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Project S907_express


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The peruvian walnut is awesome, strong and light. It is prone to cracking though so you have to watch for it... best to get a finish on it as soon as it is ready to be finished.

The headstock angle is 14 degrees. On the neck for the Peruvian body it is only 9.

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I have grown tired of trying to clamp necks to the bench for fretboard radius and leveling. Decided it was time for a better jig. I already do the pre radius on the big belt sander but getting it right requires hand sanding.

The idea is to wedge the unprofiled neck in between some dowel rod pins while supporting the neck so it doesn't flex while sanding. Flex is your enemy. It is why you sand on a fretboard for 20 minutes and it still has a bow in it... if you eleminate the flex in your snading blocks and in your neck this whole process will only take 15 minutes. So I lost a good 2 hours building the jig but gained it all back using it that afternoon.

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Since the back of the neck is supported I needed a block to go under the heal for support and to use as a clamp. Most of my necks from the cnc have the same profile but some of the others are different so I need different size heal supports.

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Worked better than I had hoped.

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Using some MDF and the jointer (for the edges) I make some finishing sanding blocks. Wet/Dry 220, 320, 400 and some contact cement. I throw them away when they are done. Since they are more for polishing the MDF is usually straight enough although I do check it with my precision straight edge and square.

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Another tool I made for fretjobs... exacto blade ground with a slight hook and an edge. This does a fine job at cleaning impacted dust from the bottom of the slots. The blue tape is to stop the knurling from scratching the fretboard. I also have a pick set that has a nice hook on it I use time to time.

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I am supposed to be working on finishing some stuff... but I tell you I love making new things more than finishing things. I have 2 very fine flatsawn pieces of Limba that I am going to use to test the new neck code on my CNC. So lets glue up the blanks.

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I spent another 15 minutes truing up my scarf jig for the Radial arm saw and the results were worth every minute.

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After a very few passes with sand paper attached to the cast iron router sled (machined flat surface) they are ready to be joined. Use the 1/16" stainless pins set wide. Then grab the cut-off from the scarf and use it as a clamping caul. Geometry is fun.

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Done back to fretting...

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Looking great!

I was looking af the fret cleaning pic trying to work out why theres so much gunk - then I realised its from the radiusing.

I always use the air compresser at about 120psi to blow all that out. Takes a few seconds and saves a lot of effort!

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Glad to see I am not the only one putting side dots at the edge of the board.I never noticed before that you did it that way.

Makes it easy to line them up.... Also my boards are about 6mm so there isn't a lot of side material left once radiused.

Looking great!

I was looking af the fret cleaning pic trying to work out why theres so much gunk - then I realised its from the radiusing.

I always use the air compresser at about 120psi to blow all that out. Takes a few seconds and saves a lot of effort!

So some woods pack in so tight that even the air compressor can't get it out. Also I hate having all the dust blowing around in the shop. If you run the cleaner through once then hit it with the shop vac it gets most of the dust. Then a blast from the air compressor finishes it off without putting tons of nasty Bocote dust in the air.

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So some woods pack in so tight that even the air compressor can't get it out.

Maybe you just need to get a bigger compressor! Mine is set standard at about 120psi which would cut the skin off your arm if you're not careful!

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Glad to see I am not the only one putting side dots at the edge of the board.I never noticed before that you did it that way.

This seems to be a trend at least for these current builds. I seem to remember it happening occasionally in the past, but not on every build.....is my memory correct RAD? Is this going to be a permanent design factor to your brand?

One has to be super accurate when choosing to do this. The line next to the dots will show the slightest varience in placement that may have gone unnoticed otherwise.

SR

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Glad to see I am not the only one putting side dots at the edge of the board.I never noticed before that you did it that way.

This seems to be a trend at least for these current builds. I seem to remember it happening occasionally in the past, but not on every build.....is my memory correct RAD? Is this going to be a permanent design factor to your brand?

One has to be super accurate when choosing to do this. The line next to the dots will show the slightest varience in placement that may have gone unnoticed otherwise.

SR

No telling.... until a machine starts doing them regularly there is a chance I change my mind. These things evolve year to year anyway. This is one of those things I still do by hand because I haven't wanted to build a jig. Plus you need a jig for all the scales and not sure my ocd would let me build only one for 25.5... You have to know your limitations.

For now crooked dots are a feature of the brand! :P

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I always seem to have one drift off

VVTF is it with that? There is always one that is just off. Used to always be the 24th or 12th fret were they were right next to each other. I had to fix that as that usually looked bad...

Now all my customers that read these threads are looking at their guitars going "VVTF? Why did I never notice that?"

Good thing most of them can't read ;)

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