sorry for bringing this up again.. I've been debating this with myself for a while now (straight vs radiused leveler). I've done it both ways with success both ways, but my calculations point to the radiused being more accurate on a non-compound fb. Forget about the strings, as long as we're leveling frets that were on say a 12" rad fb, the level of the frets should be 12+plus a bit. On 2 1/4" (wide end of fb) with a fret height of .05" the difference is .0004". Thats less than half of a thousandth - not anything we can accurately measure. So that being said, leving with a radius should preserve the fb radius more accurately than trying to mimick it with a straightedge. Not saying it cant be done because i've done it MANY times, I just like to keep things as accurate as possible, even if nobdy else notices. Now to cough up $150+ for the stewmac beam.....