Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Painting? Routing? Set-up tips? Or just straight-up making a guitar from scratch? Post here, and post pics!

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bobnagy
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Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Post by bobnagy »

Hello fellow short scale lovers !

I have been on a quest for a professional quality short scale instrument, specifically a Strat, for quite a number of years now. I am writing here in the hope that somebody will have info to assist me, and also to see if we can join together in this effort to make short scale instruments easier to come by. Supply and demand, you know, so let’s make some demand.

First off, the term short scale is not very exact and can mean many things, so let me be clear about my short scale preference. The scale length that I am interested in is 22.718�. (I also discuss the scale length of 24.069� below.) I am not interested in any other short scale, such as 22.75�, 23.5�, 24�, etc. I will explain why below.

Professional quality is important to me, since I have been playing guitar for over 50 years. Short scale beginner’s instruments just are not good enough, and nobody is really making any pro level short scale electric guitars. And even if some company would make them, there would not be enough variety. Lastly, I prefer a Strat, so...

I have been trying to find a luthier or custom guitar shop to make a custom short scale instrument, but so far I have struck out. Some people call this a fool’s errand. Others tell me it won’t work for various reasons. Still others say they have no time to build something like this. Etc.

In the meantime, since I need to have something short scale to play, I have attempted various things as workaround solutions. These are :

Shorty attempt #1) I used a Squire Mini Strat neck with a normal sized Strat body. While this works for the most part, there are some issues :
a) The scale length (22.75�) is not perfect for this short scale neck to be used as a “conversion neck�. Thus, it requires a lot of saddle movement to achieve proper intonation. The first string saddle has to even move beyond the extreme end of range that it was designed for. This is again with a normal Strat body with a tremolo. To resolve this, I had to use a different type of saddle for the first string, one that has its height screws farther apart so they can straddle the mounting screw of the trem. Yah, that’s wacky. I then had to use a longer intonation screw with this saddle, so that it can be placed forward enough (toward the nut) to achieve proper intonation. The other 5 saddles can be moved far enough without resorting to this hackery.
b) The Squire Mini Strat neck is not exactly made of high quality materials, so it needed a lot of work to finish the fret ends, replace the nut and tuners, etc., to get it up to decent pro playability.

Shorty attempt #2) I detuned a normal scale Strat neck by 2 half steps and placed a capo on the second fret. This also works, but has other issues :
a) The dang dots are all in the wrong places, and having to mentally transpose and compensate for this gives me a headache.
b) The capo gets in the way of fingering chords at low frets.
c) The neck is (feels) wider than it should be, because the “nut� is no longer located at its narrowest point. So if you like narrower necks (as I do), you’re not going to be happy.

Both of these workaround solutions do give me something that is playable, but alas it’s just not right and not what I want. And so, my quest continues and I am here to ask for your help. I also wish to propose an idea, and see if anyone else is interested.

As I mentioned above, my desired scale length is 22.718�. The reason for this odd size is that it’s exactly mathematically correct for such a neck to be a “conversion� neck when used on a normal sized Strat body. This dimension of 22.718� is the distance from the second fret of a normal scale Strat neck. In other words, if you would take a normal scale Strat neck and replace its second fret with a nut, bingo, you have a 22.718� scale Strat conversion neck (except that it would look weird). Likewise, 24.069� is the distance from the first fret of a normal scale Strat neck.

I would like to approach a guitar shop or luthier that has CNC machining capability and that can build custom necks. I would like to tell them that there are 100 people on shortscale.org that are interested in buying something like this. I suspect something like this may be financially necessary to encourage somebody to invest the time and therefore money necessary to reprogram the CNC machine to these short scale dimensions. So if you have interest in this, then please let me know.

To repeat for clarity, what I am suggesting is to build true conversion necks that can be bolted on to any standard Strat body, and it would work with only minor intonation adjustment. It would NOT require moving the bridge, hacking the neck pocket, using a different sized body, etc. It would be a complete bolt on and go solution for turning any Strat into a short scale instrument with a simple neck swap.

The 22.718� neck would have 19 frets. The 24.069� neck would have 20 frets. It may also be possible (maybe) to add one extra fret to these via a fretboard overhang, as some 22 fret normal scale Strat necks do.

With a neck like this, any Strat could be made into a short scale instrument easily, without having to figure out what neck works on what body, where to find a rare old Fender neck that may be close enough, where to find one of the few short scale instruments that do exist, etc etc etc. This neck would make short scale Strats common and easy, and anybody could have one without any hassle.

If anybody knows a luthier or custom shop that is interested in building something like this, please do let me know. If you yourself are interested in this idea, also please let me know. If anybody has any concerns, questions, other ideas, etc., again please let me know.

Thanks !
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Post by bobnagy »

First of all, I want to give large thanks to all of the people who contributed to and compiled the section containing measurements etc. of various Fender necks of all scale lengths. That is hugely useful and excellent. Thanks to all of you many times.

Secondly, I am surprised that nobody has responded to my original post. I thought for sure there would be other folks attempting to do what I am doing - namely, to construct a short scale Strat using commonly available standard parts. Ideally, a bolt on and go solution that does not require major surgery such as neck pocket hacking, bridge movement, etc. According to the measurement info here, there is no really good way to do this with existing necks. Every neck in this database is not appropriate to attach to a Strat body. Even in the best case scenario, the string saddles would need to be moved more than a quarter of an inch toward the nut to correct the intonation. In many or perhaps most cases, this is not possible, as there is not enough movement range to go that far.

The only solution, I think, is to create a custom neck, with the correct dimensions for it to bolt up to a standard Strat body and just work. I had thought that others would have reached the same point of frustration and failure that I had, in attempting to use an existing Fender or Squire shorter neck, and realized there is no such solution available, leaving only a custom neck as a real possibility. But there have been zero replies.

I have begun the work to do this, despite the expense of having a luthier do custom CNC machine programming to produce such a neck. As soon as I can, I will post a picture of the neck, work in progress.
The neck I am creating has a scale length of 22.718" and 19 frets.

More details and pictures as this work continues...
Anybody else interested ?
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Post by Fakir Mustache »

Not really on topic, but it would be so much easier to go the other way around and build a body. Guitarbuild UK has strat bodies with no routs except for the neck at pretty low prices, and I think Allparts offers them too. Although obviously a pain if you want a standard strat with the moving tailpiece.
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Post by bobnagy »

>>> it would be so much easier to go the other way around and build a body

Thanks for your reply.
I think that's very on topic actually, and a good idea well worth discussing.
After all, the goal is to have a short scale Strat, and the path to get there is less important, so long as it's reasonable and fits the needs.

However, there are some detriments to this idea :
1) There are not many standard Fender/Squire very short necks available (22.75" inches approx.). Of the necks that are available, they may be difficult to find, or expensive, or low quality materials/workmanship. I don't want to compromise on quality, nor struggle to find something to buy. And if I have to pay a high price, then I may as well just go for a custom neck, and get a neck that truly fits my preferences best.
2) A body that is not standard Strat size would likely also require a non-standard (non-Strat) pickguard ?
3) A body that is not standard Strat size, and/or a neck that is not standard Strat butt end to bridge distance, would require non-standard measurements for bridge routing, etc.

In my case, I bought a Warmoth body without bridge routing, and am having an Evertune bridge installed on it, with this custom short scale neck. I believe that Evertune provides templates to be used for placing the bridge on the body and routing the holes for it. If the bridge needs to be moved from this expected location, this adds some work/risk to the endeavor. So my overall feeling is that the best solution for me is to find a way to stick with standard measurements of everything, as much as possible. Ideally, only the neck should need to be different, but the rest of the guitar should be possible to remain completely standard in every way.

The other benefit of my approach is that, should I some day wish to sell this instrument, I can simply place a standard scale neck on it. Since few people will likely want the short 22.718" scale I love so much, so having the entire body etc. be standard allows me to swap things back to the normal scale that the rest of the world expects, and thus to sell it more easily.
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Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Post by bobnagy »

Some pictures of the new custom short neck :

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Post by NickS »

I admire your tenacity and determination to get it just the way you want it, Bob. Please keep updating us as it progresses.
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Post by Thom »

Not something I’d be interested in personally, but it is interesting to read and to see it come to life. Thanks.
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Post by bobnagy »

>>> Please keep updating us as it progresses.

Sure, I'm happy to do so !

>>> I admire your tenacity and determination to get it just the way you want it, Bob.

Thanks.
This has been a multi-year dream.
Previous efforts, which attempted to save money by using only standard available parts, have all failed to produce a fully satisfactory result.
So I have no other option it seems besides spending some money on a custom neck.
Either that, or give up, which didn't seem palatable.
I love this shorter scale so much, that I just had to see this through.

I have always felt, over the 51+ years that I have been playing, that the guitar scale is too long.
For most of that time, I simply accepted it as normal, and made the best of it, since I had never seen a truly short scale guitar.
But when I played a Baby Taylor (22.75") for the first time many years ago, I suddenly realized that a shorter length was "a thing", and it made playing intensely more fun for me.
And so I am now on the road to a fully custom instrument.

>>> Not something I’d be interested in personally...

It still surprises me however that many other people have not hit the same brick wall that I did.
Ok, so maybe many folks here do not want to go as far as I am, with a scale length of 22.718", but this whole forum is all about short.
So, what do all of you do ? For you, how short is short ?
If you want a short scale Strat, what is the scale length you prefer, and how do you make it happen ?

As I mentioned in my original post, I don't think ANY combination of standard Strat body plus ANY non-Strat Fender neck truly can work.
Mathematically, each such combination requires bridge saddle movement which goes beyond available range, or hackery involving cutting and moving things.

Companies such as Warmoth produce supposed short scale necks and bodies, but I think their minimum scale is 24.75, which is better than 25.5, but not short enough for me.
I also suspect that 24.75 is not short enough for most of the folks in this forum.
Do you just give up on making a Strat short scale, and go with a Mustang or other model of instrument ?
Or are there some other ideas that work that I have overlooked ?

It is also mathematically possible to go the custom route as I have done, but with a 20 (or 21) fret 24.069" scale neck, which would bolt on to a standard Strat body without hackery.
Would any folks here be interested in that maybe ?

Thanks for the opportunity to discuss this here, and thanks for your responses.
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Post by BearBoy »

bobnagy wrote:So, what do all of you do ? For you, how short is short ?
My shortscales (Jaguars and Mustangs) are 24". Not sure that personally I would want anything shorter than that tbh.
bobnagy wrote:If you want a short scale Strat, what is the scale length you prefer, and how do you make it happen ?

It is also mathematically possible to go the custom route as I have done, but with a 20 (or 21) fret 24.069" scale neck, which would bolt on to a standard Strat body without hackery.
Would any folks here be interested in that maybe ?
I don't have a Strat but have been thinking of picking one up for a while now. TBH I was just going to get a normal one with a 25.5" scale. Although I really like my shortscales, I do have other guitars with 24.75" or 25.5" scale and they're fine for me. If there was a simple (and cheapish) way of bolting a shortscale neck on a Strat (or Jazzmaster) then I would be interested. I suspect going the custom route, as you have, would be fairly expensive though and the benefit, for me, probably wouldn't justify the cost.

Good luck with your project though! Am interested to see how it all works out.
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Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Post by bobnagy »

To illustrate how I got to the point of creating a custom neck, here are some pictures of my previous (non-custom) attempts.

Shorty 1.0, made from an Indo Squire Strat body, and an Indo Squire Mini Strat neck.
The neck required a bunch of work to make it playable.
New tuners, new nut, and fret work.

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The main issue with this guitar is that proper intonation required moving the saddles a lot toward the nut.
This saddle movement was not possible with the existing bridge.
To resolve this, I had to replace the 1st string saddle with a different type.
This alternate saddle used a wider height screw spacing, thus allowing the height screws to partially straddle the trem plate pivot screw.
It barely worked.

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The next problem with this guitar was that the trem, as usual, lacked shall we say, "tuning integrity".
I have a very deep love/hate relationship with trems.
I bought my first Strat in 1982, and since then have loved the ability to warble and whang, but I have likely not played a single note in tune since then.

For this very reason, I decided to embark upon the project to create Shorty version 2, which will be the subject of my next post.
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Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Post by bobnagy »

Here is Shorty version 2.

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WTF Bob, this doesn't look short at all, you say ? Correct, but read on if you wish.

To attempt to resolve the tuning issues with Shorty version 1, this project includes an Evertune bridge.
By the way, if any of you don't know what an Evertune is, I seriously recommend that you immediately stop reading my blabbering here and go find an Evertune to play.
It will change your life. I am not exaggerating.

Unfortunately, the Evertune is not a trem, although they have been promising a trem version some day for years.
It therefore leaves me with some sadness to no longer be whammy enabled, but the Evertune is just so incredible that the gladness of playing always in tune overcomes the loss of the trem, at least somewhat.

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The pictures above shows Shorty 2 as originally purchased. It is a MIM Strat, and it has a standard scale neck on it.
I then took the Squire Mini Strat neck from Shorty 1, and bolted it on to Shorty 2.
At that point, I realized that proper intonation was not possible.
The first string saddle could not move far enough to intonate correctly.

This Evertune bridge was installed in this guitar by a qualifed Evertune installer.
I therefore have to assume that they did it correctly.
I think Evertune provides templates to correctly place the bridge on the body and locate the areas to route.
However, you can see in the pictures above that the first string saddle is quite close to its forward limit of travel.
And of course in this picture this guitar has a standard scale Strat neck on it, which is how this guitar was when the bridge was installed.
So with the short neck on this body, and its requirement to move the saddles ever further towards the nut, it just would not work.

Moving the bridge on this guitar would be not a great idea.
Buying a new blank body and routing/moving the bridge could work, but would require non-standard measurement and procedures, etc.

And so, Shorty 2 as originally intended was a failure.
I therefore put a standard scale Strat neck on this guitar again, use .011 strings, tune down a whole step, and slap a capo on fret 2.
This gives me the 22.718" scale I desire, but now the position dots are wrong and I feel like a horn player, transposing in my head as I play.

Shorty 2 is playable though, and it stays in tune. As long as I keep my eyes closed and avoid looking at the dots too much, I am more or less OK.

But obviously this is not a completely acceptable solution, thus leading to Shorty 3, the current custom extravaganza currently in progress.
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Post by Bacchus »

I know it shouldn't be the main talking point in this thread, but I'm really troubled by the jigsaw mats that are sitting beside each other and not connected.
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Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Post by bobnagy »

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what I call attention to detail !
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BillClay
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Post by BillClay »

I could be way off here, but wasn't the 90s Mexican duosonic neck a shortscale conversion that could be bolted onto a 25.5 body?

Either way I'm sure your custom neck is of really high quality and hopefully everything you wanted.
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Post by bobnagy »

>>> wasn't the 90s Mexican duosonic neck a shortscale conversion that could be bolted onto a 25.5 body?

All of my measurements quoted here come from the marvelous measurement data compiled by the folks of this board.

The bridge placement on a standard Strat body gives a distance of 7.08" from the butt end of the neck to the bridge line. Any conversion neck for a standard Strat body must adhere to the distance of 7.08" from butt end to bridge line, in order for proper intonation to be plausible.

The butt end to bridge line distance is subtracted from the overall scale length, and the difference is the usable length of the neck, from nut to butt end. Within this usable distance, you obviously must fit all of your frets. If you do this with a neck that has a scale length of 22.718", you find that you only have room for 19 frets. You could sneak one extra fret in there if you use a fretboard overhang, but that's kind of cheating, and thus I only discuss frets on the actual neck, not on an overhang.

The Squire Strat Mini neck has 20 frets, a scale length of 22.718", and measures 15.906" from nut to butt end. It requires 6.811" from butt end to bridge line.
The 93-97 MIM Duo Sonic neck has 20 frets, a 22.718" scale, and measures 15.875" nut to butt end. It requires 6.843" from butt end to bridge line.

When you add this additional (20th) fret to a 22.718" scale neck, you increase the length of the neck from nut to butt end, so you then must move the bridge or saddles closer to the butt end of the neck to compensate. To make these necks work on a standard Strat body, you need to move the bridge or the saddles the difference, 0.269" (Strat Mini) or 0.237" (MIM Duo), closer to the neck. This usually is not possible, or too difficult to achieve via hackery (neck pocket mod, bridge movement, etc.).

I suspect it was a marketing decision by Fender to make all of their (approximately) 22.75" scale necks have 20 frets. Most likely a 19 fret neck (anything less than the round number of 20) seems tiny and has a negative perception. So they chose 20 frets, and thus created necks which have dimensions incompatible to be used as a "Strat short scale conversion". I therefore believe that ANY 20 fret 22.75" (approx.) Fender neck cannot work on a Strat body. It may be possible in some cases to get the intonation close via minor hackery, as I did with Shorty version 1 above, but in general it's not a good universal solution.

The custom neck I had created for me, shown above, is a 19 fret neck, has a scale length of 22.718", and measures 15.638" from nut to butt end. Thus, it requires 7.08" from butt end to bridge line, and works correctly as a "Strat short scale conversion".

Similarly, a 24.069" Strat short scale conversion neck would contain 20 frets, and measure 16.989" from nut to butt end, to maintain the required standard Strat distance of 7.08" from butt end to bridge line.

Any (approx.) 24" scale neck that contains more than 20 frets won't work either, for the reasons explained above.
All 24" scale Fender necks that are listed in the data on this board have 22 frets, measure, 17.75" from nut to butt end, and require 6.25" from butt end to bridge line.
So none of them will work on a standard Strat body.

Anybody who wants to create a short scale conversion neck for a standard Strat body has two options that I know of. (Other scales lengths could also work, but you'd have to work out the math for them.)

1) 24.069" scale, 20 frets, 16.989" from nut to butt end, or
2) 22.718" scale, 19 frets, 15.638" from nut to butt end

If anything I say here is wrong, I kindly request a correction.
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Post by BillClay »

Thanks for the info! I'd always thought because of the scale length it'd be a drop in replacement, that's a bummer about the extra fret turning it from a plug and play situation into a "hack into the body or chop down the neck" one
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Post by Thom »

This is really interesting, and I applaud your process and approach. I guess for most people here the attraction was maybe less the scale length but the guitars themselves. Personally I first got a Jagstang, and the neck on it is incredible - super skinny, 24� scale. From there interest in Mustangs, Jaguars, Duo Sonics etc. grew. I once had a ‘62 Duo Sonic 22.5� scale which was a bit too short for me (as well as being upside down!).

I would say that most people here aren’t that interested in strats, so the idea of a short scale strat isn’t that appealing. Newer shortscales, though not as short as yours, like the Toronado, Cyclone, Super Sonic are interesting and more likely to draw people here I would say.

Having said that, in the past year I’ve moved to 25.5� myself and almost exclusively play Jazzmasters or my Strat. Something I never thought would happen. I picked up my Jagstang this weekend for the first time in a while and nothing beats that neck!
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Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Post by bobnagy »

>>>
I would say that most people here aren’t that interested in strats, so the idea of a short scale strat isn’t that appealing. Newer shortscales, though not as short as yours, like the Toronado, Cyclone, Super Sonic are interesting and more likely to draw people here I would say.
<<<

While I can understand that there is short scale life beyond the Strat, it's surprising to me that there seems to be very little interest in a short scale Strat. The Strat is the most popular electric guitar of all time, so just based on mathematical probability, somebody else must have thought about having a short Strat. Maybe it's because there is no good way to create a short scale Strat by using existing standard parts. No shorter Fender neck has the right dimensions to work well on a Strat body and allow proper intonation. Perhaps going the custom route, as I have, is not appealing to many people. There is always risk associated with trying something new. And the cost of a custom neck is not cheap.

But for anybody who is or may be interested in a short scale Strat, I hope the story of my adventures will help you.
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Custom short scale conversion necks for Strat

Post by bobnagy »

I just got the new neck from the luthier yesterday.
It is completely beautiful. They did a superb job.
On Friday, I'm off to see my other luthier with all of the parts for Evertune bridge routing, assembly, fit and finish.

Here is a picture of the new neck next to a Squire Strat Mini neck, showing the difference in length, as I described above.
Both necks have the same scale length, but the Squire neck has one extra fret, which makes its dimensions incompatible with a standard Strat body.

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Post by Thom »

Excellent. Look forward to seeing it assembled.