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First Inlay Work Questions


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I need a few questions answered as I begin my first inlay work.

What I'm working with:

ebony fretboard, abalone inlay material, black epoxy

First off, how tight do you want/need the inlay to fit into the hole you carve?

Once you're done fitting and you place the inlay into the cutout with epoxy in it already, how much epoxy should squeeze out on top? Just a little or quite a bit to make sure everything is filled in?

What tools do you use to take away the dried epoxy on top of the inlay once the epoxy has set up?

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Squeeze outs not a big deal, just make sure it does not squeeze out into a slot because thats tougher to clean up later, that is if its already slotted.

Practicing was key for me. What I preferred was tracing my inlay onto the fretboard itself, then taking a very sharp razorblade and cutting the shape of the inlay into the board and here was the key, I cut on the inside of my pencil marks instead of cutting on them, which gave me a perfect size route for my inlays. Doing an initial cut with a razorblade also helps to prevent you from routing outside the lines because it kinda chips away at those scribed lines, I believe it will also help prevent any chips from popping out in certain woods.

Sandpaper and files work to smooth inlays and epoxy down after you install them. I liked the file for most of the rough work because it doesn't cut wood well, so you avoid sanding grooves into your board, then I cleaned up with sandpaper. Do you have any little offcuts of ebony around? Seriously before doing my first board, I practiced cutting the route many times, my first few attempts were too big and would have been noticeable, however I soon got them nice and snug and these were fairly tough inlays. I was glad I practiced prior to installing for real. BTW, I used epoxy for my inlays, which I was glad I did because after some sanding one of my inlays became see-through and I was able to cleanly remove the entire inlay with a heatgun and redo it, no problem. There are some extremely talented inlays artists that visit and frequent this site, maybe some will find this thread. J

Edited by jmrentis
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well, i use a lot of stew mac tools

my inlaying system consists of a jewlers saw, scribe, downcut router bits for my dremel w/ base (all from stewmac) and patience

that was given to me by mother nature :D, thats the most important one

sometimes i like to sit, work a little, get up when i start to get antsy and come back later when i can focus completly and not try to cut corners

its much better to take it slow. thats the best opinion i can give

but i think you will find that working with ebony (madagascar or gaboon?) is very forgiving, once polished up with a finesand paper you cant hardley see the cavity, only the MOP

good luck and keep up posted :D

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thanks for the replies. I cut the wood with a sharp knife, routed to the lines where I could, then cleaned the rest of it with an 1/8" chisel, and a pointed knife. When I started to put the first inlay in, the hole was too small, so I had to trim a bit more to get the piece into the hole. It fit snug. I did this down the fretboard until all were in place. I took the inlays out, mixed my epoxy trying not to make any air bubbles at all in it and drop filled each hole. I put the abalone on the epoxy, worked it around until the piece went into the hole. I pushed them in and worked them around a bit to make sure there were no air gaps below the inlays. A lot of epoxy came up around the inlays, which I took as a good thing so I would have complete coverage to make sure any gaps were filled.

today I'll start to file / sand down the epoxy to see how I did.

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Sounds like you did ok. I use the router bit to clean out the entire hole. I don't you a chisel or anything like that. You want the depth to be as even as possible.

For sanding, if you get a radiused sanding block, that is the way to go. That way there are go low spots on your fretboard.

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Squeeze outs not a big deal, just make sure it does not squeeze out into a slot because thats tougher to clean up later, that is if its already slotted.

Practicing was key for me. What I preferred was tracing my inlay onto the fretboard itself, then taking a very sharp razorblade and cutting the shape of the inlay into the board and here was the key, I cut on the inside of my pencil marks instead of cutting on them, which gave me a perfect size route for my inlays. Doing an initial cut with a razorblade also helps to prevent you from routing outside the lines because it kinda chips away at those scribed lines, I believe it will also help prevent any chips from popping out in certain woods.

Sandpaper and files work to smooth inlays and epoxy down after you install them. I liked the file for most of the rough work because it doesn't cut wood well, so you avoid sanding grooves into your board, then I cleaned up with sandpaper. Do you have any little offcuts of ebony around? Seriously before doing my first board, I practiced cutting the route many times, my first few attempts were too big and would have been noticeable, however I soon got them nice and snug and these were fairly tough inlays. I was glad I practiced prior to installing for real. BTW, I used epoxy for my inlays, which I was glad I did because after some sanding one of my inlays became see-through and I was able to cleanly remove the entire inlay with a heatgun and redo it, no problem. There are some extremely talented inlays artists that visit and frequent this site, maybe some will find this thread. J

thats a cool little tip there about carveing the perimeter of the design for chip out!

my tip for after the cutting and shaping, is to tape off around all your inlays well, so you can smush and wipe off excess epoxy into all the crevases without covering your board making extra work and filled in fret slots

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Thanks, cutting the shape with a razorblade first really helped me out a lot in getting a perfect route free from chips and over routing around the edges, however, it takes a bit of time to do, though I think its worth it. I can't believe I hadn't thought to use some tape to keep the board and mainly the slots clean during glue up, thats a very helpful tip as well. I was always just very careful, but honestly I had to wipe some away a couple times around those small frets, some tape will save me some trouble and hassle, thanks for that tip. J

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I read up about inlay work so that's where I got the idea of using a knife to cut the edges, then use the rotozip to clean out the middle.

I left a lot of epoxy on/under the inlay. Most of them I couldn't see because of all of the epoxy on them. I used electrical tape, (because of the thickness of it), to tape around the inlays, then filed the epoxy down until my file was dragging the tape. After that, I block sanded down until I started hitting wood and stopped.

Today I glued the fretboard onto the neck and I'll radius sand tomorrow. After that I'll fret.

Stay tuned.

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I sanded the radius into the fretboard today, but I only sanded to 220 and I couldn't wait to see what it looked like so I put some black die on it. Fan-freaking-tastic.

Tomorrow I'll continue to sand up to 800 or so then I'll 0000 steel wool it and die again. I hope it looks good after my final sand, I think it will.

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BTW, I used epoxy for my inlays, which I was glad I did because after some sanding one of my inlays became see-through and I was able to cleanly remove the entire inlay with a heatgun and redo it, no problem.

One tip I picked up from Andy DePaul (great place to buy inlay blanks, BTW!) was to paint the backs of the inlay blanks with enamel or white/pearl colored fingernail polish. Then, if your inlays get a little on the thin side when sanding, it's a lot less noticable than having the dark colored epoxy or ebony board showing through. Worked great on mine!

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BTW, I used epoxy for my inlays, which I was glad I did because after some sanding one of my inlays became see-through and I was able to cleanly remove the entire inlay with a heatgun and redo it, no problem.

One tip I picked up from Andy DePaul (great place to buy inlay blanks, BTW!) was to paint the backs of the inlay blanks with enamel or white/pearl colored fingernail polish. Then, if your inlays get a little on the thin side when sanding, it's a lot less noticable than having the dark colored epoxy or ebony board showing through. Worked great on mine!

thats sweet!

do you paint ti on the final shaped inlay prior to install or before the shape is cut?

im wondering if enamel would give real pearl more stability along the natural hairline crcks; or if it would make it so hard it would shatter trying to cut it.

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BTW, I used epoxy for my inlays, which I was glad I did because after some sanding one of my inlays became see-through and I was able to cleanly remove the entire inlay with a heatgun and redo it, no problem.

One tip I picked up from Andy DePaul (great place to buy inlay blanks, BTW!) was to paint the backs of the inlay blanks with enamel or white/pearl colored fingernail polish. Then, if your inlays get a little on the thin side when sanding, it's a lot less noticable than having the dark colored epoxy or ebony board showing through. Worked great on mine!

Funny you mention that as when I called Andy to order some more pearl to redo that inlay, he offered that piece of advice along with a few more ideas. He is a great guy and is very helpful. Whenever I need any pearl related material, I don't even bother looking around, I go straight to him, not only do I get what I want, but he makes certain you're happy with everything and that is now rare in customer service. Anyhow, it was partially my fault that it got thin. I described my initial idea and he had some scraps laying around that were prefect and he sent them with the order, but one piece that I used was fairly thin compared to a standard thickness, I could have gotten away with it, but I didn't glue the inlay up with enough radius to match the fretboard, so I ended up sanding it too thin. Andy is always a great help and made sure everything was well. Adding some color to the back, even a piece of paper is helpful, though, with standard inlays, I don't think its much of a problem, I know when you start getting fancy, these tricks can make a big difference. J

Edited by jmrentis
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I didn't glue the inlay up with enough radius to match the fretboard, so I ended up sanding it too thin.

Man, and I was afraid I was the only one who'd done that! Had the same mistake on my first fretboard inlay. Was so p.o.'d about it, that's when I called Andy and ordered all new inlay blanks (as well as a new fretboard from LMI) and started over! I got it right the second time around!

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Sanded to 800 followed up with 0000 sttel wool. After that I dyed again, and it is smooooooth and black! I doesn't even look like wood, well hardly.

I used my home made fretwire bending tool to get the radius just over 12" so the tang ends hit before the middle. I used the fret caul I bought from Stew. Mac., and pressed them in. There were a few of them that didn't want to sit right for whatever reason. Slots were clean, tangs looked like the rest of the tangs, I even tried turning the fretwire around, some were still tight. I filed down a hair of the tangs and sent them home. After I had them all seated, I hit them with CA glue to make sure they wouldn't move. I got the thin CA glue from Stew. Mac. and ran it in from the end of the fretwire. It sucked it in like solder on a copper pipe joint.

I'm done for today. Maybe tomorrow I'll trim the ends, work on the fret ends a bit then start figuring out how in the world I'm going to fit the body wings on this thing.

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hijacking con't

who is this andy guy?

website?

store name?

thanks much very;

Andy Depaule.

Website

Depaule Supply.

Your welcome.

He is a very nice guy. Actually I better make a list of wants, so I can stock up at the Handmade Instrument Show in a couple weeks. He lets you look through boxes and boxes of shell to pick out anything you want. Actually a very good idea, I always buy 4 times what I should.

Peace,Rich

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