In response to your question on the other thread, yes, I use an 11" round block in my drill press wrapped in sandpaper.

Thank you, Bobby. Is that a block you made or something you can purchase?
I do have a drill press, so I’m half way there

I made a jig with a sled and a scissor table to hold and rotate the router.

dpgetman , I like this set up. I get what’s going on, on the left side, but how does the cutting side work?

In a production environment, I think they use a shaper (or several) with custom fixturing to hold the neck for the shaping passes. If you're not already an experienced woodworker, it's not recommended due to safety issues.

randybartlett , that sounds way beyond my pay grade

I don't do this sort of carpentry work on my banjos, ( I work on old foreign cars ??), but found the Gold Tone video fascinating and fun to watch him fit the neck. goldtonemusicgroup.com/goldton.../n-obbela
Cheers, Knight

Casey, yes I made it. I tried using a pine 2x12 first, but the end grain was a problem trying to smooth, so stacked MDF boards to achieve the height and was much easier to round without a lathe. I use double face tape to adhere the sandpaper.

Prior to the modern era, they were all cut with chisels. Some of my antiques look like they were chewed out by beavers. Only the edges need to be clean, you can't see the interior...unless you take it apart. Making it smooth and nice had no added value in a production environment...back then.

I just use chisels and sandpaper to round heel joint. With practice you can do it in less than an hour.

I have a "ROBO-Sander" for my drill press, I made a sled with a 11" curve at one end for the Robo follow berring for the heel, centre line for the neck & an adjustable wedge for the 3* +/- angle, another ROBO sander with smaller berring (I made) for the tension hoop notch, these are good for a straight heel.

Tommy

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Originally posted by CaseyJones

dpgetman , I like this set up. I get what’s going on, on the left side, but how does the cutting side work?

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Sure, the router is clamped into a little wooden square that swivels on top of the scissor table in an arc that matches the diameter of whatever rim the neck is being cut for. The scissor table goes up and down and so once the neck is set at the right angle and slid close to the router bit, you rotate drop it a centimeter rotate again drop it a centimeter until the neck is cut.

I am in the process/build of dpgetman's style cutter now. My eariler verson did not raise or lower the router but raised & lowered the neck with shims, . I bought a sissor lift & redesigning , a much better way. I will probably still cut the heel curvature with my ROBO sander & cut the heel for the TUBE on the new rig for the Tube & Plate flange

Thank you, dpgetman. That is a pretty good set up. How do you get the wooden square holding the router to swing? Also, how do you get it to swing in an arc to match that 11” radius?

To lightgauge, would post pictures of your block or send them to me? I like this idea too. I did get to visit a well known banjo builder’s shop a few months back, and he was using an 11” block mounted on a lathe motor, so it was spinning vertically

CaseyJones, here is what I use:

It looks like I would need to spend more money on tooling up than hiring a shop to do the work.
I want as perfect a fit as I can get.I certainly don't want the unseen part to be rough in any way.
Jimmy Cox once told me the accuracy of the fit of the heel is very important to the sound of the banjo.

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Originally posted by CaseyJones

Thank you, dpgetman. That is a pretty good set up. How do you get the wooden square holding the router to swing? Also, how do you get it to swing in an arc to match that 11” radius?

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The square is anchored with a bolt in the middle, so it swivels, and the router is clamped between the walls with the bit tip extended to be 1/2 the desired tater from where the anchor screw is. You can see a line drawn on the wood marking the center of the swivel. 

quote:

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Originally posted by trapdoor2

Prior to the modern era, they were all cut with chisels. Some of my antiques look like they were chewed out by beavers. Only the edges need to be clean, you can't see the interior...unless you take it apart. Making it smooth and nice had no added value in a production environment...back then.

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I'm pretty sure they used a brace and bit to drill the dowel hole too, perhaps with the ring trick to keep it level.

We tend to forget that there was a time when any joiner worth their wages could do this kind of work with a good bench and set of tools.  When we see photos of period banjo makers they are usually not surrounded by fancy scissor router jigs and stuff, just a solid bench with the wall covered in chisels, gouges, planes, spoke shaves, brace and bits, hand saws... pretty much the stuff you would find in any joiner's shop making anything.

A decent joiner could cut a heel with gouges in less time than it would take to set up a fancy jig.

quote:

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Originally posted by Joel Hooks

quote:

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Originally posted by trapdoor2

Prior to the modern era, they were all cut with chisels. Some of my antiques look like they were chewed out by beavers. Only the edges need to be clean, you can't see the interior...unless you take it apart. Making it smooth and nice had no added value in a production environment...back then.

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I'm pretty sure they used a brace and bit to drill the dowel hole too, perhaps with the ring trick to keep it level.

We tend to forget that there was a time when any joiner worth their wages could do this kind of work with a good bench and set of tools.  When we see photos of period banjo makers they are usually not surrounded by fancy scissor router jigs and stuff, just a solid bench with the wall covered in chisels, gouges, planes, spoke shaves, brace and bits, hand saws... pretty much the stuff you would find in any joiner's shop making anything.

A decent joiner could cut a heel with gouges in less time than it would take to set up a fancy jig.

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"Perfect" is the enemy of "good enough". Nobody can hear the difference between a solid-but-internally-shabby heel cut and a perfectly inlet one. Humans like to believe in magic. Hobbiests have time to dedicate themselves to perfection. Stradivarius necks were nailed on at the heel. Tone nails, evidently. 

quote:Originally posted by TLGI am in the process/build of dpgetman's style cutter now. My eariler verson did not raise or lower the router but raised & lowered the neck with shims, . I bought a sissor lift & redesigning , a much better way. I will probably still cut the heel curvature with my ROBO sander & cut the heel for the TUBE on the new rig for the Tube & Plate flange

I can't take credit for the fancy jig design, RedArrowRyan came up with that little bit of 21st century genius (though I think I saw some chisels on his shop wall as well...). The nice thing about the sliding box aspect of the jig is that you can set the neck angle with shims and the skew angle against a central line drawn on the top of the box and record those settings on the box itself so, when you need to fine tune either the neck or skew angle a bit, where you originally cut is easy to reference for the small adjustments for the re-cut. I usually wind up recutting an angle at least once, so the reference is nice to have.

I am no expert, just a hobbiest (I make between 6-10 banjos a year), but I've deferred to my betters here on the Hangout who argue that the heel-to-rim connection point is pretty crucial to getting good sound transference from the point where the notes are initiated to the point where the sound gets resonated (in addition to looking nice and professional). So, I shoot for magic when I can and go with "good enough" when I have to.

Also, nice set up lightgauge , I've tried the sanding drum approach in the past, but the one aspect I always had trouble with was with the sled, getting the angles just right, and keeping the drum itself from deflecting against the pressure of feeding the neck into the drum. Looks like you have a nice approach. I actually enjoy the jig design aspect of the process, so perhaps I'll give that method another go.

Concerning the earlier post on strad necks...those necks were all replaced later on.

Hearing the differences in an instrument with poor fitting pieces doesn't have anything to do with magic.
It does however have a lot to do with listening.

steve davis i agree and have definitely heard the difference. I purchased a used banjo a while back that just sounded bad. I knew it was a good quality instrument, but eventually I noticed the neck to pot fit on the lower part was “off.” Someone had messed with it at some point and not finished what they started. The neck was more square than radiused. I took to it with some sand paper and - far from perfect - I just made it more round, and that banjo came to life when I put it back together.
That is the main reason I started this thread. As I finish my first neck, I want to be sure that neck to pot fit is PERFECT!

This setup is pretty slick:

m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_-4ESt1...WFyaWM%3D