JM-1 The King's 2nd PitBull build

[king casey]

May be a silly question, but what is the purpose of your centre line?

I have the neck stuck to a sheet of perspex with double sided tape.
The perspex is bolted to the desk along with a straight 'L' bracket.
I have a centre line on each end of the sanding block....which is lined up with the line marked on the neck.

Objective is to run the block along the edge of the bracket whilst being centred on the neck.
I keep sanding until the painted line disappears.
At that point the neck has a radius of 7.25".

I used 180 grit sandpaper on the maple neck and it took a couple of hours elbow grease.
The same setup on the rosewood and it was about half an hour.

cheers, Mark

Edit: Here's and image of the setup in action from the Tele-Strat build diary.

[Simon Barden]

May be a silly question, but what is the purpose of your centre line?

He likes playing middle-of-the-road music.

[king casey]

He likes playing middle-of-the-road music.

Doh!! ...hey that's a term you don't hear much nowadays.
Who would be considered 'modern day' MOR?

Anyway Yes McCreed, you come up with your own method of cat skinning and if it works..

I did invest in a longer radius block so I can get both hands on and really give it a work-out.

I think if you keep long sweeps past each end there shouldn't be any unevenness. (is that a word?)

cheers, Mark.

[Fretworn]

Doh!! ...hey that's a term you don't hear much nowadays.
Who would be considered 'modern day' MOR?
.

Nowadays, probably Ozzy Osbourne.

[jugglindan]

<snip> there shouldn't be any unevenness. (is that a word?)

Yes, yes it is.

[McCreed]

Ah, I see now.

I asked because I'm going to be doing another re-radius (done 3 already) and I haven't marked a centre line or used a jig of any kind. I do secure the neck to my bench so it doesn't shift around while I'm sanding though.
I just use a radius block and do lots of checking with my gauge as I go. And as all the fretboards have been finished, I can see where the material is coming off by where the finish is left, as well as by the fret markers.

I haven't had any issues doing mine this way, but I can see how your jig could be helpful.

[king casey]

What's going on with fretwire?
I did buy some from Alibaba as it was cheap.
Took a friggin age for it to appear in my mailbox though.



On ebay it's generally sold in 1.8 metre lengths (so not enough for 2 guitars) starting about $30.
So there's no economy in buying it in lengths.

Meanwhile it's inspired me to fish all the frets discarded thus far out of the bin and use them again.

cheers, Mark.

[McCreed]

1.8 metres gets me approx. 1.5 - 22 fret necks (actually 32 frets total).
Including postage, it works out to about $1.78/fret. Considering I used to pay $350-375 for a fret job done by someone else, I don't think that's too bad. If I bought more quantity it would go down, but I don't need to keep that much stocked.

And FWIW, that is US-made fret wire.

[king casey]

Having done a couple of them already I can see there's a hefty labour bill involved getting a professional to do it.
Still, those pre-cut frets from Alibaba represent a fairly attractive deal.

Anyway, I've salvaged the frets that I removed and am in the process of re-fretting the neck.

cheers, Mark.

[king casey]

Ages ago I bought some nut bone blanks from ebay.
Can't remember how much but it must have been cheap.


There were originally 5 in the packet and at x2 per blank there's a total of 10.

What put me off was the fiddly size and no clamp to hold them in place whilst carving took place.
After my brain wave with using perspex and double-sided tape for the fret-board radius...


Using sandpaper and the 7.25" radius block I now have some nut blanks.


One at the top is first cab off the rank.
The two bottom are the original plastic ones that they will replace.
...and I was considering buying yet another Tusq nut..
cheers, Mark.