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how thick must fretboard be


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Snork Posted on Jan 3 2004, 06:51 PM

  how thick does the piece of wood that is the fretboard have to be? 

im interested too, i was just gonna have a 6mm thick board, this seems about right. im sure too thick a board is better compared to a small one....

anyhow ill be interested to see what the size is...

mike

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Well snork, since your doing an Ibanez type thing,... I think. Ibanez fret boards, are 1/4" of an inch at their thickest spot, with roughly a 16 inch fretboard radius.

Other brands are probobly around the same (thickness). So make sure your board is no thinner than 1/4" (6.35 mm for you Mike) I'm doing a fretboard install on an RG470XL, so I did plenty of measuring and such.

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yeah...1/4"

that's pretty much the standard, i'm not sure but i've read rumors that ibanez boards on the super thin wizard necks might be a bit thinner so that there can be wood on the other side of the truss rod, course this depends on the truss rod, the stew mac ones are 11mm high, but the other rod/steel plate model are about 9mm, so you do the math

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woopse, i thought that said 0.5mm :D

so what's the thickness of the actuall neck heel (excluding fb) is it still pretty much 3/4" and the neck just seems a bit lower then other guitars?? and i'm assuming both your neck pockets are the 3/4" (19mm) deep ones?

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the fret board sits on top of the truss rod, do you have to route a little channel in the back of the fret board as well as the neck??

(double action truss rod = straight channel) or does it just glue on top of the neck?? i somewhat got a grasp of this, but not completly, also, where does the fret board change height?

Curtis

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woopse, i thought that said 0.5mm :D

so what's the thickness of the actuall neck heel (excluding fb) is it still pretty much 3/4" and the neck just seems a bit lower then other guitars?? and i'm assuming both your neck pockets are the 3/4" (19mm) deep ones?

yes..3/4" deep at the heel

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so what's the thickness of the actuall neck heel (excluding fb) is it still pretty much 3/4" and the neck just seems a bit lower then other guitars?? and i'm assuming both your neck pockets are the 3/4" (19mm) deep ones?

The Wizard heel measures 0.81" or 20.6mm thick (excluding fb). The top of the S540 body is not flat, even around the neck pocket, so there's a small variation around the pocket but on average it's around 3/4". But the bottom of the fretboard sits slightly above the top of the body. Even my Wizard II neck (which is a bit harder to measure since that one's on the guitar) seems to have the same board and heel thicknesses as the Wizard.

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ok sweet, i had a feeling the 1" (25.4mm) rule would still apply, thanks alot guys

the fret board sits on top of the truss rod, do you have to route a little channel in the back of the fret board as well as the neck??

(double action truss rod = straight channel) or does it just glue on top of the neck?? i somewhat got a grasp of this, but not completly, also, where does the fret board change height?

Curtis

The freboard does not get routed, Only one side of the neck gets routed for the rod, it's installed then you glue the fingerboard on. The fretboard changes height before hand when your planning the peice of wood (for the fingerboard) to thickness, in this case you'd make the board a bit thinner then usual, do all your fret slotting, then glue it on.

The height of the fingerboard (or thickness) changes after you radius the board though, the sides of the neck will be thinner then the middle because you rounded them off to make the fingerboard shape (radius)

hope that makes things a bit more clear curtis :D

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thanks, also, took couple looks at the washburn and found out the fret board changes height at the neck pocket area and near the headstock, but everything else looked the same, this correct?

P.S. it also has a flat fret board, no radius

Curtis

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P.S. it also has a flat fret board, no radius

Curtis

i think you mean a 16" or 17" radius, which does seem fairly flat, but if you put a ruler on it, you'd clearly see it was rounded (radius'ed)

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whoa, first post, kinda confussing, a little, you glue on the fret board, then plane it down after fret slotting and thats it right?

Curtis

P.S. first guitar and neck building, so if ask too many dumb questions, then its alright to slap me over the internet

Curtis

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no problem at all, it's sunday, and my chair is extra comfy :D

ok,

-glue neck together if you're doing a laminate neck (if you don't know what i mean don't worry about it and just read on)

1.plane both the neck blank(0.81" / 20.6mm) and the fingerboard blank (0.20" / 5mm)

2. do any scarf jointing or cut out the angle for the tilt back headstock if you're doing one,

3. cut the slots for the fretboard,

4. rout the truss rod channel and then put the rod in

5. position and glue the fingerboard on top

yada yada.... 6. radius the fret board, 7. controu the back, 8, fret the neck,

is that a bit better? sorry i tend not to makes sense unless you speak derek..

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:D you know what, just take a look at lex's thread, it's pinned in the top of the solid body section of the forum

Pinned: Pictorial of 5-string fretless bass being built.

check the second page is where i think the neck starts

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