Maple Fretboard Finishing?

[Hydrogeoman]

I have a maple fretboard I am finishing and I am disappointed with the results so far. It seems that I did not sand the raw wood with fine enough grit and it shows the scratches plainly in the lacquer finish.

What grit do you take your maple fretboards down to typically? I went to 320 grit but I think this is too coarse to not show through the clear finish. Thoughts?

Thanks

Greg

[westhemann]

320 is plenty fine...but i think you most likely did not move through the grits properly...or did not sand with the grain

i sanded my exploder board to 220,and there are no visible scratches at all.

[Hydrogeoman]

320 is plenty fine...but i think you most likely did not move through the grits properly...or did not sand with the grain

i sanded my exploder board to 220,and there are no visible scratches at all.

You are right Wes, I was mistaken. The scratches are in the lacquer. I concentrated on sanding between the 1st and 2nd frets tonight starting with 1800 through 6000 micromesh and it was looking pretty good until I sanded through the finish. Dang! Guess I will be shooting more lacquer this weekend.

So now my question is, what grit do I need to take the lacquer to before I can switch to my buffer? I have an the arbor buffer (like the Stewmac one) with Menzerna fine and very fine compounds. It seems like you need to sand to a very fine grit with these compounds, so if I were to use say a Meguires #2 polish with a foam pad before the the buffing compounds, what grit would I need to sand to?

I find sanding between the frets extremely tedious, so I am just looking to optimize the process and still have it looking perfect in the end.

Cheers - G

[Southpa]

Who said you had to sand between the frets after coating the fb with lacquer? Its not really necessary. I normally do it with poly. Spray it on, let it dry, scrape the finish off the frets. You have the option to polish but otherwise it should be a done deal.

Edited April 18, 2007 by Southpa

[Hydrogeoman]

Who said you had to sand between the frets after coating the fb with lacquer? Its not really necessary. I normally do it with poly. Spray it on, let it dry, scrape the finish off the frets. You have the option to polish but otherwise it should be a done deal.

So far, I have not been able to achieve a dead flat surface after I spray the nitro lacquer, thus the sanding. Hopefully, my spraying will improve with more practice and the finish will not require any leveling.

[westhemann]

sanding between frets is definately tedious...that is why if i am using a finish with good "burn in" between coats,i will spray the final coat on the fretboard with it laying flat,so i can make the coat "wetter" and it will self level without sagging.it is possible to get the coat level enough to only need buffing even with the guitar hanging,but i am not that good yet.

[Hydrogeoman]

sanding between frets is definately tedious...that is why if i am using a finish with good "burn in" between coats,i will spray the final coat on the fretboard with it laying flat,so i can make the coat "wetter" and it will self level without sagging.it is possible to get the coat level enough to only need buffing even with the guitar hanging,but i am not that good yet.

Wes, I am trying to do that very thing right now. I mixed a batch of 4 parts thinner to 1 part lacquer and layed down a wet coat with the neck laying flat. It has sat for about a half an hour now and I can still see sanding scratches. I am going to continue shooting the wet "melt in" coats every hour or so today until I don't see anymore scratches. Then hopefully I can minimize or eleminate any more sanding.

That is my plan unless any pros have other suggestions.

Cheers