Warmoth neck fail - update

TimmyO

Some while back I specced and ordered a Warmoth neck for a Tele-ish build. Roasted maple, jumbo frets, 59 round back - lovely.

It's taken me a (very) long time to finish the guitar and I just got all the electrics done recently. I'd not attempted a proper setup on it thus far as, well, it wasn't finished and I didn't know if the neck was going to keep needing taking off to sort neck pickup height (overhang fretboard/scratchplate thing) 

So - in the last few weeks I've been trying to set it up and had to admit defeat - I wondered whether it needed a shim or the nut to be cut deeper (i.e. something I wasn't going to be able to sort) so this week took it to a local recommended fettler.

He called me today with the bad news, he says he can't get the neck slackened off enough so the truss rod must have been installed wrongly. He also says that it seems to have a bit of an S in it too.

FFS

He's suggested I take it to one other particular repair guy in town who might have some clever idea, but as far as he's concerned it's useless. :-( 

I'll take it to the other guy in the week for a 2nd opinion.

Reading Warmoth's returns page I may be ok even though it's over a year old - warranty is for 2 years - but it will likely oct me return shipping and customs again. 

Not happy :-( 

Jetfire

Oh snap  

SteveRobinson

What spec neck is it? The modern ones have a two way truss rod so that you can introduce relief

TimmyO

It's a regular, headstock-end-adjusting truss rod. 

I'm clinging on to the hope that the tech isn't good/has missed something and that the other guy will say something different :-/ 

impmann

SteveRobinson said:

What spec neck is it? The modern ones have a two way truss rod so that you can introduce relief

This.

In my experience a lot of 'techs' can't cope with BiFlex truss rods. When at 'rest' the rod can have several turns before pulling back the other way - ie you have to keep unwinding until it starts pulling back. I've 'fixed' quite a few guitars that were 'ruined' or 'unrepairable' just by understanding how a BiFlex works. Perhaps it's my Shergold background that helps here - it was a Shergold invention...

SteveRobinson

If the adjustment is at the headstock end then this neck is Warmoth "vintage modern" construction so only a single action rod unfortunately.

TimmyO

The tech in question hadn't heard of Warmoth so I'm hoping he's not as knowledgable as he/people think

ICBM

Unless it's really bad it can always have the frets selectively dressed, as WezV suggested somewhere here. If it's got an s-bend that makes it trickier, but it can still be done usually - taking careful measurements with the guitar fully strung and then working out where to take off the height. Essentially that's what a 'Plek' machine does.

TimmyO

ICBM said:

Unless it's really bad it can always have the frets selectively dressed, as WezV suggested somewhere here. If it's got an s-bend that makes it trickier, but it can still be done usually - taking careful measurements with the guitar fully strung and then working out where to take off the height. Essentially that's what a 'Plek' machine does.

I hadn't said anything as I didn't want to come across as thinking I knew more than the tech - but this is what I was thinking/hoping. 

SteveRobinson

TimmyO said:

I hadn't said anything as I didn't want to come across as thinking I knew more than the tech - but this is what I was thinking/hoping. 

If he's never heard of Warmoth you are already ahead.

TimmyO

OK then, an update and a pretty decent outcome:

The 2nd chap took it in and has done:

1. A "light fret dress" as a general tidy-up and identified one low fret somewhere in the top half of the neck as part of that and took account of it in the dress.
2. Shimmed the neck
3. Re-cut the nut slots and shaped the nut (he said it was initially overly large and the slots were very high)
4. Raised neck pickup to account for the changes and balance with the bridge (which, due to the 22nd fret overhand meant neck off again!)

He said he wasn't impressed with the Warmoth neck, felt it needed more work than it should have as a new neck. Also the truss rod is fully slack - so if it moves with the seasons I'd best hope it goes in the direction I still have some control over with the truss rod. 

For doing that (including a set Roto 10s) he charged £40 - which I was very happy with.

The result is night and day - it's very playable now. If you put a gun to my head and asked if it was perfect I'd probably want a gnats more relief which I can't put in it as it is, but that's being very picky - it's close to spot on which given where we started I'm happy with.

Phew.

WezV

If that is all they needed to do to get it to work the neck was far from useless in the first place.  none of that is beyond the scope of kit/partscaster guitar assembly.

give the truss rod some time, the strings will pull the neck wood a bit and it will probably end up just fine. 

i have only had one warmoth neck that was unplayable from the box, but also only one which needed no work at all to play as well as it could.


I have had another dozen which were all pretty well playable from the box, but got a light level, dress and edge roll to get the most from them

I generally consider a light dress to just be part of the assembly process, or even first set-up on a factory fresh guitar.

nut slots are never right until final set-up - overly high slots is par for the course on any guitar parts and most brand new guitars

DLM

I love happy endings!

I was one of those who LOLed the post where you said the tech had never heard of Warmoth.