Cutting a roasted maple headstock

[TBurst Std]

http://www.unofficialwarmoth.com/index.php?topic=28669.msg406658#msg406658

 

[Strat Avenger]

My first roasted maple neck is due to arrive 4 days from now. I will need to drill alignment pin holes for the Sperzel locking tuners, and one pilot hole for the relocated hole on the Fender Deluxe contoured heel neck plate (the plan is for threaded inserts to be installed).

 

[Cagey]

The retail packaging for those tuners comes with a layout template for those holes, unless you bought them as individual pieces. Otherwise, the hole location jig (currently available from StewMac) is a good solution.

For what the little buggers cost, you'll want to be able to use it more than once, but having it is a real luxury that works for a number of tuner designs, making it a little easier to justify.

 

[Strat Avenger]

Yeah, that's pretty cool.
I was more concerned about tear-out, cracking, etc., with this talk about drilling into roasted maple.
I've installed Sperzels on a regular maple neck and was very successful.  You (Cagey) installed my Fender locking tuners, as I didn't have a template for those.

 

[Cagey]

Right. Those "Fender" tuners even have two pegs per tuner for some reason. Not sure why - doesn't help anything. They're just for anti-rotation. Nothing structural there. But, without the jig, those would have been prone to a lot more misalignment error at installation time.