Crazy idea for 22 fret Fender necks?

[Steve A.]

Gibson aficionados often wish that strats and teles had 22 fret necks. Some of them do with the end of the fretboard hanging over the body a little bit making it trickier to remove the pickguard.

So here is my crazy idea — why not make replacement necks that use a scale slightly shorter than 25.5" to accomodate that extra fret? The nominal 24.75" scale on Gibsons has varied over the years, as low as 24.58" according to some reports, and now typically around 24.6".

I have not yet done the math but a typical tele bridge should allow the saddles to be intonated for a 25.2" or 25.1" scale while it might be a tight fit on a typical strat trem bridge. (If the bridge plate must be replaced it should still fit the existing holes.)

Any thoughts on this? Perhaps the idea of a 25.5" Fender neck is so ingrained in our minds that we have never considered anything else...

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Another crazy idea... some guitarists like to use an unwound 3rd string on their acoustics although the standard saddles are designed for a wound 3rd string. So how about an aftermarket saddle intonated for an unwound G string? I have never measured them but a lot of acoustic saddles look very similar and the height could be decreased by evenly sanding the bottom.

(I just checked my Fender acoustic with an unwound 3rd string and its intonation was right on... go figure!)

Steve A.

[olddawg]

Gibson aficionados often wish that strats and teles had 22 fret necks. Some of them do with the end of the fretboard hanging over the body a little bit making it trickier to remove the pickguard.

So here is my crazy idea — why not make replacement necks that use a scale slightly shorter than 25.5" to accomodate that extra fret? The nominal 24.75" scale on Gibsons has varied over the years, as low as 24.58" according to some reports, and now typically around 24.6".

I have not yet done the math but a typical tele bridge should allow the saddles to be intonated for a 25.2" or 25.1" scale while it might be a tight fit on a typical strat trem bridge. (If the bridge plate must be replaced it should still fit the existing holes.)

Any thoughts on this? Perhaps the idea of a 25.5" Fender neck is so ingrained in our minds that we have never considered anything else...

◆

Another crazy idea... some guitarists like to use an unwound 3rd string on their acoustics although the standard saddles are designed for a wound 3rd string. So how about an aftermarket saddle intonated for an unwound G string? I have never measured them but a lot of acoustic saddles look very similar and the height could be decreased by evenly sanding the bottom.

(I just checked my Fender acoustic with an unwound 3rd string and its intonation was right on... go figure!)

Steve A.

Steve... my go to guitar for decades was a 1983 Japanese Squier Strat with a Gibson scale. No one believes me until they measure it. I call it my little black Strat. A lot of people have tried to buy it from me. Unfortunately it hasn’t been right since I had a so called local “premier luthier” refret it. But it’s always been an excercise of pouring hundreds of dollars into a guitar that I paid $135 for used in 1988. It has 21 frets but I have at times put an extra fret for the E and B string on it. I also have another Mid 80s Squier Strat with a Gibson scale and factory 22 frets. It’s a factory dual humbucker with no pickguard.
I’m a little disgusted with both of them lately because I can’t get the trems to float right on either of them. Maddening since they were fine for years. What happens sometimes when you let someone with the wrong alchemy touch your Strat with a vintage style trem.

[Steve A.]

Steve... my go to guitar for decades was a 1983 Japanese Squier Strat with a Gibson scale. No one believes me until they measure it. I call it my little black Strat. A lot of people have tried to buy it from me. Unfortunately it hasn’t been right since I had a so called local “premier luthier” refret it. But it’s always been an excercise of pouring hundreds of dollars into a guitar that I paid $135 for used in 1988. It has 21 frets but I have at times put an extra fret for the E and B string on it. I also have another Mid 80s Squier Strat with a Gibson scale and factory 22 frets. It’s a factory dual humbucker with no pickguard.
I’m a little disgusted with both of them lately because I can’t get the trems to float right on either of them. Maddening since they were fine for years. What happens sometimes when you let someone with the wrong alchemy touch your Strat with a vintage style trem.

If you want to pay shipping both ways* send me your strat neck and I'll check it out for you and see if it is something I can fix for free***. That is assuming that the screw holes will line up with one of my strats...

* plus a set of the strings you use.
*** Basically anything less than a full refret job.

Steve A.

P.S. This is a limited time non-transferable offer. I've been doing custom setups and refrets on maybe 30 of my guitars over the past 4 years learning the trade... I'll buy and return guitars to GC just to get more practice doing custom setups. Well, not exactly... I buy them thinking that I might keep them if I like them enough but often end up returning them.

P.P.S. I have a really nice tele with 2 hbs and a 22 fret neck w/ a rosewood fretboard... FSR made 250-300 of them in Surf Green for GC/MF around 2011. (A good friend has one that he raves about and when one of them showed up locally I grabbed it.) I was going to change the pickups in it yesterday but the Fender PAF-style buckers are slightly smaller than regular hb's and I did not want to rout out the bridge pickup cavity.

[olddawg]

If you want to pay shipping both ways* send me your strat neck and I'll check it out for you and see if it is something I can fix for free***. That is assuming that the screw holes will line up with one of my strats...

* plus a set of the strings you use.
*** Basically anything less than a full refret job.

Steve A.

P.S. This is a limited time non-transferable offer. I've been doing custom setups and refrets on maybe 30 of my guitars over the past 4 years learning the trade... I'll buy and return guitars to GC just to get more practice doing custom setups. Well, not exactly... I buy them thinking that I might keep them if I like them enough but often end up returning them.

P.P.S. I have a really nice tele with 2 hbs and a 22 fret neck w/ a rosewood fretboard... FSR made 250-300 of them in Surf Green for GC/MF around 2011. (A good friend has one that he raves about and when one of them showed up locally I grabbed it.) I was going to change the pickups in it yesterday but the Fender PAF-style buckers are slightly smaller than regular hb's and I did not want to rout out the bridge pickup cavity.

I appreciate the offer my friend, but I’ll sus it out eventually. It’s not THAT bad actually. I’m just really picky.

[Steve A.]

I appreciate the offer my friend, but I’ll sus it out eventually. It’s not THAT bad actually. I’m just really picky.

I would say that I'm really picky, too, but I prefer to play with just my fingers these days...

I've been playing guitar for practically every day of my life for the past 50 years and I am really knocked out by how easy it is to play my guitars since I learned how to set them up professionally from a real pro.

Steve A.

[bob p]

> I've been doing custom setups and refrets on maybe 30 of my guitars over the past 4 years learning the trade...

So have you gotten around to refretting that pile of guitars that yuo've had stuffed into a corner?

Just in case you're not aware, you can go to W* and buy scale conversion necks for Strats and Teles. You can get a Gibson 24.75 neck or even a baritone conversion neck.

Somebody also makes compensated 3-bar Tele saddles. they're compensated by threading the screw hole at an angle rather than being perpendicular to the bar. For the life of me, I can't remember who sells them. Anyone?

[rjb]

Somebody also makes compensated 3-bar Tele saddles. they're compensated by threading the screw hole at an angle rather than being perpendicular to the bar. For the life of me, I can't remember who sells them. Anyone?

Wilkinson is the one I'd heard of. But there are a bunch of others.
https://www.thegearpage.net/board/in...addles.731693/

-rb