Neck-through-body (commonly neck-thru or neck-through) is a method of

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external electric Guitar amplifier, sound amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar. It uses one or more pickup (music technology), pickups ...

construction that combines the instrument's

neck The neck is the part of the body in many vertebrates that connects the head to the torso. It supports the weight of the head and protects the nerves that transmit sensory and motor information between the brain and the rest of the body. Addition ...

and core of its body into a single unit. This may be made of a solid piece of wood, or two or more laminated together. The strings, nut, fretboard, pickups and

bridge A bridge is a structure built to Span (engineering), span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or railway) without blocking the path underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, whi ...

are all mounted on this central core. Additional body side components (if any) that fill-out its shape are glued or mechanically attached to this central core. These are referred to as "wings". The construction technique is also used on electric

bass guitar The bass guitar (), also known as the electric bass guitar, electric bass, or simply the bass, is the lowest-pitched member of the guitar family. It is similar in appearance and construction to an Electric guitar, electric but with a longer nec ...

s. Neck-through-body construction is considerably more expensive than the traditional glued

set-in neck A set-in neck (often shortened to ''set neck'') is a traditional form of joining the neck of a stringed instrument with its body. This is typically done with a tightly fitted mortise-and-tenon or dovetail joint, secured with glue. Sonic qualit ...

and

bolt-on neck A Bolt-on neck is a stringed musical instrument neck that attaches to the instrument body with either bolts or screws, as opposed to glue and joinery as with set-in neck joints. Methods The "bolt-on" method is used frequently on solid bo ...

style construction methods. However, it's less costly than the very rare and difficult "one-piece" fabrication of an entire instrument made from a single piece of material.

History

The first electric bass guitar, the solid-body "Audiovox 736" created by Paul Tutmarc circa 1937, had a neck-through construction. "The Log", a prototype solid-body guitar built by

Les Paul Lester William Polsfuss (June 9, 1915 – August 12, 2009), known as Les Paul, was an American jazz guitarist, jazz, country guitarist, country, and blues guitarist, songwriter, luthier, and inventor. He was one of the pioneers of the solid body ...

in 1941, can be considered as a forerunner of neck-through designed instrument. Les Paul built the model using a recycled 4x4 fence post as the neck and body core, and mounted the disassembled parts of an Epiphone and Gibson archtop guitar onto it. The 1952-57 Harmony H44 had this construction feature. In 1956 Rickenbacker was one of the first guitar manufacturers to use the modern variant of this technique, although this was originally restricted exclusively to semi-hollowbody guitars.

Pros and cons

The most important benefit for the player of a neck-thru guitar is the reduction of heel mass. The heel is the term used to describe the thickened area at the body-neck junction. Body-neck connection area thickening is required for structural integrity. In the

violin family The violin family of musical instruments was developed in Italy in the 16th century. At the time the name of this family of instruments was viole da braccio which was used to distinguish them from the viol family (viole ''da gamba''). The standa ...

of instruments this area's called the "button", "saddle" or "nose". The area where the neck attaches to the body is naturally a weak zone. There's a lot of pressure exerted on the instrument due to the combined tension of all the strings pulling on the instrument between the tuners and the

. The neck-body connection area is weaker if you have to join a separate neck to a body. The screws ( bolt-on) or glue ( set-neck) used to connect the neck to the body requires significant area to be able to provide sound structural integrity to act against the string's tension and bond body to neck totally stably to ensure tuning stability of the instrument. Heel mass then becomes an obstacle when attempting to reach higher registers of the fretboard. Ibanez RG neck-thru construction

Neck-through construction allows easier access to higher frets because there is no need for a bulky heel as there is no neck-to-body connection. In such an instrument, the neck morphs into the body of such an instrument. When constructing a neck-through guitar the

luthier A luthier ( ; ) is a craftsperson who builds or repairs string instruments. Etymology The word ' is originally French and comes from ''luth'', the French word for "lute". The term was originally used for makers of lutes, but it came to be ...

can

chamfer A chamfer ( ) is a transitional edge between two faces of an object. Sometimes defined as a form of bevel, it is often created at a 45° angle between two adjoining right-angled faces. Chamfers are frequently used in machining, carpentry, fur ...

the neck-body transition area (which would be the heel) to a minimum, sometimes almost relieving the heel entirely. This allows easier, sometimes unhindered, access to the upper registers. For players of rhythm or open chords alone, or players that do not reach up to the highest registers of the fretboard in

lead Lead () is a chemical element; it has Chemical symbol, symbol Pb (from Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a Heavy metal (elements), heavy metal that is density, denser than most common materials. Lead is Mohs scale, soft and Ductility, malleabl ...

or solo playing, there is significantly less benefit accrued from this construction method. A neck-thru guitar may sound warmer than a bolt-on construction instrument, with more sustain as well as better tuning stability and more easily attainable low fret action. Scientific studies on the subject are lacking, and at least one experiment seemed to contradict the logic. In modern high-end bolt-on and set neck instruments the attainment of low action is often just as possible as with neck-thru instruments. The construction of a neck-thru instrument makes it inherently more rigid than a bolt on instrument and therefore somewhat less susceptible to temperature and humidity changes. All guitars require maintenance and benefit from careful monitoring of humidity, but perhaps, electric neck-thru guitars require the least monitoring of all wooden guitars.https://www.guitarmeet.com/the-pros-cons-of-neck-through-guitars/ Neck-through construction is harder and more expensive to mass-produce than bolt-on or

constructions. This method of construction may be somewhat more common in

bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Wood * Bass or basswood, the wood of the tilia americana tree Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in th ...

es than in guitars. Repairs to this type of neck can be more tedious if not impossible. Repairs to such instruments can be more costly because of this. In some cases, it may be easier to remove the old neck completely by removing the wings and replacing the core with an entirely component. Alternatively, such a guitar can be converted to a bolt-on or set-neck by creating a heel and affixing the new neck to the core already in place, rather than to try to repair the neck itself. However, due to the stability of this kind of construction, neck-through guitars tend to be more sturdy.

Use

This structure is used by many companies, including Parker Guitars, BC Rich, Yamaha,

Cort Guitars Cort Guitars (Cor-Tek Corporation) is a South Korean guitar manufacturing company located in Seoul. The company is one of the largest guitar makers in the world, and produces instruments for many other companies. It also has factories in Indonesi ...

Ibanez is a Japanese guitar brand owned by Hoshino Gakki. Based in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, Aichi, Japan, Hoshino Gakki was one of the first Japanese musical instrument companies to gain a significant foothold in import guitar sales in the United Stat ...

(primarily on basses), Jackson,

Alembic An alembic (from , originating from , 'cup, beaker') is an alchemical still consisting of two vessels connected by a tube, used for distillation of liquids. Description The complete distilling apparatus consists of three parts: * the "" ...

, Schecter, Carvin, ESP Guitars, .strandberg*, Dean, Halo,

Rickenbacker Rickenbacker International Corporation is a string instrument manufacturer based in Santa Ana, California. Rickenbacker is the first known maker of electric guitars, with a steel guitar in 1932, and produces a range of electric guitars and bass ...

and many others. Many configurations of the

Gibson Firebird The Gibson Firebird is a particularly distinctive solid-body electric guitar manufactured by Gibson Guitar Corporation, Gibson beginning in 1963. It features several unusual features for a Gibson guitar. It has distinctive shape. It is made wit ...

and Thunderbird are also built neck-through. The construction method is also popular with independent guitar builders, who can typically devote more time to such a labour-intensive neck joint than a mass-producing company could.

References

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