A Short Note From Rick Gledura

There are many companies today building guitars, When I decided to devote the rest of my life to building guitars it was not an easy decision. After all the competition is brutal, it's an incredibly hard field to break into,  I knew that I was going to have to offer something very special to even get noticed never mind sell enough so that I could make a respectable living.

In my opinion the most important part of the guitar is the neck. The neck is the part that translates your ability and soul into the music, sounds and tones that are pleasing to your ears.

There are many different shapes, sizes, scales, radius's, fret sizes on today's guitars. As a long time musician and builder here are the ways that I feel give the best all around sound & playing comfort.

1. I handpick all my neck wood as only a small builder can. I select only the straightest of grains with the most potential for remaining straight & stable.  Wood is constantly changing due to temperature & humidity not to mention a constant string pull of almost 160 lbs depending on string gauge.

2. I also hand pick each and every fingerboard, I reject 9 out of 10.  I pay extra for the privilege of getting the first culling rights. Because I am building fingerboards from  exotic beautiful pieces of very rare South American woods they are rarely straight grained. This is why it is so important that my necked is quartersawn and 100% straight.

3. I hand taper, radius, slot, inlay and install each and every fret totally by hand. After the fretboard has been hand radiused I carefully cut the fret slots to the correct width & depth to match the fret wire being used.  This is an extremely important step.  If you cut the fret slots too wide the neck will have a rubbery feel.  If they are too narrow the fret tang will create a back bow in the neck.  After I slot the fingerboard I slightly bevel the slots on the surface so that if future removal is necessary it reduces wood tear out significantly.

4. I then proceed to install the heavy duty 2 way truss rod in the neck. the truss rod compensates for up bow or back bow. This also allows you to set the fretboard relief in the 7th and 9th Fret area.

5. I also install 2 graphite stiffening rods in the neck to assure even more stability.
(Perhaps the most stabilizing thing about my neck is that I am using the Deep Set Neck Tenon standard on all my guitars.  This costs considerably more to do this operation.)

6. Next the fingerboard is glued on, it is clamped to a 1" thick machined aluminum billet to insure total flatness.

7. Twelve to twenty hours later the frets go in. Each fret is wiped clean with naphtha to eliminate the factory oil coating. If this simple step is ignored the frets will tend to not remain securely seated.  Each fret is carefully glued & pressed in with a two ton fret press with a special radius matching caul.

8. On the third and final day of this laborious process the neck receives it's final hand shaping and the fret ends are trimmed. Please note I make my neck profiles slightly thicker on the bass side. This asymmetrical design adds a lot of comfort and fits to the natural ergonomic shape of the hand.

Many people think that super thin is the best design.  The thinner the neck means less wood which means less rigid and more hand & elbow fatigue.  The closer you grip your fingers together the more stress is produced on your hands, muscles forearms and elbow tendons.  Ok enough Biological input.

9. When the neck is in it's final shape I then mount it into the neck jig. The neck is securely clamped as if it were set in the body. The tuners and nut are installed, it is strung up to full playing tension. The neck is then rotated 80 degrees to simulate the playing position.  while in this position a precision dial indicator is used to adjust the truss rod until it reads dead zero. Machined steel rods are then raised to meet the back of the neck at 3" intervals from top to bottom. At this point the neck cannot be moved. The strings are removed and the neck is re-measured. This is the only way one can duplicate the posture of the neck with the strings off.

10. Now the the frets are precision ground and leveled until a precision straight edge is laid perfectly flat over the entire length of the fingerboard. Very few other luthiers go to these extremes that I do when I tension level my necks. Perfectionist that I am, I continue to check for fret flatness. The next step I take is to use another precision ground tool to check 3 frets at a time. This insures 100% flatness laterally as well as longitudinally. Once everything is perfect I hand bevel and polish each fret until it shines like a mirror. The neck is now complete & perfect.

Summation

I approach every aspect of guitar building in this complete & thorough manner.  Guitar building is my life and I will continue to build top quality instruments until I die.

Rick Gledura
04/20/01