About Me

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Location: Los Angeles, California, United States

I have been a Los Angeles City firefighter for 20 years. I work in the Glassell Park section of Los Angeles. In 1985-1986 I worked for Charvel/Jackson in Glendora, California. It was a great experience, regardless of it being just a $5.00 an hour job. I worked in the wood shop and did the inlaying and fretting. I did get to see Neal Schon, from Journey, in one of his videos use a guitar I worked on and fretted. That was over 23 years ago. I was watching MTV with my cousin when I saw the guitar. I said, "Jim, look, I made that guitar." "And how much did they pay you...?" he asked. "Five dollar an hour" I told him. "Five dollars?...that's it?" Then he changed the channel. Making only $5.00 per hour puts things into perspective. But it still was fun. Now, it's just simple tools and equipment. It ain't perfect, but it is fun.

Saturday, October 21, 2006

Neck taper for body slot.

Finally had the guts to make a cut. "Measure twice, cut once."
I measured more than that. Once you make this cut, it stays cut.
I put the bridge and studs next to the neck and guess-timated about a 4/32" string spacing at the 20th fret. That's what my Taylor has, and it is about as low as you want to go without buzz.
With a bridge space of 9/32" and a total bridge height of 18/32,"
I took 5/32" off the top to measure line for the bottom cut.
Band sawed the bottom cut and sanded the rest just up to the bottom line. 1-1/4" is the width of the piece. Better to be a little low with the bridge and adjust up, than to be too high and having to cut more wood out of the bridge area. This was a brain twister for me to figure out. You can always build up the bridge area with nice inlaid wood, like ebony, or remove some too. Let's see how my calculations worked.

posted by Mike Perez | 3:58 PM

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