The biggest problem is that fretting the strings with the action that high throws the intonation way out and there's not enough adjustment in the bridge to compensate for it. This is one of those where the neck has to be removed in order to access the adjustment nut. I was surprised it had moved. It's been a pretty stable guitar as far as needing adjustments goes.
I need to add some tension to it so it will bow backwards a bit. I have no idea how much to adjust it. That's not something I do to my guitars very often and when I do all the rest of them have truss rod access behind the nut. I'm pretty sure I'll have the neck off at least twice and maybe more. What a PITA!
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Post by funkykikuchiyo on Jan 15, 2021 9:52:00 GMT -5
Adjusting the truss rod without tension is a bit of an acquired skill. The best way to get the hang of it is this: tuned to pitch, sight down the neck. Look long enough to get a mental image of how much bow there is. Get the neck off. Put the heel of the neck against a hard surface, the peghead in one hand, and the other hand over the fingerboard. Push it into a forward bow. Push until it looks like it did with the string tension. Try to get some muscle memory for how hard you're pushing. Now you can start adjusting the neck and checking as long as you can remember how hard you were pushing. With a bit of practice this can be surprisingly reliable.
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Post by ninworks on Jan 15, 2021 9:57:53 GMT -5
Thanks. Your guidance will definitely help. However, I don't want to have to do this often enough to get good at it.
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Post by ninworks on May 4, 2021 5:38:49 GMT -5
I'm taking the Danno into the shop this week. I just don't want to mess with it. I wonder if I should get it without the mounting holes drilled and just let my tech do it? It's a 3 bolt neck.
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Post by Peegoo 🏁 on May 4, 2021 18:04:21 GMT -5
Leave the guitar all in one piece; don't take the neck off. You can loosen the string tension by two turns on each tuner knob. Not all the way slack,...just looser than concert pitch.
Even though it's an additional step to remove a neck, the tech will appreciate it because it will show how far the neck needs to be tweaked.
Given just the neck, a tech is flying blind.
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Post by ninworks on May 5, 2021 4:38:15 GMT -5
Geese I'm a buffoon. The 3 hole in the neck thing, is supposed to go with the Strat neck post. I am definitely taking him the entire doubleneck. I don't know how that happened. Too many distractions.
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Post by Peegoo 🏁 on May 5, 2021 13:14:17 GMT -5
Ohhhh ok. I was trying to decypher your cryptic message.
Many Dano necks are three-screw into the body.
Cheers, brother!
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Wrnchbndr
Wholenote
Posts: 353
Formerly Known As: WRNCHBNDR
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Post by Wrnchbndr on May 6, 2021 12:13:04 GMT -5
Loosen the strings enough to make the pitches low but you don’t need to make them floppy. Install a capo on the first fret. Remove the neck screws and the neck can be tilted forward and then out of the pocket. Adjust your truss rod 3/4s of a turn in the desired direction and lever the neck back into place. The capo keeps the strings in place in the nut and on the tuner posts. This works on all guitars with a heel adjustment truss rod but requires a bit of care when the neck pocket fit is tight.
You can’t evaluate the truss rod adjustment unless the guitar is tuned to pitch. Evaluate at pitch, take off the neck, adjust, reattach the neck, tune to pitch, and then evaluate again.
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