Brian May Red Special Guitar Neck CAD Design Walkthrough

In this video, I demonstrate and discuss how I designed the neck for my Brian May Red Special guitar build using TurboCAD 2016 Professional CAD software. I begin by explaining how I worked up overall design sketches using known measurements and design details including the assumptions I made, then move on to cover the detail on the headstock, main section and tenon separately. The video is illustrated with TurboCAD screen recordings and animated renders of the 3D objects.
I created my interpretation of Brian May's Red Special by studying photographs in the public domain and the X-ray images taken in 2003 at St Bartholomew's Hospital in London; I used known measurements of commercial replicas and made some reasonable assumptions and judgements to fill in any gaps. I have collated known information about The Red Special and its commercial replicas, the Super and Special made by Brian May Guitars on my website, dsgb.net. Links to all references mentioned in this video are included below.
Throughout the video I alternate between imperial and metric units for simplicity's sake but please note that the Red Special would have been designed in the imperial system of weights and measures, as would have been the convention in 1960s Britain. I worked in the metric equivalents of imperial dimensions in TurboCAD and used a lookup table in Microsoft Excel to convert between the two.
Brian May’s Original Home Made Pickups (BHMOHM)
• Brian May Red Special ...
www.theredspecial.com/2018/01...
How Did Brian May Design His Red Special Guitar?
• How Did Brian May Desi...
Premier Guitars Rig Rundown Video (see time index 17:44 for the close up views of the neck heel)
www.premierguitar.com/videos/...
Visit the official home of the Red Special, maintained by Simon Bradley:
www.theredspecial.com
Brian May Guitars (BMG) Super Specifications:
shop.brianmayguitars.co.uk/bm...
Video Sequence Index
00:00 - Introduction.
01:25 - Guitar body and neck overall design sketches.
02:22 - Guitar neck design sketches (general overview).
03:03 - Headstock outline construction from first principles.
04:47 - Neck design sketch construction (plan view).
06:26 - Neck design sketch construction (side elevation).
07:27 - Neck thickness discussion with reference to the BMG Super.
08:25 - Neck heel discussion with reference to Premier Guitars rig rundown video.
09:26 - 3D CAD object construction introduction.
09:49 - 3D CAD object construction (headstock lozenge shape).
11:09 - 3D CAD object construction (headstock volute).
12:03 - 3D CAD object construction (main section).
13:32 - 3D CAD object construction (tenon).
14:21 - Outro.
Please check out my other KZbin videos and website, dsgb.net which cover a wide range of topics on Brian May's guitars and musical equipment.

[@RedSpecialTribute]

Amazing video Doug! love the animation renders. See you soon in October!

[@dsgb]

Thanks Andrek. Not long now. Can't wait. 👍🏻😀

[@tonymcaloon6894]

Brilliant work. The Red Special has got to have the biggest neck of any star guitar and you’ve really captured it very professionally.

[@dsgb]

Thanks Tony. 👍🏻😀 I have spent a long time studying and considering the Red Special and even longer drawing up and refining these neck CAD drawings. The motivation for making this video is to help others understand and appreciate the elegant logic behind the design and find the inspiration to work up their own sketches and plans.

[@petercole2283]

Brilliant video Doug, thoroughly enjoyed

[@dsgb]

Hi Peter. Great to get your feedback. Thank you so much. 🙏🏻😀

[@TheRedSpecialGuitarPodcast]

Awesome video Doug. I love the style of the video and the detail. So much info for people who want to build one

[@dsgb]

Thanks buddy. Your positivity and support is always greatly appreciated. 🙏🏻😀 I have avoided making purely CAD design style videos up to now because I wasn't confident that I could pitch them so they have general appeal or even i interest for Brian May enthusiasts.

[@spidey4fun]

Thanks for the video Doug. It was interesting to see how you did the CAD design work. My process was very similar.

[@dsgb]

Thanks Brad. That's reassuring to know. 👍🏻😀

[@tribesmanjohn]

Thanks, this will really help me with my build.

[@dsgb]

I look forward to seeing your Brian May Red Special build. Will your dad be playing an active role in this endeavour or all your own work? 🤔 I might have a spare set of Adeson Brian May Tri-Sonic pickups you could use. Do you have a hardware set?

[@themaninthesuitcase]

Fascinating video. I really need to revisit my design I started. I think having some kind of design document would make things significantly simpler and less messy. The project was getting messy which was a major part in which I ended up burning out on it. Fusion 360 has a great feature when I can work on a metric workspace but when dimensioning things I can put things like “1in” and it handles the conversion for me. Fractional can be done either in decimal or with a fiddly formula like ((3/8)*1in )+ 2in. Whilst not applicable here it might be helpful for other people going down this path.

[@dsgb]

Hi Chris. Thanks for your input and feedback. I've been tweaking my design and reviewing my CAD technique for several years and I agree that without a clear focus and plan/guidance document, it would be challenging and disheartening. I got disillusioned a lot with the design and build project. My motivations for producing this kind of content is twofold: to help others appreciate the elegant design underpinning The Red Special guitar and to help people with the same goals avoid the frustration associated with all the educated guesswork required. 👍🏻😀

[@tiberiolincoln5687]

Very good, thank you so much.

[@dsgb]

👍🏻😀

[@tiberiolincoln5687]

@@dsgb please, Can you draw the guitar body parts later? thank you so much.

[@dsgb]

Yes, I'll cover the CAD design of the guitar body sections in my next long format video. It will be similar to this one.

[@tiberiolincoln5687]

@@dsgb thank you so much.

[@itssoos2652]

Are you by any chance still in contact with the KZbinr basix4? His channel got hacked and all his old videos are now private

[@dsgb]

Hi. I last saw Matt Hutchison at the U.K. Red Special meet-up on October, 5th 2019. I don't keep in regular contact with him. Try the Facebook Red Special Forum group: facebook.com/groups/118925954837713

[@chickenlickin3820]

How much would you say for a complete build of the red special?

[@dsgb]

I provided an estimate here but that is likely out of date now: dsgb.net/faqs/redspecialvalue/

[@chickenlickin3820]

@@dsgb Thanks, could you produce one for me?

[@dsgb]

I am an enthusiast/hobbyist. I don't make guitars on a commercial basis, sorry.

[@rapborlongan9584]

Is the neck straight or does it have an angle? If it does have an angle, what is the angle?

[@dsgb]

I explain in the video that it is 2 degrees from tenon to main section and 5 degrees from main section to headstock yielding a total angle from tenon to headstock of 7 degrees.

[@rapborlongan9584]

Ohhhh thank you

[@dsgb]

No problem. On reflection, I might not have explicitly stated that the main neck angle from the body is accepted to be 2 degrees but I do discuss this so review that section of the video again. 👍🏻

[@stevengrantofthegiftshop1549]

Didn't Brian say the body shape is of his acoustic guitar with his own cutouts? So I guess he drew around the Egmond body? Nice video btw!

[@dsgb]

Thanks! 👍🏻😀 That comment is attributed to Brian but I'm not convinced he meant it literally. The Red Special body shape isn't close enough to an acoustic guitar body shape in my opinion. Perhaps he meant "size", i.e. length and width? 🤔 However, I do wonder whether Brian based the Red Special neck thickness on an acoustic guitar because these are often thicker than modern electric guitar necks.

[@michaeltrojanek9392]

@@dsgb I once read somewhere that the neck thickness is an accident and that he missed to subtract the fretboard's thickness from the mahogany. But like with everything else, we won't know until someone asks him 😄

[@dsgb]

@@michaeltrojanek9392I also struggle to accept this quotation which is attributed to Brian. The fretboard is 7 or 8 mm thick. This is an enormous amount to just mistakenly not take account of, especially given how long it would take to carve the neck manually. He would have to make profile gauges and check progress regularly. I don't find it to be a credible possibility that Brian and Harold "didn't take account of the fretboard thickness".

[@michaeltrojanek9392]

@@dsgb Exactly, 7mm is not exactly easy to overlook. On the other hand - there are guitars with fret markers in the wrong positions 😄 Maybe people just need any explanation for a neck thickness that must feel enormous to people who are used to super-thin shred-necks.