Fred's 1st Build - STA1M

[dingobass]

I do have a question re the frets though.
I find that most of the frets are not fully seated in the middle:
Attachment 5999

The sides are okay, but I can see a small space between fret and fretboard in the middle.

I read on this forum that these can be pushed back in with a hammer with nylon head, is that right?

Thanks!

Sure can.
Just support the neck on a sand bag to stop it bouncing and flexing, otherwise you will find the frets won't seat.
(Easy to make with a leg off an old pair of jeans and two zip ties)

[wokkaboy]

hey Fred, good advice from DB again. support the neck when you are seating frets.
Welcome Fred, looks like a cool build you got under way !

[Island_Moose]

Am I seeing things or is one of your frets way too short? It appears the one nearest the camera does not extend to the edge of the fingerboard.

[FredA]

Hi,
It's a little short, but really by a fraction. I think the camera makes it worse.
I'll pay more attention to it tonight but I didn't notice any issue with that and the string was on the fret when I tried it (couldn't help trying to play my 2 string guitar once I had two strings on...)

[FredA]

Hey there,
So I've been sanding away almost every night, not the whole night, just a quick 30mins every night.
Today I've been testing the blue-black burst colour on a bit of wood. Only one coat and it's not too bad, so I feel like I"m going to risk it:


I've also leveled the frets, following the methodology on this forum (the cheap version).
I first sat the frets fully with the nylon hammer. I have a full bag of sand that I used as a support with a tee shirt on top. Worked well.
I then protected all frets and made myself a fret leveling tool with a straight bit of wood on which I attached a bit of 240 sand paper with double sided sticky tape. Worked great:

I then reshaped the frets with a small triangular file, and finished the frets with bits of 400 sandpaper rolled around my finger followed by DB issued steelwool.
Pretty happy with the results. They're all level, shiny and I've removed the sharp edge they had on both sides. Fells much better when sliding between frets now!


And to finish the day I shaped the bone nut to the same shape as the plastic one I removed by scraping it on 80 and 180 sandpaper.
It fits snugly in the slot left vacant on the neck.

I haven't fixed it yest as I guess I may need to lower it a bit once the strings are on.

That's it for this weekend!

[FredA]

Hey guys,
A bit more progress this weekend.
After more sanding during the week I was down to 400 grit and thought it was time to start grainfilling.
Here are pics before:

and


As advised on this forum I went on to mix some ebony timbermate with water in a plastic container until it was liquid enough to be applied with a brush.
I brushed this mix all over the body and scraped it flat.


I left that to dry overnight and today I sanded it back to 400 grit.
That really made the grain pop:

and back


I found that some of the larger gaps had not bee filled so I've just reapplied another coat of the same mix.
We'll see if I can sand this again tomorrow.
If everything looks fine I'll start staining this one next weekend.

[Laz101]

Great job FredA

[wokkaboy]

looks great Fred nice progress

[andrewdosborne]

Coming along nicely Fred. I'm interested to see how you go with the second application of Timbermate to fill remaining gaps - it maybe my technique but I cannot seem to get a satisfactory grain fill.

[FredA]

@andrewdosborne - I tried to go in the same direction as the grain for the second application while I was going mostly across the grain for the first... and my mix had dried up a bit too in 24hrs so was a bit thicker.
Anyway we'll see once sanded!
Did you try more than 2 applications to see if you can slowly fill everything up to same level?