Necks & Fretboards

The necks are now fitted to the bodies and the fretboards are complete and ready to be glued on the necks.. Once the fretboards and peghead overlays are glued up I can get on with carving the necks.

Fretboards

I'm updating some of my methods to get more consistent results. That includes how I make fretboards. I've made a new jig to taper then and now use a set of specially designed router bits to radius the fretboards.

The tapering method is not my invention but is shown several places on the internet including:
http://www.anzlf.com/viewtopic.php?t=2169

Taper jig, the movable fence is set a specific distance from the edge
and a spacer used to create the taper

Close up of the spacer, narrow end first then the wide end

Radius router bit, this one is a 16"

Full set up for routing, need a bit better dust collection

Fretboard attached to the carrier

The result, quite smooth right off the router

Two Fingerboards Ready

The two fingerboards for the Parlour guitars are done. Ready to be attached to the necks then fretted.

I also glued on the peghead overlays an roughed out the shape..

Getting there....

Making Good Progress

I've done a fair bit of work over the last week. The neck has a peghead veneer, and the peghead is routed to shape it also has a "W" inlay. The neck is cut down to rough size. The fretboard is cut, slotted, & the dots are inlaid and it is glued on the neck. The whole thing is starting to look like a guitar..

I also routed the binding channels into the body and bent the binding so I can get started on them. It is going to be a bit tricky mitering all the joints around the arm bevel but I think I have it figured out.

Cutting the peghead to shape with a drill press router

Fretboard bound & ready for dots

All bolted together

Peghead inlay

Tenor Guitar Neck

So been doing lots. the finger board is glued on and the neck is mostly carved.. I always enjoy carving the neck of an instrument.. for some reason t's relaxing.

Just some finish work to do on the neck then time to start on the bridge..

Gluing on the fingerboard

carving the neck

Still have the volute to carve

all done except for some sanding

Making Fretboards

Not many process pictures but I just finished the two fretboards for the tenor and parlour guitars.. 

One for the Parlour in Wenge with Paua shell bar fret markers and bound with the same binding as the guitar.

One for the tenor in Ebony with gold Mother of Pearl fret dots, also bound in maple like the guitar..

They still need to have the frets put in but I might wait for a bit on that as I am sort of into cutting pearl not I might cut the gold MOP celtic knot inlay for the tenor's headstock.

My little rig for cutting the slots for the bar fret markers

Yes I missed by about 1/32" the slots are 1/16"

Bound and ready for frets

Different angle

Completed Tenor Fretboard

And again the artistic Angle

The two together

Neck & Fingerboard

SO the next somewhat nerve wracking step in construction is to route the tenon on the neck to fit in to the already routed mortise. The main reason for the nerves is getting the angle of the neck right somewhere around 88 or 89 degrees. I don't actually measure the angle, I just adjust it to get the proper height above the future bridge location..

Then the fingerboard needs to be slotted and tapered, I have a nice jig I made for slotting fingerboards but of course it will not work on fanned frets.. oh well i could use my new fingerboard tapering jig..

My first time using a Japanese style saw for cutting fret slots.. works great

\Looks fine to me

The fingerboard next to the neck

My tapering jig

Finishing the Fingerboard

So a few posts ago I cut the slots in the fingerboard. Now it needs to be tapered to the correct shape bound and the marker dots and frets installed.

It is rough tapered on the band saw and fine tuned with a apron plane or a block plane whichever is handy.

Then the fingerboard is bound, I am not a big fan of the look of unbound fingerboards, I don't like seeing the fret tangs, I know it is common in classical guitars but not something I like. Usually I use a contrasting wood for binding but this time since I am keeping the decoration simple I just used some 1mm strips of ebony I had ripped off the fingerboard before slotting.

The dots are installed and finally the frets.. With a bound fingerboard the tangs of the frets must be removed from the end of the fret where it overhangs the binding as there is no sot in the binding to receive the tang. There are special made nippers to do this or various contraptions to hold the fret while you file off the tang (nippers don't work on stainless frets) But I just took some cheaper common nippers and ground a slot in them so the fret sits flat

A half done fret and nippers,
you can just see the slot ground into the bad of the nippers

Close up of fret

Completed fingerboard with gold mother of pearl marker dots