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Can this neck be saved?

WayneP

WayneP

Oct 11, 2004
2,497
3,419
Corpus Christi, Texas
#1
Hello All,

I recently scored a cherry 1999 fretless Ibanez Prestige BTB1005. It’s a beauty, but this thing is giving me fits. Two months in, I still haven’t been able to use it. I’ll spare y’all the details of all the problems I’ve been having with it (some of them admittedly self-inflected), but I don’t know what to do about this one.

Okay - I like the action on the low side. I got the truss rods adjusted to straighten the neck (it was bowed a bit) to get the strings down closer to where I want them. The neck seems to have a couple of issues, one of which is, I haven’t been able to get it straight enough. But I can’t address that until I deal with this other issue.

Since I couldn’t quite get the neck straight and was getting a bit of fret buzz (okay, it’s fretless but you know what I mean) for first 4 or 5 fret lines, I raised the string height a bit to compensate. A bit higher than I want, bur livable.

But – there was some crazy buzz on the A string at the 4th fret line. Third and 5th fret lines were fine, but not the 4th. No other string at the 4th, just the A string.

So - this morning I removed the strings, and wiped on some fretboard oil. With some “gloss” on the neck, and the light reflecting just right, I found the problem: There is a slight depression at that very point on the neck – A string, 4th fret. It took some doing, but I managed to capture a picture showing it – see the attachment.

Help me out, TB luthier experts – can this be fixed? I’ve never seen anything like it and I’m heart-broken.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

Pedulla Club #45 Unique Arrangements of Hymns, P&W Standards, and Original Tunes
Administrator, Official Tobias Club #133
Administrator, Fretless Club #943
Big Cabs Club #23
My Basses
My Rig: Stage and FOH Friendly
Pedulla Club #45
 

Attachments

  • IMG_1367 adj..JPG
    IMG_1367 adj..JPG
    1.5 MB · Views: 47
#2
I saw a Dan Erliwine video on fixing dents in wood a while back. It's basically laying down a damp cloth over the immediate area and carefully heating it with a soldering iron. I did this on a dented ash body, and it worked .. except that I was overzealous in trying to make it perfect and burned the wood there slightly. Fixing that was more of a pain than fixing the dent. :)

Of course, that board depression may not be just a dent, could have been sanded/cut into the wood. Not sure how this trick would work with that. Good luck!
 
#4
This is not a dent and it is not uncommon on fretlesses, especially those made before CNC manufacturing. These "troughs" can occur anywhere under any string. On fretted basses a fret dressing can even things out, but on a fretless about all you can do is use some sort of filler to bring the trough up to the level of the rest of the fingerboard and then sand/scrape to flush.

Although far from perfect, the best "fix" I have found so far is CA glue, applied in multiple very thin coats and beginning with the deepest part of the trough and working outward until you get everything built up pretty much level with the rest of the 'board. Then dress.

It would be wonderful if this fix worked as well on DB fingerboards, but those troughs can be inches long.
 
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#7
It can be fixed. One choice would be to use a long sanding beam and dress the fingerboard down until it’s all level. Sand along the string paths until they’re level then use the sanding beam and blend the facets into each other across the board. There’s a good thread about fretless fingerboard leveling here in Hardware, Setup and Repair if you do a search.

The other choice is to fill the low spot with CA glue or good epoxy then level it. Even with that choice it wouldn’t be a bad an idea to level the whole board as described above. Also, “good” epoxy means a marine epoxy like West Systems or Total Boat which are more expensive and not typically available in smaller quantities. Definitely don’t use 5 or 10 minute hardware store epoxy.
 
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#8
on some basses you will never be able to get the neck flat, maybe because the wood will compress against the truss rod, maybe because of how the truss rod sits inside of the channel , and sometimes it’s plain bad luck.


If you’re getting Fret buzz on the first 4 or 5 frets , I would assume you have a back bow (truss rod too tighy / neck over adjusted ), which would be consistent with you having to raise the action.

Any competent luthier will be able to fix the issue. I think it may be a combination of bad setup and a couple of low and high spots in the fretboard.
 
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#9
use epoxy wood filler the color of the dented fret board.. it's cleaner then let it set for a few days.. and use 320 grit radius block.. small radius piece of wood.. it's easy to make- double side tape sand paper 60 grit paper to neck and just rub the flat edge to the neck and paper and it well take on the radius.. then you have a thin radius block.. after the epoxy sets sand it with 320 600 1000.. and apply oil to the whole board.. or you can use maybe a wood filler pencil.. or colored saw dust and super glue and excellerator.. you will need that skinny radius block any way..
 
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#11
From the description it sounds like a very slight depression, not a rut. In that case I would not try to fill it with anything - I would resurface the entire board with a long sanding beam. Then you can count on the entire board being true and it will get rid of the marks left by the round wound strings.
 
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#13
Thanks all for the replies – very helpful! To answer a few questions:

Gervais Cote said:
If you could tell us how deep is the depression, that would help.
Click to expand...
I really have no way of measuring it. It’s so slight that you can barely feel it rubbing your finger across the neck (side to side). In fact, it I didn’t know it was there, it wouldn’t even be noticeable.

GretschWretch said:
But those string grooves . . . .
Click to expand...
Stewie said:
My old rosewood fretless P neck had some deep grooves (bending Rotosounds while young and stupid). Had the neck dressed. He used the sawdust and glue to fill the grooves. It is ridiculously perfect now.
Click to expand...
The string marks are indeed a puzzler. I mean, this bass is pristine – it still has the plastic applique on it showing what the knobs do! The case looks like it’s never been out of the closet. The guy (original owner) had the action on the high side (to compensate for the neck issue, or that’s just what he liked? I have no idea) so my thinking is that with the high action he had to push the strings really hard. He said they were Thomastik-Infeld JR345’s. I couldn’t believe how rough those things felt! I swapped them out for some DR Sunbeams.

elgranluis said:
If you’re getting Fret buzz on the first 4 or 5 frets , I would assume you have a back bow (truss rod too tighy / neck over adjusted ), which would be consistent with you having to raise the action.

Any competent luthier will be able to fix the issue. I think it may be a combination of bad setup and a couple of low and high spots in the fretboard.
Click to expand...
That’s the second potential neck issue I’ll have to deal with. It’s hard to sight down the neck of a fretless, but it looks to me like the neck is straight for the first 5-6 frets, then has a slight bow.

Regardless, it’s good to hear that you (and others here) think it’s a fairly easy fix!

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

Pedulla Club #45 Unique Arrangements of Hymns, P&W Standards, and Original Tunes
Administrator, Official Tobias Club #133
Administrator, Fretless Club #943
Big Cabs Club #23
My Basses
My Rig: Stage and FOH Friendly
Pedulla Club #45
 
#15
@Turnaround is absolutely right, don't mess around trying to address the spot, and especially if the relief isn't spread out right, get it resurfaced. If you're not comfortable doing it, find a good luthier and have them do it
 
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#17
If you can barely feel it with your fingers that means it’s probably less than 0.015" deep so better sand the whole board to level it as others mentioned.

On a bass that would be just a backup and rarely use it, marine epoxy would be my option followed by a sanding to level it. Not as nice as the sanding of the whole board though.
 
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#18
Turnaround said:
From the description it sounds like a very slight depression, not a rut. In that case I would not try to fill it with anything - I would resurface the entire board with a long sanding beam. Then you can count on the entire board being true and it will get rid of the marks left by the round wound strings.
Click to expand...
THIS is the correct answer. Please don't fill it with anything, especially with it being so small.
 
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#19
Well, talked it over with my luthier last night, and he says it’ll be a piece of cake - I won't be able to tell any work was done. He's seen and fixed far worse. We live 3 -1/2 hours apart, so it’ll be a while before I can get it to him. I’ll post back with the results!

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

Pedulla Club #45 Unique Arrangements of Hymns, P&W Standards, and Original Tunes
Administrator, Official Tobias Club #133
Administrator, Fretless Club #943
Big Cabs Club #23
My Basses
My Rig: Stage and FOH Friendly
Pedulla Club #45
 
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