Thinking of buying a cheap neck? Don't bother!

4114Effects

So I ordered a neck for a project - brand new £25 delivered. Got to be worth a try right?

NOPE.

Looks OK at first, but on closer inspection the frets are like rollercoasters ... not fully pressed in on some spots, pressed in too hard and dented on others. Otherwise it looks OK, straight enough and fits the neck pocket well. 

Will cost me £10 to send the flipping thing back, so I thought about keeping it and doing something whacky. Any ideas? The few thoughts I had were -

1. Slide guitar? 

2. Keep it and practise re-fretting? 

3. Remove the frets and make a fretless tele ... ?

4. Travel down to see the seller and beat him around the head with it until the frets flatten?

Any other ideas for what to do with it?

Moral of the story - don't skimp on quality when buying a neck! Makes me realise just how good the GSPbases one I have on my other partscaster is!

Roland

Option 2

4114Effects

Agreed. If it turns out I'm no good at re-fretting, I can always go back to option 4 ...

Roland

Name and shame so that someone else doesn't make the same mistake

jellyroll

5. Throw it away and move on.

4114Effects

Fair point. It was http://aggmusic.co.uk/

Goes by Alan George Guitars on Facebook I think. I don't want to completely ruin his reputation, maybe this was just a bad example. It would put me off ordering anything else from him though. 

ThorpyFX

make it into a very cool coat hangar

ChrisMusic

Option 4 definitely ~ It solves so many things in on go !

Don't bother with the fretless idea, I've done that before and unless you use an e-bow or a sustainer pickup you will get zero sustain, especially on the first string, you need a much denser (i.e. metal a la Vigier) fretboard to make it work acceptably.

Actually, I think two is your best option, educational and therapeutic  

martinw

I'd say you got your money's worth.

4114Effects

Yep. Lesson learned

littlethoughts

4114Effects said:

Fair point. It was http://aggmusic.co.uk/

Goes by Alan George Guitars on Facebook I think. I don't want to completely ruin his reputation, maybe this was just a bad example. It would put me off ordering anything else from him though. 

Good to know though, I've considered one or two of his guitars in the past but if that is anything to go by my money might be better spent elsewhere.

Dalefty

Turn it into some form of kinky sex toy for you and your partner?  Or if you're a sad loaner who doesn't have a significant other, you can turn it into some form of masturbation aid?


DaLefty

4114Effects

I'm by no means a sad loaner. I very happily lend people things.

Andyjr1515

Yup - I think at £25 for a delivered neck your expectations should be at least primed   I think (know) I would struggle to get hold of the wood for that much!

There is an Option 5 - which is to use it to learn how to seat and level frets because - believe me - there are necks around at 4x the price that are just as un-playable without doing exactly that.  On that basis, £25 plus the bits to do the work could save you hundreds over the future years...

Sassafras

I suppose you could glue a thin strip of brass or tin to it once you've pulled the frets and make it a fretless. I'd try that with a £25 neck. Not much to lose. Otherwise it's options 2 or 4.

jd0272

Aye, fret practice and spraying/finish practice.

(Ya tight wad . )

guitargeek62

A neck takes a lot of work to get right, it's the one area that you really should NOT skimp on where possible. For one thing, it's your interface to the guitar, it needs to feel right; secondly, fret levelling (& dressing) isn't a 2-second job, so factor in some budget for expected work to be required* once it arrives.

*USACG may be the one exception I know of for this, their work is almost spot on every time.

Sarge

Option 2 definitely!

Roland

Reactivating this thread.

Looking to reduce the cost of my slide guitar challenge build I decided to buy a cheap neck from eBay. This one http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/111861223303. For £20 it would be cheaper than buying the wood and wire to make my own. I expected it to be made using the same machines and jigs as other Chinese necks, but using poor quality wood, and with badly seated frets. Actually the wood's not too bad, but the frets are out of place. 1 to 5 are OK, but then they get progressively flat until the 15 is a whole fret width out of place, after which they progress the other way until the 20th is half a fret width sharp.

What gives? Is there something about tempered scales that I don't understand? I haven't decided whether to keep it, because after all it's for a slide guitar, or send it back as it's not fit for purpose.

ICBM

Could it be a different scale length than the body is designed for? It looks like the fret spacing is OK in the pictures in that the frets all appear to get progressively closer together - unlike a few old German guitars for example, where sometimes they get quite random above the 12th! It also doesn't specify scale length in the description… which is a fairly important omission.

Measure from the front face of the nut to the 12th fret. It should be 324mm.

LooseMoose

Touchstone Tonewoods have tele and strat type necks - £35 and they are excellent. I've used them and the fretting was outstanding.