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Old 10-05-2014, 03:43 PM
Dru Edwards Dru Edwards is offline
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Default Do electric guitars need neck resets?

We hear a lot about acoustic neck resets but what about electric guitars? I never hear about it. I guess with strats you would just need a shim but what about Les Pauls?
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Old 10-05-2014, 03:49 PM
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Yes, they do. And, it's not uncommon for a strat, tele, or other bolt on neck to need a reset. I had one done for a strat a while back. The bow was such that it could not be adjusted through a shim or truss rod adjustment. It is cheaper than an acoustic (I paid right at $150 for it) since the neck can be removed. It had to be hydrated and reset.

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Old 10-05-2014, 05:40 PM
MBE MBE is offline
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Depending on whether it's a bolt-on or set-neck, there are a variety of methods that can be used, but yes - they can and do get neck resets at times. Keep in mind that many players use 9 or even 8 gauge strings on an electric so the tension is far lower - probably one of several factors contributing to lower rates of neck resets in electrics vs acoustics (along with the fact that many electrics are solid bodies and the tops can't and don't belly up from string tension - it's just the neck that warps).
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Old 10-05-2014, 07:57 PM
Paleolith54 Paleolith54 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MBE View Post
Depending on whether it's a bolt-on or set-neck, there are a variety of methods that can be used, but yes - they can and do get neck resets at times. Keep in mind that many players use 9 or even 8 gauge strings on an electric so the tension is far lower - probably one of several factors contributing to lower rates of neck resets in electrics vs acoustics (along with the fact that many electrics are solid bodies and the tops can't and don't belly up from string tension - it's just the neck that warps).
Do you have personal experience with this? I would have never imagined an electric with a steel truss rod ever warping to this degree unless it was left out on the porch year-round. Not saying it is not true, just would never have expected to hear this.
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Old 10-05-2014, 08:42 PM
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...and that many guitarists use 8s and 9s??? I've never heard that.
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Old 10-05-2014, 11:28 PM
j3ffr0 j3ffr0 is offline
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I've got some pretty old electrics -- all 20-30 years old. No neck resets here -- not even close. I use 9s, 10s and 11s. Two of my Carvins is built neck-through the body. Nobody is gonna reset those. They haven't moved at all since I bought them 25 and 30 years ago.

A Martin Shenandoah and rather tough to play Sigma 12 string were the only two guitars I've ever owned that came close to needing a neck reset.
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Old 10-06-2014, 05:36 AM
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I've seen some hollow-body electrics that needed a reset and my first electric I bought in a pawn shop in the '70s, a horrible Japanese solid-body thang with a bolt-on neck, drew blood because of a wrong neck angle until I met a rather famous guitarist who kindly shimmed the neck for me.
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Do you have personal experience with this? I would have never imagined an electric with a steel truss rod ever warping to this degree unless it was left out on the porch year-round. Not saying it is not true, just would never have expected to hear this.
My first Gibson Les Paul had a compound bow in the neck. If I adjusted the truss rod to absolutely straighten the bass side the treble side still had relief. It wasn't until I had it refretted that the luthier planed the fretboard and got the action true.

Bob
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Old 10-06-2014, 08:51 AM
Dru Edwards Dru Edwards is offline
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Thanks guys. I'm familiar with neck shims on strats / bolt on necks but never clued in that that is in fact a neck reset. I don't read too much about glued neck joint neck resets (Les Paul) too much but perhaps that is because I spend my time here on the AGF rather than the electric forums.
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Old 10-07-2014, 05:11 AM
MBE MBE is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Paleolith54 View Post
Do you have personal experience with this? I would have never imagined an electric with a steel truss rod ever warping to this degree unless it was left out on the porch year-round. Not saying it is not true, just would never have expected to hear this.
Seen some strats and teles that needed a neck shim (and received them), as well as some old semihollows that definitely needed one. Haven't yet encountered a Gibson that needed one but to be honest I don't seek out older Gibsons as they aren't my personal taste.
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Old 10-08-2014, 08:09 PM
zabdart zabdart is offline
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A lot of Les Pauls and SGs from the 70s will need neck resets at some time or other. Norlin, in their penny-wise and pound-foolish ways, chose to save money on a few inches of scrap wood by making the mortice and tenon joints more shallow by an inch on those guitars. Many of them have a tendency to twist at the neck joint over time and therefore need to be reset.
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Old 10-09-2014, 09:12 AM
Dru Edwards Dru Edwards is offline
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Originally Posted by zabdart View Post
A lot of Les Pauls and SGs from the 70s will need neck resets at some time or other. Norlin, in their penny-wise and pound-foolish ways, chose to save money on a few inches of scrap wood by making the mortice and tenon joints more shallow by an inch on those guitars. Many of them have a tendency to twist at the neck joint over time and therefore need to be reset.
Thanks for the input, Zadbart. Ah, the Norlin years and the various money saving adventures they put players through. Same could be said with Fender/CBS.
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Old 10-09-2014, 09:25 AM
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Originally Posted by s2y View Post
...and that many guitarists use 8s and 9s??? I've never heard that.
TONS of electric players use 8's and 9's??? Set neck electrics can certainly need a reset. With a bolt-on, if it came to that, I would just get a new neck. I have never needed more than a shim to correct neck/body angle with a Bolt-on. Now mor fenders have the "micro-tilt" adjustment that works very nicely.
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Old 10-09-2014, 09:28 AM
Tone Gopher Tone Gopher is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dru Edwards View Post
Thanks guys. I'm familiar with neck shims on strats / bolt on necks but never clued in that that is in fact a neck reset.
I don't consider it a "reset" as much as an "adjustment". I have dialed in many Strat/Tele necks to get a desired bridge height. It's a matter of tuning the balance of the setup (ex. saddle height, trem height, etc.).
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Old 10-09-2014, 10:32 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by zabdart View Post
A lot of Les Pauls and SGs from the 70s will need neck resets at some time or other. Norlin, in their penny-wise and pound-foolish ways, chose to save money on a few inches of scrap wood by making the mortice and tenon joints more shallow by an inch on those guitars. Many of them have a tendency to twist at the neck joint over time and therefore need to be reset.
Gotta be careful with the generalizations, but you did qualify it nicely with "a lot." By contrast, my Kalamazoo, small script '74 Standard has a transitional tenon, not the short one. It is, however, the guitar I mentioned above that needed the neck to be planed to correct a compound bow. What is interesting and ironic about it is that the neck is built up from three pieces of mahogany, which was a measure to prevent... wait for it... bowing.

It's a lovely guitar now, though, at forty years old.

Bob
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Old 10-09-2014, 11:50 AM
ombudsman ombudsman is offline
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Resetting a neck implies that there is a set neck joint in the first place. Shimming or trimming the joint for a bolt on neck is usually not a big deal.

As for resets, they certainly aren't common on solidbody electrics. I have heard of it on occasion. Sometimes SGs can break at the neck joint (when they don't break at the other end), but that's not quite the same thing.

Thin hollowbody guitars with a cutaway and a small neck block like the Gibson ES125C and 225 can have the neck joint fold up if the guitar is left in a hot car and the maple starts to move, requiring a reset. I have seen several of these, it stopped me from buying one of them. I've heard of Guild Starfires having that problem too, but I have 5 Guilds with that type of construction (Starfire III/T100D/M-65) and have played many others without encountering that problem.
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