fyb

Oh, darn. I was looking at the wrong thread. I bet that left you pretty confused. lol. Sorry!

Let me see if I can answer this one correctly! Jon, a member here has a slotting service. You can send him the fretboard and he'll slot it for you for a very reasonable fee. I don't believe he radiuses boards, but you don't really want to radius the board until it's glued to the neck anyhow, to insure it's level. A radius block costs only about $10-$15 and all you need to do is use it like a sanding block. Once you've got the board radiused, you'll want to use a longer (perfectly) straight sanding stick to even out the board so that it's as close to perfectly level as possible before installing frets.

Ok, so is that a bit more usefull? Sorry about that confusion.

peace,

russ

Thanks

I will do it for $1000. Or....you could by some b/w pickguard material from stewmac.com and cut it out yourself. You should be able to do a fine job of it with very few tools, given enough time.

peace,

russ

That was a useful answer. Thanks

Bad idea or just no takers?

Hey all! I was wondering what the consensus was on getting fellow forum members to do small tasks and what not. Is it usually a good or bad idea?

So far I have only bought pre-radiused and slotted boards from Stewart MacDonald but a friend of mine just gave me a slab of rosewood that I'd like to use as a fretboard. He used to sell saw blades and knew the guys at the old Guild plant so the piece I got was a fretboard blank from them in the pre-Fender days. I'm not really ready (time, money, and the learning curve are always factors!) to do my own slotting and radiusing, so I was wondering if anyone was perhaps willing to do it, or to recommend someone who could do it (for a fee of course). All input is welcome. Thanks!

I've never seen it used this way so I was wondering how well it'd work. What do you think?

I have an acrylic Stew Mac neck pocket routing template whose outer edges work pretty well as a straight edge when I need to do straight lines with my router. I was wondering if anyone knew of something similar but longer, perhaps 3' or 4' long. It would need to be thick enough to use with a piloted router bit and very straight. What do you suggest?

Most of the tenons that I have seen, except from Gibson are like you suggest. Haven't you seen Perry's threads of his guitars, including some bolt ons that he hold by the neck without bolting them and they stay in. Look at Mykas neck jig thread to see it clearly.

Thanks for the info! I'm going to look for some of those threads.

It seems that alot of glue in necks use square-ish tenons. Do you think it's be a good idea to have the tenon follow the taper of the fretboard, so that it'd be shaped like a large parallelogram sort of like a large dovetail? It seems to me anyway that this could be stronger than a regular tenon.

The guitar I'm working on is chambered sapele with a spruce top. Do you think it'd be a good idea to make the PU routes really deep too, essentially adding more chambers? I'm using humbuckers and mounting rings so attaching the pups won't be a problem. Will the extra depth have feedback issues? Thanks for the help!

I was just wondering if a 1/2" diameter pattern bit will work OK with standard Fender neck pocket and humbucker routes, so do I need something smaller for inside the corners? Thanks!

Those look a little different from the clamps I have, but I believe are similar. This is the style I have-link

They work very well for me. I glue up soundboards, backs, and tops with them. Pretty slick really.

Peace,Rich

What do you use for the 2x2 stock?

I know Harbor Freight sells cheap stuff, but these looked like they might work pretty well for gluing up body blanks and laminating tops. What do you think? Has anyone used them?

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/disp...temnumber=39146

I can't get the search to look for P90 cause it's only 3 characters!

I'm going to be putting P90s in a flat top guitar and I was wondering how deep should I make the route? Also, in Hiscock's book he shows some deeper areas in the route for the pole piece screws and wiring. How deep should this part be? Thanks for the help!

I normally make mine about 1/4" thick, maybe 3/16" if the wood is quite strong. That thickness is partially chosen because I need covers thick enough to house the magnets I use to affix them to the body. Also, yes, it would be a good idea to spray or wipe on a light coat of sealer just to make sure the cover doesn't warp due to climate changes.

peace,

russ

Magnets are a great idea! I hadn't thought of that.

You guys have been alot of help!

I would like to do a solid wood cover for a rear control cavity. How thick do you think it should be to keep it pretty stable? Should I put more finish on the cover or even finish it on all sides to help with stability? Thanks!!!

I already have a few quartersawn maple neck blanks, roughly 4"x30"x3/4". Would these be suitable for making a scarf-joined headstock or should you start with thicker material? I was also thinking about using sapele for the headstock if I could get away with it. What do you think?

At this point, double sided tape is your friend, and imho, it will work. I used it to cut my routes and it held fine. Just don't jam your router into it too hard, just use it as a guide like it's intended.

What kind of tape? Is it something you can get @ Home Depot or something? Is residue a problem?

I'm working on a hollowed out sapele/spruce quasi-tele and I just about finished the template out of 1/2" MDF. I got the outer contours just they way I want them and I also routed out the areas that'll be the chambers. The part you see on the left is about 1/2" thick. I noticed that it has a little play in it and I'm worried that when I use my router the template will move too much.

What can I do? Can i use double sided tape to secure it? Will the residue come off? Do you think that part @ 1/2" wide is strong enough to handle the router abutting it? Any help would be appreciated!

I know that quilted maple for a neck is generally considered a no-no but I wonder how much of this is because it's a figure found in soft maple. I saw this piece of bubinga on ebay and I thought it'd make a killer neck, but I don't know if that's a good idea or not. With a wood as hard as bubinga, do you think you could get away with this as a neck? What about with carbon fiber rods in it? Here's the piece I was looking at....

I'm probably not going to try it any time soon, but that piece was a perfect size for a Fender style neck and it'd look sweet on the right guitar.

A friend of mine asked me this the other day, and I really didn't know what to say. Is there a reason that rosewood boards are left unfinished? Do you think it'd be a bad idea to finish one? What about with an oil finish like TruOil? I've seen quite a few gunk-filled and discolored boards ... wouldn't a finish help this?

I would question whether that planer is really that much different than your Ryobi. It does have a lot of cuts per in. It doesn't mention a cutterhead lock.

I did read a review about the Dewalt 13" planer when it came out. The writers liked it very much. It is about 150 more than that steel city and has a proven track record I guess. I'd like to get rid of my Jet planer/molder and buy the DeWalt and save some space in the process.

I'd say planers are an example of another machine where you get what you pay for. See if you can dig up a review somewhere on the steel city.

Marty

What do you mean by a cutterhead lock? Also, like the Dewalt for the most part but no infeed/outfeed tables makes me a bit worried. My cheapo Ryobi can make the first and last 3" of most boards unusable with snipe but maybe there are other factors too. And the Dewalt's pricey but I know that the saying 'you get what you pay for' often holds true.

Thanks for the help folks!

I presently have a $200 Ryobi planer which I picked up about 6-8 months ago, and I think it's time to upgrade. It has no infeed/outfeed tables, I get a crazy about of snipe on longer boards and it makes alot of tearout on sapele and mahogany even with brand new blades I saw this planer recently at Woodcraft and it seemed like a heck of a deal for $400. it's got a 3 knife cutterhead, 2 speeds, and infeed/outfeed tables. Anyone have any experience with this or any other Steel City tools?

Hey all! I tried searching for some info about hard ash, but I keep getting an error cause ash is only 3 letters!

I have a bunch of hard ash that I got pretty cheap and want to make a semi-hollow out of it. I'm not sure of the top wood yet, but I was thinking that hollowing out the ash would make the weight manageable and maybe keep it from being too bright tonally. Also, do you know if the ash will take stain or dye pretty evenly?

Thanks for the help!

Well thanks for the input guys. It looks like sanding might be my best option but I don't know anyone with a big enough sander. I'll try to think of something! I'm thinking maybe getting something large and very flat (a piece of 3/4" melamine or something similar) and adhering sand paper to it ... then sanding that way just to keep everything nice and flat. We'll see

I got some gorgeous ribbon striped sapele for a project I'm working on but I keep getting tear out and I just put new blades in my planer!! Most of the body blank came out fine but there is some noticable tearout in a few spots. I tried to get a pic but my camera couldn't really get it right Can I moisten the grain to raise it up some las if I were fixing a ding? Will sanding sealer cover it up some? What else can I do?? I can't find anyone locally (north central Connecticut) with a drum sander unfortunately. Thanks for the help.