Coating fretless maple fretboard?

[ntenny]

Originally Posted by Turnaround

It's not a good idea to leave maple unfinished. Unlike rosewood, maple is reactive to humidity changes and must be coated to be stable. It's plenty hard, just not stable when left exposed. That's why maple fingerboards are finished where most rosewood boards aren't.

Now that I know this, is it something I should worry about with a maple fingerboard that's been uncoated (and apparently stable) for a couple of decades? A previous owner defretted it but didn't coat it, and I've been taking an "if it ain't broke don't fix it" attitude. Am I setting myself up for future trouble?

-NT

[Turnaround]

Originally Posted by ntenny

Now that I know this, is it something I should worry about with a maple fingerboard that's been uncoated (and apparently stable) for a couple of decades? A previous owner defretted it but didn't coat it, and I've been taking an "if it ain't broke don't fix it" attitude. Am I setting myself up for future trouble?

-NT

If it has remained stable for a couple of decades, it's not likely to change now unless it is subjected to major changes in humidity. Also, it may look uncoated but have a sealer on it. Some instruments look like there's no finish on the fingerboard when in fact there is a satin or flat sealer of some kind.

[rogerb]

Originally Posted by fourstringbliss

I'm going to fill the fret slots with styrene plastic strips. I'm going to glue them into the slots, cut them down with a razor blade, and then use a radiused sanding block to sand the board smooth and level. Then I'm going to spray on around six coats of the EM6000 and let it cure for at least a week. After that I'll use the radiused sanding block to sand the coating smooth and level.

So that should work. Hopefully the six coats will be enough, my defretted board needed a lot of radius sanding to get it flat enough. You may end up going through six coats, no problem though you can just add more.

Mask off vertically each of your plastic strips in the beginning, leaving just the strip visible, then you can sand them down to your radius in the same direction as the strip, with higher grit sand paper.

Cleaning up the glue when gluing in the strips probably a good idea as well.

I'm no pro at this, just trial and error, and there have been a lot of errors.

[Meatrus]

Originally Posted by Turnaround

It's not a good idea to leave maple unfinished. Unlike rosewood, maple is reactive to humidity changes and must be coated to be stable. It's plenty hard, just not stable when left exposed. That's why maple fingerboards are finished where most rosewood boards aren't.

All wood is reactive to humidity changes. The reason that maple boards are finished is because of the dirt which builds up on unfinished maple turning it ugly. Maple is a suitably stable wood.....thats why its used for necks!

[Rich 67 jazz]

I did my maple fretboard last year, I used wood veneer to fill the slots and a radius block sander I bought from Stew-Mac. It was a 9.5 radius block for my Jazz bass. I finished with Varathene Polyurethane Satin spray that I got from Amazon. Also used a fret saw from Stew Mac that is the same thickness as the wood veneer so that the wood fit flat in the slot. Took about ten coats of poly sprayed thin then let it cure for at least a week before I put the strings on. It has held up nicely so far.

[k31bassman]

Last year I routed off the fingerboard on a Squier neck with a bad truss rod, replaced the truss rod with a Stew-Mac double action rod, glued on and shaped a flame maple fingerboard, sanded it with a 9.5" radius block, and finished it with Tru-oil. 6-8 coats rubbed with 0000 steel wool between coats.

Here's a picture before wiring and stringing it. It's my favorite playing fretless.

[rogerb]

I do like the 'spray' idea. Pouring or layering epoxy always seems to leave me with some high & low spots. Sanding the epoxy isn't that easy.

You can't see it with a long straightedge, but once you string it up and go for some low-ish action you can hear them! Choking rather then mwah.

I do some very slight wear on my fretboard already I've played it a lot this month though, a couple hours day. Rotosound nickel roundwounds. I'll have to rethink how I am coating this thing.

[fourstringbliss]

I'm going to go with the superglue idea because I am getting some poly chipping around the fret slots. Does anybody know how much glue I'm going to need?

[SurferJoe46]

Personally I think that's a bad idea - as I'm not sure of the bond integrity there, especially in a wear area that is now going to happen a lot more with the strings directly on the fingerboard.

I still say to sand the whole surface off and down to the wood and you can even use the spray spar varnish and get a tougher and more contiguous surface that isn't a repair, but a single skin.

Although the spar isn't as tough as a resin or epoxy coat, it is repairable and you can just spray a new coat on in a few years and sand it down to level it out later.

One thing I've noticed about that MinWax spray spar varnish is that it gets tougher after a while and is really pretty impervious to wear and abrasion after a few weeks.

If you try the SG as a spot filler - let me know how it works out as I would like to know of any problems and successes it gives to you for my future edification.

[fourstringbliss]

Originally Posted by SurferJoe46

Personally I think that's a bad idea - as I'm not sure of the bond integrity there, especially in a wear area that is now going to happen a lot more with the strings directly on the fingerboard.

I still say to sand the whole surface off and down to the wood and you can even use the spray spar varnish and get a tougher and more contiguous surface that isn't a repair, but a single skin.

Although the spar isn't as tough as a resin or epoxy coat, it is repairable and you can just spray a new coat on in a few years and sand it down to level it out later.

One thing I've noticed about that MinWax spray spar varnish is that it gets tougher after a while and is really pretty impervious to wear and abrasion after a few weeks.

If you try the SG as a spot filler - let me know how it works out as I would like to know of any problems and successes it gives to you for my future edification.

I've used SG as a spot filler for poly and it bonds just fine. There are lots of people here on TB who have successfully coated their fretless fingerboards with it. Dan Erlewine's picture tutorial on defretting a bass shows him using SG to coat a maple fretboard with SG after defretting and it doesn't show him or mention needing to sand it back to the wood.

[SurferJoe46]

OK - have it your way then - but there's a big difference in spot filling for aesthetics a nick or a bump on the body and trying to fill bad spots on the fingerboard with it and expecting it to work for any decent period of time.

The semester I spent in Plastics Lab tells me this is prolly a bad idea in the long run since SG definitely has a different valence-bond and it's surface attack (which is nil-to-non-existing) to the base material is going to be suspect since there's no free hydrocarbons* or even any simple proteins to it, where SG really LOVES to go.

* By design and in order to get an original, non plasmoptic, non-transpirational, a very non-impervious and glossy sealed surface, these endo-thermochemically chained elements are bound/locked into the resin and are not outgassing after a very short bonding time - which is evident since you cannot detect the sweet (delicious) smell of resin unless you sand, grind or otherwise cut into it.

I think I could find my old PlaLab book and find more reason why it's a bad idea, but these few nasty chemical terms come to mind at the moment.

@ Erlewine's vid - which I have both watched and of which I also read the transcript - and although it never mentions it, I'm for sure that he at least started with a level surface and wasn't trying to fill holidays and divots from the actual act of defretting the neck.

Just because it's not mentioned doesn't mean it wasn't done first. I don't suspect it was left out to obscure and be-mystify the process; it might just be an obvious omission.

So until further information and success of this process comes along, I still feel your doing this is a bad idea and you may regret trying it but then again, I have been wrong in the past. This might fall under: 'New Things Learned' I always say.

I must remember that it's your neck (and not mine) that's on the block here. We never had this conversation.

[fourstringbliss]

Originally Posted by SurferJoe46

OK - have it your way then - but there's a big difference in spot filling for aesthetics a nick or a bump on the body and trying to fill bad spots on the fingerboard with it and expecting it to work for any decent period of time.

The semester I spent in Plastics Lab tells me this is prolly a bad idea in the long run since SG definitely has a different valence-bond and it's surface attack (which is nil-to-non-existing) to the base material is going to be suspect since there's no free hydrocarbons* or even any simple proteins to it, where SG really LOVES to go.

* By design and in order to get an original, non plasmoptic, non-transpirational, a very non-impervious and glossy sealed surface, these endo-thermochemically chained elements are bound/locked into the resin and are not outgassing after a very short bonding time - which is evident since you cannot detect the sweet (delicious) smell of resin unless you sand, grind or otherwise cut into it.

I think I could find my old PlaLab book and find more reason why it's a bad idea, but these few nasty chemical terms come to mind at the moment.

@ Erlewine's vid - which I have both watched and of which I also read the transcript - and although it never mentions it, I'm for sure that he at least started with a level surface and wasn't trying to fill holidays and divots from the actual act of defretting the neck.

Just because it's not mentioned doesn't mean it wasn't done first. I don't suspect it was left out to obscure and be-mystify the process; it might just be an obvious omission.

So until further information and success of this process comes along, I still feel your doing this is a bad idea and you may regret trying it but then again, I have been wrong in the past. This might fall under: 'New Things Learned' I always say.

I must remember that it's your neck (and not mine) that's on the block here. We never had this conversation.

Fair enough. I think you've convinced me to sand it back to the maple and coat it with something else. It does seem like everybody else who has had success with CA on fretless applied it to bare rosewood or ebony, not finished maple.

[phillybass101]

Surfer Joe's vocabulary is outstanding :-)

[fourstringbliss]

Originally Posted by phillybass101

Surfer Joe's vocabulary is outstanding :-)

Agreed!

[fourstringbliss]

Would this work?



I'd radius sand the finish off, apply the surfboard resin, and then resand, right?

[Turnaround]

Originally Posted by Meatrus

All wood is reactive to humidity changes. The reason that maple boards are finished is because of the dirt which builds up on unfinished maple turning it ugly. Maple is a suitably stable wood.....thats why its used for necks!

Maple has a larger co-efficient of dimensional change under varying RH levels than many other hardwoods. It's certainly more reactive than rosewood. It needs to be finished to reduce its exposure to moisture changes.

[shirojiro]

I like Watco Danish Oil finish on my fretless fingerboards.

It has a little poly in it as well.

[fourstringbliss]

At this point I'm going to pull the frets, glue in radiused white plastic strips, trim the strips with a razor blade, fill the tops of the fret slots with thin CA, and then radius sand it all until smooth. I'm not too worried about the bond strength between the CA fill and the surrounding poly 'cause I figure if it can withstand sanding and stay bonded it'll withstand flatwound strings and stay bonded. If that eventually fails I'll sand back to bare wood and use tru-oil and call it good.

[Rip Topaz]

Originally Posted by fourstringbliss

At this point I'm going to pull the frets, glue in radiused white plastic strips, trim the strips with a razor blade, fill the tops of the fret slots with thin CA, and then radius sand it all until smooth. I'm not too worried about the bond strength between the CA fill and the surrounding poly 'cause I figure if it can withstand sanding and stay bonded it'll withstand flatwound strings and stay bonded. If that eventually fails I'll sand back to bare wood and use tru-oil and call it good.

Be sure to keep an eye on things when you're filling with the CA. It's REAL easy to get glue running out of the fret slots and making a mess on the back of the neck. Be ready to catch drips, and be careful how you catch them. CA will hurt you if you're not careful.

[fourstringbliss]

Originally Posted by Rip Topaz

Be sure to keep an eye on things when you're filling with the CA. It's REAL easy to get glue running out of the fret slots and making a mess on the back of the neck. Be ready to catch drips, and be careful how you catch them. CA will hurt you if you're not careful.

Yeah, I've been thinking about that. Would it work to use wood glue to glue the plastic fretline inserts into the fret slots instead of CA? Then I could tape off the sides of the fingerboard before I did any top filling with CA.