NND - New Neck Day - 3rd time's a charm?

So I've had this Robert Cray strat that keeps insisting it's my #1. I've brought in other, higher end, strats and strat-like guitars thinking maybe I'd like one more, but so far, they're all gone and this one keeps on keeping on. The only thing I've never quite loved about this guitar is the original neck, which I like a lot but not quite as much as I know I could. A soft V neck with a maple board has always been my holy grail neck. The original 60's C neck with rosewood is a great neck by any standard, and maybe my second favorite, but I keep trying to get a good maple V neck on this one.

I tried a Jimmie Vaughan neck on it, but I don't think I ever got it set up quite right and, frankly, even though I tend to like a beefy neck, it was a little beefier than I liked. I was always aware I was playing a fat neck. That one didn't last long. Then, about a year ago I got a Roadworn 50's neck and I loved it. It slid right into place and I barely needed to touch it other than to adjust the saddles slightly for the tighter radius. I LOVED that neck but over time I found that keeping a 7.25 radius fretboard playing well is just a little bit beyond my meager set-up skills. And a few months ago I sold that one too.

So, going for #3, I thought about a Clapton neck, but they're pretty pricy and I didn't really want such tiny frets. So I bought a Classic Player 50's neck, which Fender seems to sell as an aftermarket part even though the guitar has been discontinued (maybe they just had a surplus of them?). I had that guitar for a while when I first started playing again over three years ago and I really liked the neck. It's a little beefier than the Roadworn, not quite as much as the Vaughan, it's a 9.5" radius, and has medium jumbo frets. This one needed the nut filed and tuners installed from scratch (bushings and all), so I took it to a good local tech guy. Turns out it needed a shim too, so I'm glad I took it to him - some of the stuff with this neck was above my pay-grade. Anyway, he bolted it on, and set it up perfectly and I've been playing it for about a week. It plays great, feels great. This MAY be it. I can't say I like it more than the Roadworn neck, but I like it as much, and with the 9.5" radius, I suspect I'll like it longer because I can tweak stuff on a 9.5" board as needed and keep it playing well.

Anyway, here's hoping the third time's a charm. And if not, I'll just stick the original Cray neck back on it. It LOOKS better with rosewood, but I just love the feel of a maple board and a soft-V. So hopefully, this is it's final configuration.

-Ray

unnamed by Ray, on Flickr

 

I'd pretty much figured I was gonna just stay with the Cray neck, which was NOT broke and didn't need fixing. But a few months ago I got a Martin CEO-7, my first acoustic with a V neck since my old '68 D-28 that I played as an only acoustic for 25 years. And the neck on that CEO-7 felt and feels so sublime compared to the other "good enough" MLO necks I'd played on other Martins, that I figured I had to revisit this strat one more time. I played a Baja enough to know that neck was a bit too chunky for me - and I had trouble finding any V in that profile. The Jimmie Vaughan was about as chunky but had a V. The Roadworn 50's was similar to the depth of the Cray's orignal neck, but with a great soft V and a really sublime satin finish - really sublime feeling neck. This Classic Player 50's neck is fatter than the Roadworn or Cray, but not near as fat as the Baja or Jimmie Vaughan, and it has a pretty obvious V until you get pretty far up the neck. I need to take some sandpaper to the back to de-gloss the poly finish. But I'm really liking this one a lot. Time will tell - I LOVED the Roadworn neck until I ran into setup issues I knew I was gonna have to always stay on top of - but I'm optimistic this could be a keeper.

-Ray