I have badmouthed Warmoth a number of times, but I have to give them their due on the neck they sold me back in the 1980s. When I went ran my rocker up and down the neck to find out how much fret leveling I would need to do...the answer was none. the frets were all perfectly level. Also, they were crowned and polished beautifully. The neck and fingerboard are also bird's eye maple with no skunk stripe. I'll try to get pics that do it justice when I am done.
I managed to crack the finish a bit under when I put the string retainers on, but they cover it up, so I will live with that. Also wish I had strung it up before putting on the decals. It's not terrible, but I'd orient them a bit differently if I had it to do again. The only way to fix that now would be to paint the headstock like the body and re-finish the top with a new decal. Not doing that--at least not any time soon.
I strung up the guitar (I guess I can call it that now), and adjusted the truss rod and the height at the bridge. I tuned to an open E and tried some tone caps, finally settling on a .033 uF. Then drilled the final two holds for the jack plate and closed it up.
The strings are WAY too high at the nut. I have been dreading fixing that, so it was not hard to leave this part for last. I started to sand the bottom of the nut, and suddenly saw the wisdom of what Simon and McCreed have been trying to tell me about cutting down from the nut slots.
I did not buy nut files, but will go back to considering it if I kill this nut. It's natural colored, whereas my bone blanks are white, which will go well the pickguard if this goes poorly, I tell myself. I cut some teeth into feeler gauges as I have seen done on YouTube. Completely went through two Dremel cut off wheels in the process.
I'd be crossing my fingers for this last part, but it's too hard to hold my improvised nut-saw-feeler-gauge when I do.
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