mixing wood on a laminated neck

[mux164]

hey people i am about to start doing some 5 piece necks up and have a quick question.

i am planning on using Sapele in the middle laminate and a mixture of soft wood for the outer laminates, the sapele is just about an inch wide, would i be best to put the softest wood either side of the middle or the outer edge?

i have had no problem using radiata pine next to merbau and as far as i know sapele is harder then merbau

thank you for the your time, and im sure this may start another pine debate

 

[B. Howard]

Not sure why you want to use soft woods for a neck. The key is balance, the order doesn't matter so much as the fact that the lay up is symmetrical.

 

[Fret Hopper]

I used maple/walnut/maple/walnut/maple on the first necks that I glued up. You an see them on my build thread. Came out pretty nice and I am really pleased.

From the ozone...

Mark

 

[fletch123]

as far as i know sapele is harder then merbau

G'day mate, Merbau is like a rock, Dense and heavy whereas Sapele is closer to mahogany. Merbau is much harder on your tools than Sapele.

If I were you, I'd go the Sapele in the centre with a thin decorative strip either side of merbau and then use some Vic Ash as the outside laminates ( Bunnings has tons of the stuff and its easy to find Quarter sawn ).

Cheers

Dave

 

[mux164]

thanks for the replies, i guess its more of what i have lying around, i have used radiata pine and merbau before and had great results

i was planning on using cypress pine, radiata pine and sapele in the middle, i am certain that it will hold up well using a set of 9's

if anything i will only be wasting my time

 

[scottop1972]

what are the benefits and draw backs to using a laminate style neck versus the old stand by of a one piece neck?

are there any tonal differences? I remember reading an article where steve via talks about the resonant properties of a guitar body and neck and when they are similar that the guitar has a much better tone as opposed to having a neck that resonates at a different quality than the body and may cancel out some of the frequencies?

 

[mux164]

yeah i seen that too with steve vai, it was from guitar world, but i dont know, i do it because i use pine a fair bit.

 

[B. Howard]

I use laminated necks on all my guitars to improve neck stability. Even my all mahogany necks are two piece laminations.

 

[Luthier-Atlanta]

If that is the route you are going to take I would highly recommend keeping the softer woods away from the outer portion of the neck to help reduce denting.

 

[mux164]

yeah i ended up gluing the radiata pine to the sapele and it looks good.

with the scrap sapele that i found i have 12 center pieces although i may make a neck entirely out of sapele.

and with the pine i got 16 pieces so 2 each neck i should get a fair few necks out of them