Has renovated many of Levin's parlors over the years. The same body model was used from the beginning of 1900 to the end of the 1930s. One of the things that is less good with these is the neck attachment. Instead of a real dovtail, a neck foot with straight edges was used and which is only stuck in the glue. The whole force from the tension of the strings presses against the soft spruce in the neck block, on a guitar with a real dovtail that force is absorbed by the curved edge in hard wood which is much more stable than the spruce block. What can happen is that the soft spruce is pushed in by the neck when the strings are tuned and the neck moves. It does not take many tenths for the neck to get the wrong angle down towards the stable.

After encountering this too many times, a few years ago I started to mill away a couple of mm in the bottom of the neck pocket and glue in a plate in harder maple wood. It gives the neck a much harder abutment surface and strengthens the neck block with an extra glue joint. I never get an unpleasant surprise when the strings are tuned to tension nowadays. A plus is that you get a completely flat surface at the bottom of the neck pocket, it is common for that surface to be damaged when the neck is broken loose.

Has improved my jig for the job. Previously, I milled the bottom completely straight in both side and depth, the problem is that the neck was once ground into a surface that can tilt. What happened was that I had to work hard to adjust the end of the neck to the new surface to straighten the neck.

My new jig uses the same portable vise to clamp down the guitar, the vise can easily be clamped to the workbench.

To be able to follow the plane at the bottom of the neck pocket with the cutter, I have put hinges on the cutter jig that is attached to the guitar with some Bessey U clamps.

The jig also includes a simple measuring tool in the form of a piece of acrylic plastic where two metal screws have been threaded in. One of the screws is unscrewed so that it just reaches the surface of the neck pocket. The screw is secured with a nut. The second screw is given exactly the same length after measuring the first with a caliper. By moving around the plexiglass sheet, I can ensure that the cutter follows the same plane as the original surface in the neck pocket, either by moving the jig's attachment points and letting the hinges bend or by taping a suitable blade size under one side of the plate.

With the jig adjusted, it is easy to mill as deep into the entire surface of the neck block as the thickness of the piece of maple to be glued.

Shaping the new piece to be folded in can be difficult as there are no straight edges on the neck pocket. The easiest way is to use masking tape, with a number of small pieces of tape you can quickly fill in the shape of the neck pocket. The tape can then be transferred to the blank and used as a saw template. I put a cross on the side facing outwards so as not to make a mistake. A little adjustment of the fit with a semi-circular rasp is all that is needed.

I make a new or reuse an old block that is used as a caul during gluing.

I glue the maple plate with epoxy glue. Since epoxy is a messy sticky substance, I cover the guitar with plastic foil and tape. Some clamps on the caul and the only thing left is to level the edge of the maple plate at the same level as the top.

The two operations I've made so far with this method resulted in necks with almost exactly the correctt attachment, I saved a lot of time and energy setting the neck correctly 🙂