Fender Multi-Piece Body Construction type?

[Kinetic Bass]

How does Fender produce their multi-piece bodies, do they use any pegs or biscuits or just plain blanks and glue?

What type of glue do they use if it's just plain blanks? Something like Titebond II...or proprietary formula?

I saw Ken Smith in his video use pegs.

Are there any advantages to use pegs, dovetail or any locking mechanism?

 

[Beej]

They (and most mass-produced manufacturers) use blocks glued together. I'm not sure about the glue they use, but you can do it with regular old titebond. The advantages to using pegs/dovetail/locking mechanism (biscuits, dowels etc) is the same for any woodworking. It can strengthen the joints and hold things more true, depending on how well-aged the wood is. The 'downside' is that it's more costly, mostly in production time, as well as the fact that the nature of a fender-style solid-body electric instrument not subject to a lot of pressure/force in areas that would cause the body to split or crack on the seams.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

I've never understood why manufacturers don't dowel or biscuit the body pieces together, that would be stupid-easy to do perfectly with CNC, but I guess it's just one more operation, and they have some clamping jigs that hold everything together. On my own builds, all neck through, I ALWAYS dowel the body wings to the neck beam, it just makes glue-up nearly stress-free.

 

[Kinetic Bass]

I want to know if drilling holes for pegs effects the tone and sustain vs just a buiness decision, for example Fender Custom shop is not tied up to any business decisions, do they do any locking on CS bodies, I know most csutom shop stuff is usually one piece bodies, but some are 2-piece with grain matching.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

I can't imagine how it would change the tone in any way you could hear with human ears, but in theory the more rigid everything is, the more sustain, but I HIGHLY doubt it's quantifiable either way. I build neck-through's because I like the carved heel possibilities, not for any any perceived tone advantage. In my case, it just eliminates the stress during glue-ups, the body wings and neck beam can't slip out of alignment with dowels. Ric basses from the 70's occasionally developed "negative neck angle" (the neck folding up towards the bridge), but that was largely due them stupidly hogging out a big "swimming pool" neck pup route, and not reinforcing the joint to the body wings either side of the neck. I have a dowel jig (similar to the one linked below, minus the fancy blue anodized finish) that ensures a perfect 90 degree dowel hole and alignment side to side. If you decide to use dowels in a build, just suck it up and get one, well worth $20.

https://www.amazon.com/Beaiguna-Centering-Straight-Woodworking-Adjustable/dp/B0DGXQRR49/ref=sr_1_8?crid=1QRDBCXVAXPP4&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.vImWEngJ6N1_yzA8iJwiYo1yfxZNAwH5OxcI_MsEqcntVc6cPyqhd2Wdbxq6RYmUbvBj6SddCqCzzh8Ut5pH00CbuhabkAdzuIW2HMMrzt2Qhtal5QpNtAW35t70glV736pzd0rmP44KzOZOY5wR7HsXtdOQ8OJhmbzknrTveu9RvKRZCklG3G8JfM9LBjme5stohjSgfq5ibk1ZjqnZjhMqnuUaDX5aajjSiwVveLDw3SFXF1lTo9jqeRekGU-M69StB2TCp_zgJUnKl7rShFwPtV97CeYVdeHHAUdht5Q.3Se09zPrmzZFCfqJBvw2erfXQKlzS0e7X8h5YTejMsU&dib_tag=se&keywords=doweling+jig&qid=1778865827&sprefix=doweling+jig%2Caps%2C202&sr=8-8

 

[Beej]

I want to know if drilling holes for pegs effects the tone and sustain vs just a buiness decision, for example Fender Custom shop is not tied up to any business decisions, do they do any locking on CS bodies, I know most csutom shop stuff is usually one piece bodies, but some are 2-piece with grain matching.

I'll go out on a limb and say it has minimal impact on tone if any. Certainly less impact than say, turning your tone knob by one marker-point. I heavily chamber out my builds for weight reduction, and as long as I'm keeping a full beam down the center, there's no real difference in tone from a bass with no chambering, especially if electronics and pickup locations are the same.

Sustain is enhanced by keeping the 'beam' between nut/bridge very stiff. The stiffer, the more sustain. That said, it can also sound kind of sterile and hi-fi, and sustain is frankly pretty worthless on a bass for most music. You can get much more variety in stiffness between using an alder body and an ash body compared to doweled/not doweled. The difference between two alder bodies, one with dowels and one without, would be pretty negligible, if you could even detect it.

I'll also go out on a limb and say that the difference between a custom shop instrument and an off-the-shelf, is that the CS is more hand-made through the process, which results in a much greater cost. The actual quality difference would not be statistically significant, especially since these instruments are mass-produced, which results in a duds on the one end of the spectrum, and great instruments on the other. With all components, materials and construction method effectively the same. In other words, you aren't necessarily going to get a better instrument going with custom shop, though you will certainly pay more.

 

[ardgedee]

for example Fender Custom shop is not tied up to any business decisions

Oh they definitely are, Fender would not operate it for long as a money-losing division of the company.

They are probably making different decisions regarding how to produce instruments than the mass-production factories but the workers still have quotas to fill. If they spend too much time or waste too much material on their instruments they probably won't be at their job for long.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

I've seen some builders use biscuits, but the biscuit cutter itself is an expensive piece of kit, and I don't see any real advantage over dowels, but if you already have one…..

 

[DanAdams]

I figured that Fender must have to hire some wizards to cast magic spells to bond the boards on those fancy models.
I cant figure out why else they would be so dang expensive

Over 2 grand for a Pine bass...

 

[Low Main]

EBMM uses glue joint shaper cutters and they must use a lot of clamping pressure because their glue joints are Tight.

I've seen some 3 piece clear finished Stingray bodies that had such good wood selection and edge joinery that I had to stare at the end grain to see the profile of the shaper cutter.

I think the glue you use is much more important than the gluing alignment method. If you're gluing up body blanks, not finished parts, you can get well aligned edge joints without dowels or biscuits.

But the glue has to be rigid when cured. More rigid than Titebond. Titebond II cures even softer than regular Titebond and produces bad results.

Titebond 50 or another industrial PVA cure to a more rigid line and are better choices.

 

[Zooberwerx]

I've never understood why manufacturers don't dowel or biscuit the body pieces together, that would be stupid-easy to do perfectly with CNC, but I guess it's just one more operation, and they have some clamping jigs that hold everything together. On my own builds, all neck through, I ALWAYS dowel the body wings to the neck beam, it just makes glue-up nearly stress-free.

My IKEA furniture is held together by the same technology...that and a handful of cam fasteners.

Thanks for sharing!

Riis

 

[Engle]

I've seen some builders use biscuits, but the biscuit cutter itself is an expensive piece of kit, and I don't see any real advantage over dowels, but if you already have one…..

I bought a biscuit cutter to build my cedar deck without visible fasteners. I've used it for a repair, but I made maple biscuits for more strength. I'll probably use it next bass build.

 

[logdrum]

More sustain is not always desirable. It's a balance between damping and resonance

Anyway -- my over 100 year old bass top has a section of repair where they added wood. as well as the center seam Think about this for a minute, It is at the most 3 - 4 mm thick . The strings I currently use exert about 110 kg of pressure. ( some strings are 130 ) I do have repaired cracks but the center seam is intact. The glue is made from horse bone and hooves and it has held for more than a century

And you are worried about a 30mm wide glue surface with modern glues and only about 84 kg for a heavy set of Chromes 4 stringer. Also the pressure on upright basses is a lot of downward pressure basically to break that glue joint on the center seam and on a bass guitar it is not totally directed that way, more with the grain. Unless you are using the bass body as a cricket bat or to support a love chair -- I think this is useless worry.

 

[Smooth_bass88]

If they don't use the right glue, forget about it. The tone is completely ruined and your playing will suffer immeasurably

 

[Fender_Bender]

For the at home builder some sort of dowel is helpful to keep things aligned once you start clamping the pieces together. A big outfit like Fender will have air clamps that close with a touch of a button and things dialed in so that the pieces don't squirm around. You don't need anything large or long, even a bamboo skewer from your kitchen drawer is useful. And the smaller a dowel that is used ,the less possibility for it to have a sonic impact. I also use a couple of fine brads driven partially through fret slots when gluing a fretboard on to keep alignment in check. Remove after dry.

 

[birminghambass]

Fender is incredibly frugal. Glue costs money, so they don't use it. Same reason they stopped using any shielding at all. A Fender bass body is usually 2-5 pieces of wood held together by the finish, bridge and pick guard screws. Don't believe me? Take all the screws out of a Fender body and shake it lightly. It falls to pieces.

 

[Bruce Johnson]

Fender is incredibly frugal. Glue costs money, so they don't use it. Same reason they stopped using any shielding at all. A Fender bass body is usually 2-5 pieces of wood held together by the finish, bridge and pick guard screws. Don't believe me? Take all the screws out of a Fender body and shake it lightly. It falls to pieces.

Oh, come on now......That's just silly talk. Fender does indeed use glue and shielding when building their basses.

 

[Bruce Johnson]

For the at home builder some sort of dowel is helpful to keep things aligned once you start clamping the pieces together. A big outfit like Fender will have air clamps that close with a touch of a button and things dialed in so that the pieces don't squirm around. You don't need anything large or long, even a bamboo skewer from your kitchen drawer is useful. And the smaller a dowel that is used ,the less possibility for it to have a sonic impact. I also use a couple of fine brads driven partially through fret slots when gluing a fretboard on to keep alignment in check. Remove after dry.

Yeah, that's the real answer. We don't use big dowels or biscuits for strength when gluing up body blanks. They aren't necessary. Boards that are properly jointed and glued have plenty of strength for the job of being a bass body. Some of us use small dowels or pins to get things accurately lined up. Particularly if the the glue-up is later in the process, where the parts are partially machined. Such as mounting wings on a neck thru.

In the Fender factory, the boards are pre-cut and jointed to an accurate size, glue is applied, and they are slapped into a pneumatic clamping fixture which holds them exactly in line as the glue cures. Dowels aren't needed.

 

[Speedbird]

Decades ago, my bud was a good carpenter. He swore when properly done an Elmers wood glue joint was stronger than the wood itself. Did some destructive testing, couldn't prove him wrong. How that stuff holds up to decades of pressure and wood movement? IDK?

There must be a reason, maybe say present day Fender wants to build their MIA whatever as close as possible to how it was done back in the day? Can't REALLY be the cost

 

[winston]

I've never understood why manufacturers don't dowel or biscuit the body pieces together, that would be stupid-easy to do perfectly with CNC, but I guess it's just one more operation, and they have some clamping jigs that hold everything together. On my own builds, all neck through, I ALWAYS dowel the body wings to the neck beam, it just makes glue-up nearly stress-free.

Hot diggity dang, that looks gorgeous and well-engineered!! Is your middle name Ricky by chance?