1 question as I am Trying to build a Duesenberg lap steel.

[Steve Comontofski]

Hello: We all know the beauty of a Duesenberg lap steel guitar. I have bought all the Duesenberg parts but have been stumped by one thing. Is there anyone out there that has a Duesenberg? Can you measure the distance from the nut to the bridge for me? Inches or MM. I have the distance of at least 27 inches and I am using a 22 frets instead of 24. Please help me.

Steve

[Karlis Abolins]

The Duesenberg website has the following info for the fairytale:
Body/Neck Wood: Korina (+ Maple top on headstock)
Width at nut: 65 mm / 2.56"
Dimensions: 94 x 19 x 4.2 cm / 37" x 7.48" x 1.65"
Stringspacing: 54 mm / 2.13"
Fingerboard: Black anodized aluminum
Scale length: 648 mm / 25.5"

scale length is the distance from the nut to the bridge.

[Steve Comontofski]

I appreciate your response. The problem is that distance of 25.5 can't be right. If one uses a 24 fretboard, plus 2 pickups with a few inches of spacing, the distance is almost 30 inches. I think they must be using the capital in some creative way to get the 25.5 . I need someone who has any model and can physically measure, please.

[Bill McCloskey]

how long is your fret board? a 24 fret fretboard on a 25.5 scale neck should be about 19.1"

[Karlis Abolins]

Bill is right about 24 frets equaling 19.1". 24 frets does not mean 24 inches. Each octave is half the length of the previous octave. The 12th fret of a 25.5" scale guitar is half the distance of the scale length or 12.75". The next octave (frets 13 through 24) is half of the 12.75" (6.375") to the right of the 12th fret at 19.125".

If you have a guitar handy, you can check the arithmetic yourself. The 12th fret should be half the distance from the nut to the bridge. If the guitar goes up to the 24th fret, you can also check that position. Some guitars only go up to 22nd fret.

I made a guitar which I call a Doozietone based upon the Duesenberg model. I made it based on the specs from Duesenberg and I can assure you that the 25.5" scale is correct.

Karlis

[Steve Comontofski]

Thank you Bill and Karlis very much .I knew I was missing something, and it was the second octive being about 6 inches. That's a beautiful Doozie Karlis. If I can ask 1 more favor, Is the distance from the end of your fretboard to the bridge roughly 6 1/2 inches to equal 25.5? That is the big question I have. All the people I read about building these warn about getting the distances correct so I will fret the right note.

[John Hyland]

Measure the distance to the 12th fret and multiply by 2 to get the scale length. It’s that simple.

Caveat though, ensure the first fret is a full distance and somehow not cut out to accommodate the nut.
Regardless of how you set the scale you should check this. You can check this as the nut to the 5th fret is equal to the 5th to the 12th.

[Karlis Abolins]

Steve, the location of the frets is the most critical part of getting a good result. Locating the frets correctly will give you a guitar that will be a delight to play. The fretboard is just a physical construct that contains the frets. The length of the fretboard is immaterial to the end result as long as the frets are in the right location. The scale length is the basic starting point for fret calculation. It is the distance from the nut to the bridge. To be more precise, it is the distance between the place on the nut where the strings touch the nut and the place on the bridge where strings touch the bridge. If you use rollers on your nut, then the top of the roller is the location of the nut. Each fret location is based on this point including the location of the bridge. Below are the distances from the nut (top of the roller) to each fret. The distance to the 1st fret is 1.431 inches. The distance to the 2nd fret is 2.782 inches and so on. You will notice that the distance to the 12th fret is 12.750 inches which is half of the 25.5 inch scale length

scale length 25.5
1 1.431
2 2.782
3 4.057
4 5.261
5 6.397
6 7.469
7 8.481
8 9.436
9 10.338
10 11.189
11 11.992
12 12.75
13 13.466
14 14.141
15 14.779
16 15.380
17 15.948
18 16.484
19 16.990
20 17.468
21 17.919
22 18.344
23 18.746
24 19.125

If you use the Duesenberg Multibender, you will have to be careful to line up the bridge rollers on the Multibender so that they line up perfectly and are the same distance to the front of the Multibender. When you install the Multibender, you want to make sure that the tops of the rollers are 25.5 inches from the nut (tops of the nut rollers).

I wish you well on this project. If you take care, you will have a beautiful guitar that will give you years of enjoyment.

I purposely am not answering your question about the distance from my fretboard to the bridge. My guitar has only 21 frets so it does not match what you are building.

Karlis

[Steve Comontofski]

Karlis: Thanks again as you spent a lot of time on your answer. I'm embarrassed as I should have asked AI Google for my question. That would have saved weeks of trying to figure it out. The answer to my question is: does the number of frets affect the 25.5? The answer is no. I too want to have 22 or 21 frets so I can spread the distance between the 2 pickups. Karlis, your choice of wood is excellent and beautiful. Mine will be painted with acrylic white trim, made with very heavy mahogany. Didn't know how heavy that wood is. I'll post a picture when done.

[Jim Palenscar]

I make laser engraved fretboards for folks and use all different scale lengths and they are accurate to .001". That being said- typical lap steels have no rollers so the 0 point is right at the nut. If there are rollers you need to remove the distance from the base of the neck at the nut to the center of the roller- in many cases that's about 1/8" nut still need to measure. I also measure from the center of the roller or the start of the nut w/o rollers to the center of the changer or neck side of the bridge, divide by 2 and drop a center point down on the neck which will be the 12th fret and put a line there on a piece of tape on either side of the fretboard area. When you fix the fretboard to the neck you center the 12th fret there. This gets you about as accurately as possible and if there are any fretboard fret placement problems it will minimize their effect. Once Greg Leisz had an Emmons that he said was on lots of recordings but he was always fearful of playing above the 12 fret as it didn't sound quite right. When we measured the placement of the 12th fret it was at least 1/8" off so we replaced the fretboard and all was well. There is always a reason.