#2 - EXM-1 Guitar Kit...

[rjmc]

Talk about turning around the mission impossible. Nice work. Came out great!

Hi,

Thank you so much for so kind words. It's been, yes, I've repeated it over the last responses, but it was indeed a hell of a journey that is not completed. Learned so much, and somewhere in the process, I was almost giving up. I'm glad I didn't.

Thank you!!!!!

[DarkMark]

Really like how it turned out and “Damn, nice looking work bench!”.

[rjmc]

Hi,

Thank you for your kind words. Working on an Ikea module and on this workbench... two different worlds....

[rjmc]

Hi,

Somewhere next week I'll move on to finish the guitar. However, today I took some time to clean the fretboard (didn't mask it, huge mistake)... But after some cleaning, I noticed some cracks on the fretboard....

What should I do to fix this?

[Simon Barden]

Should be an ebony fretboard, so it's unusual to see any marks like that. Don't think its a crack, just part of the wood grain. With rosewood, you'd have a lot of those all over the board as it's just how the wood's textured. Ebony is a lot smoother, but I guess it's still possible to get a few marks in it depending on which part of the tree the wood's come from.

So I don't think it needs fixing per se, but I would certainly lemon oil the fretboard to stop it drying out. Trying to fill the gap might end up with something that's more noticeable.

[rjmc]

And... more pictures.... Found also a damaged fret...

[rjmc]

And after oiling the fretboard as suggested, this looks more severe....

[BigDaddy]

Fill with CA glue and scrape level?

[rjmc]

After oil in the fretboard....



Taking a better look....



So... Am I doomed, or there's any way to repair this, or I don't have to worry? I only spotted this detail by using lots of zoom... looking normaly you don't notice...

[Simon Barden]

I really don't think you are doomed. They aren't going to use the best pieces of ebony on a kit board, and I'd imagine that's the result. Apparently ebony can be prone to small splits and cracks if it dries out too much, but I think what you have is just the result of a lower quality bit of wood (and maybe not the best variety of ebony).

If you want a smoother surface, then I'd go with other's advice and use CA to fill the cracks (I'd use black CA as it's a dark but not solid black) and scrape flat. Leave it a couple of days after the oiling before doing that. And then I'd lemon oil on a regular basis, maybe every 6 months.