Helpful Hints Needed: slotting & fretting a currently fretless neck

[Day-mun]

I mentioned in another thread that one of my bass necks is about to be replaced (-what's the matter with me?). The one that is soon to be removed is a W maple/ebony super-bass construction fretless J-bass neck. After some thought, and getting some feed-back from the respectable regulars around here, I've decided to go completely against their advice (-sorry, KG) and have the neck slotted and fretted. -Not my me, no, -I want it to turn out great, and for good reason: I plan to gift it to an acquaintance of mine that is in need. This is a good guy, -a workin' man in a weekend band who lives paycheck-to-paycheck, and could stand to have one of the many favors he does everybody else come back around to him.

-Anyway, I talked to a hobbyist luthier I recently met, and ran the project by him. Now, he usually only builds acoustic guitars (-very well, I might add; his work is perfection), and hasn't to date been asked to do such a thing. (And again, what's the matter with me?) He feels confident that he'll be able to do it, but would love to cut down the time it will take to "noodle it out" and get some insight on how to go about setting up for cutting the slots in the correct locations. I know StübHead has done this and created his own custom scale-lengths, so I thought I'd pose it to you gurus and see if there is some tip, trick, tool(s), or fancy fixture the neck could be clamped into and indexed to turn it into a quick and fool-proof process.

So, if you've some advanced woodworking skills, and know what information this hobbyist friend of mine is after, let 'er rip (-with pics if ya got 'em), and I'll steer him to the thread while he contemplates how to execute the operation. Thanks guys!
ccasion14:

 

[line6man]

You should note that if you fret a factory unlined fretless neck, the side dots will be in incorrect places, right under the frets. Unless you can deal with that, you will want to redrill for new side dots.

Incidentally, you referenced the shortscale bass that StubHead did a while back. I recall that he explained his process of using Milliput (or something similar) to make side dots on that bass' neck.

 

[stratamania]

Here's a fret position calculator.

http://www.stewmac.com/fretcalculator

 

[Day-mun]

@ line6man: The side dot issue is of little to no concern to the luthier doing the work; he plans to drill out the existing side-dots and plug with ebony he has on hand, then re-drill and install side-dots in the correct locations for a fretted neck. -Guess inlay is no big deal to this guy.

@stratamania: Thanks, -I'll pass it on, but I'm pretty sure I recall him pulling a book off the shelf and turning right to the page that explains the formula.

What I'm after here is how those of you who have executed translating the theoretical information and calculation of the fret positions in a given scale length into a practical application that's efficient and accurate. Once the slots are precisely positioned and cut, This dude is in the home stretch; fretting and leveling, side-dot inlay, nut work, etc. is all in a day's work for him.

 

[Cagey]

The main problem that comes immediately to mind is that the thing is already radiused. That means it's gonna require a special jig to hold the thing while the slots get cut. Not the end of the world, but you're adding time/labor. If you have a luthier who's willing to do it, he's probably already got the appropriate tools so you don't need to worry about that.

Still, even with a jig, on a pre-radiused neck you're going to end up with slots that are cut deep in the center of the arc. I don't know that that's a problem, but I'd worry about bow/relief issues. But, maybe not. Even if there were no radius, you'd cut to a depth that's the least common denominator for the edges, so you'd end up with the same thing by the time you radiused it. So, maybe I'm worried about nothing.

I don't know. Seems like a lotta work. How much is somebody gonna charge for something like that? I keep coming back to selling it for whatever you can get and buying what you want that's designed for what you wanna do. Faster, easier, maybe even less expensive.

 

[Day-mun]

All good points, KG. I wondered about a lot of these very same things, namely: none of the exterior edges or contours of the neck are parallel/perpendicular to the string-path (-and very few are even flat), -what pray-tell does one index the saw to? -I guess the four bolt-on holes on the back are, but still, that's a lot of 90's to get around to the front of the thing.

The guy who's going to do this is, as said before, is an artist/hobbyist, not shooting to get rich or make a living tinkering with fiddles (-he's already got a different full-time job and, by the looks of it, doing just fine financially), and said he'd not charge for the time/mat'ls it would take to build jigs or other fixtures, nor for the time it takes to "noodle it all out"; whatever he comes up with will be tools and intellectual property he can perhaps use again later. -So he won't actually punch the clock on my project's billable hours until the saw hits the fretboard. He ball-parked it at a hundred to hundred-n-forty bones (tops, depending how long it takes him) to slot, fret, dress & level, plus raise the nut, fill old side-dot locations with matching ebony and install new side-dots in fretted-correct locations. -And, I am gonna split the cost of the operation with the recipient of the neck. So all-in-all, not a bad deal; I get to give the luthier friend an opportunity for an enriching learning experience, help out a local musician with putting together an a quality instrument that fits his wallet, and I clear a neck pocket out for my next GAS attack! WIN/WIN/WIN!!!

:laughing7:

 

[Cagey]

Makes sense. I do the same thing in some cases - eat the development to finance tools or education that can be used later to do other jobs that some might refuse. For what he's asking, I'd say that's a helluva deal and I'd be tempted to jump on it if I were you. If you asked me to do it, I'd probably either refuse the job or charge substantially more than that. It's not the sort of thing anyone would get asked to do very often.

I also think I'd want to see some sort of evidence of other work along those lines, though. What you're asking for is not a trivial task and I'm really shocked at the price. If you're attached enough to that neck to go to this much trouble to preserve it, you don't want it to be some kind of WWII Mengele experiment. 

Uranium frets! What could possibly be wrong with those?​

 

[Day-mun]

We're all only here in this life for a short time, -so we'd better get to our shenanigans and make a mess of things while we can!  :toothy12:

-So, anyone got pics of some jigs (moderately easy to construct) or any handy ideas of how to make it happen?

 

[stratamania]

I think you need to determine the centre line of the neck. A jig then needs to be made where the neck can be held in securely with parallel parts either side. That could then either be used also as a position and saw guide or a means of attaching a pre made mitre jig that can be moved along its length.

The slots of course would need to be perpendicular to the centre line.

If you have a depth guage on the saw it should be possible to follow the radius of the board when sawing.

 

[Day-mun]

Thanks, stratmania!  :icon_thumright:

there are a lot of cool gizmos that pop up when I google images for "fret slotting jig", but most of 'em are either cutting a 'board not yet glued to a neck  and in a rectangular block shape, or the ones working on already constructed necks seem to be a manufactured fixture with radiused clamping pads and captive tracks for the miter-box to slide side-to-side on (-some with detents at each fret position)...

Well, at least the back and the front of the headstock are flat, as is the back side of the heel, -he can always start with that to get the thing clamped flat/level. This guy seems pretty sharp, I sure he'll work out something that'll maximize the chances of success! 

This thread reminds me of one of StübHead's queries: "How do I make this hole (-or slot, in my case) here?" -"How?" being the operative word for this thread.  ???

 

[stratamania]

Something else I thought about after I posted was this.

If we assume that the nut slots leading edge next to the fingerboard (can't be a fretboard as it doesn't have any yet is itself 90 degrees from the centre line.  A line positioned at 90 degrees from the centre of the nuts width should be the centre of the neck.


Get him to take some pics as he goes along it would be interesting to see.

 

[Day-mun]

Undoubtedly true; I forgot that "fret-zero" is already slotted and installed. Indexing from there is going to put everything else "on"; perhaps the jig should have a guide/clamp/brace thingy that presses tight against the nut or into the nut slot to square itself with the (soon-to-be-fret)board's line of symmetry, hmmm....

From time to time, this craftsman posts photos of what he's up to in his shop on fb, so I'm sure it wouldn't be a far cry to get him to pass along some pics for us. I wish I could be there to watch the process, but he and I work different schedules so, unless he's at his bench on the weekend(s), I won't get to witness much of the magic first-hand.

 

[stratamania]

However it's done the nut is the datum line from which all else is measured / aligned especially for this project.

 

[Day-mun]

Yeah, I knew it was the theoretical basis for all the other slot positions, but I was thinking more about the neck's outer-most physical shape and what there is to clamp onto and index to in order get it squared up with a saw and it's respective guide(s)... again, back to the "how" of the matter.

:icon_scratch: Dunno why the How of it had me so puzzled that I forgot that the answer to the What would (-or could) be the solution to both. -But then again, as it's been said before "In theory, practice and theory are the same, but in practice, they are not."

...It's a good thing someone else other than I is going to execute this project, -sheesh!  :doh:

 

[Cagey]

On the plus side, the more you learn, the less frightening it all is and the more likely you'll take on some projects yourself. Then you start saving money, which allows you to build more guitars. And as we all know, He Who Dies With the Most Guitars Wins.

Although, as someone else pointed out, the biggest fear is that some significant other will sell the things off for what you say you paid  :icon_biggrin:

 

[stratamania]

Re clamping it down, you could use the mounting bolts at the heel, and a clamp at the headstock to hold it down. The a strip of wood either side of the headstock attached to the base of the jig can stop lateral movement at that end.

Then you just need parallel guides at the sides to the centre line along the length of the neck.

 

[Day-mun]

Update: I just dropped off the neck to the guy yesterday. He plans to build a block that fits the 10" radius of the 'board with a perpendicular slot in it. the neck with get clamped down with a guide block running along side it to keep the radiused block from tipping/sliding around. His fret-slot saw has a depth control on it to keep from cutting too deep; will stop the cut when the depth control comes in contact with the top of the radiused block. -As for position of each slot, he's gonna use the StewMac calculator and measure out each one.

The old side-dots will get drilled and filled with ebony plugs, and new side-dots will be drilled and filled with Milliput (-thanks, StübHead for the tips on that stuff!), with no face-dots. Then the nut will get raised using an ebony shim in the floor of the nut slot that is cut to the same thickness as the height of the new frets' crowns.

After he's done, I'll "fix-up" the finish (Minwax satin poly) along the shoulders and smooth everything out.

 

[stratamania]

Sounds like man with  a plan.