or over it........Originally Posted by Simon Barden
or over it........
Yeah, over the edge is more like it!
Making the world a better place; one guitar at a time...
I decided to make a fret board smoothing block. First attempts were not great:
With the pine block I was using a 50mm round bit and I guess I forgot to secure the depth. That 2 inch bit has a lot of mass and once it gets going its a bit of a wrecking ball. The second attempts I used some scrap from the neck blank, laminated some extra thickness to the bottom, got through the side routing ok, but didn't do a very good job securing the piece when doing the radius. The piece leaned into the bit and got spat out.
Third time lucky, one Rickenbacker smoothing block:
Ok technically not a Ric block, Ricks have a 10inch radius, and this is 12. Here we have Mapleglo:
and Burgundyglo:
It was a good opportunity to check the colour on a larger piece and see how it would look with the centre stripe, which is why I painted it rather than just clearing it.
Nice work Rabbit. (well, on the third one anyway...)
How long are those? They look shorter than commercially available ones I've seen.
Making the world a better place; one guitar at a time...
ThanxNice work Rabbit. (well, on the third one anyway...
How long are those? They look shorter than commercially available ones I've seen.. It's 150mm long and will have a velcro backing stuck to it so I can use 150mm ROS pads. What you have seen, the long ones are used for shaping the radius from a blank. Since I use a jig to machine the fret board radius, all I need is a curved block with a finer grit to smooth any machine marks. Doesn't even have to be curved, it could be flat and still do the job. I just went through the exercise because lockdown
Longer is always better for levelling things out. That's why smoothing planes are the longest type of plane. If you can, I really would use a longer block.
yeh, smoothing, not levelling. 150mm is long enough and still nice and manageable for it's purpose, which is why I don't use a 150mm file instead of a 600mm levelling beam when levelling frets
And levelling. Same thing. You want to keep the surface flat and smooth and correctly shaped, you go as long as you can.
More goodies arrived.
That's about all the bits, except the truss rods ( I have the material for that, just need to make a jig to cut it to something usable.), and the jazz pickup bezel. I have the 0.9mm stainless sheet to make that from. Since I can't press the part I have to cut and weld pieces. Initial attempts were promising.
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