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coating for fretless fingerboard?

W

warwick89

Oct 6, 2009
86
3
#1
hey guys, im new here. i just got my first fretless bass (sx JB) and i really like it but i wish my fingerboard had a coating. i love the feel of an ebonal board, real smooth and slick but my ebony feels kinda grainy.

So has anyone coated a fingerboard? do people even do that? what do i coat it with?

laquer? poly?

Thanks
enjoying the forum...
 
#5
I've done two fret-pull boards with Mirror Coat epoxy. This is the same stuff that is used to do bar surfaces. On a flat surface, it will self level, and will look like glass.

For a fretboard, you should buy a radius sanding block (available from at least stewmac.com) because you do NOT want a perfectly flat surface. The sanding will scuff up the mirror, glass like appearance, but you can restore it by sanding up to like 2000 grit, and then using polishing cloths. I never went past 2000 grit though, since it's just a cosmetic thing and I wanted to PLAY IT RIGHT NOW.

I strongly recommend that you get some ruined necks off ebay and try it on those first. Epoxy is NOT something you can easily sand off and start over. Also, if you mix up the ratios (which is very easy to do with very small batches needed for a fretboard) you can end up with a permanently sticky, gooey mess that is harder than heck to clean up.

My first neck ended up a mess with a bad low spot. My second neck ended up very playable but not cosmetically perfect. I'm sure my third neck would be great, but not quite as good as this:

SteinbJK600.jpg


It's also a very affordable project. The smallest order of Mirror Coat was like $50 and it's enough to do 200 necks, I would guess. The radius sanding block was under $20, and after that it's just sandpaper.
 
#7
Jason P Bass said:
It's also a very affordable project. The smallest order of Mirror Coat was like $50 and it's enough to do 200 necks, I would guess. The radius sanding block was under $20, and after that it's just sandpaper.
Click to expand...

Um, nope. The smallest order of epoxy is enough to do five to six necks. I've done four so far and I've got about enough left in my bottles for one more neck.

+1 on the it can make a big mess thing. Make sure you lay a plastic bag down over whatever surface you are working on and also make sure you tape off your neck where you don't want that epoxy (ie: the back of the neck).

Get the 8" sanding block from stewmac, not the 4" one. The longer one is quicker when you are sanding the board level. Make sure you like sanding. Like 80% of the work with this is taking your time with the sanding.

You CAN remove the epoxy and start over if you screw it up. I really sucks to have to do that though. Majorly time consuming.

PS: Air bubbles are your enemy. I found a suggestion on here to mix one part hardner to two parts epoxy to one part denatured alcohol. That seemed to reduce the visousity of the epoxy to the point that air bubbles were easier to "blow" out. The epoxy took a little longer to set, but not much longer. Either way you are looking at a day inbetween coats. Usually around 6 to 7 coats for me.
 
#9
Kael said:
Um, nope. The smallest order of epoxy is enough to do five to six necks. I've done four so far and I've got about enough left in my bottles for one more neck.
Click to expand...

How small was the smallest order that you found? I've done two necks (three if you count the complete rework job on #2) and I have enough for at least 50 more. It's really hard to estimate when I've used so little epoxy.

Thinning the mixture to get out air bubbles sounds interesting. I used a creme brulee torch and it generally worked great, but I was nervous about getting too close or applying too much heat. Would you say that you ended up with absolutely zero bubbles?
 
#14
line6man said:
Mine is an epoxy.

I have no idea what kind exactly, the guy who did the job was a bit secretive of his methods and materials.

I guess Boiled Linseed doesn't gloss up much?
Click to expand...


that guy did one heck of a job :D

yeah, you only get so much from linseed. which is fine for me. it's really what i was going for. this bass feels like i'm playing a piece of furniture, so when i did the refin on it, that's how i treated it. loving how it's turning out.
 
#15
standupright said:
that guy did one heck of a job :D

yeah, you only get so much from linseed. which is fine for me. it's really what i was going for. this bass feels like i'm playing a piece of furniture, so when i did the refin on it, that's how i treated it. loving how it's turning out.
Click to expand...

I think your bass looks better with a dull shine than a gloss like mine actually.

I've been thinking of having my Padouk/Pau Ferro neck epoxied eventually, but I want to try to get as little gloss as possible from the epoxy.
As much as I love the shiny epoxy look, it would be very out of place on this particular neck because the neck is otherwise completely unfinished.
 
#19
I have used poly and bondo with some amount of sucess. The bondo was super hard and sounded really growly and cool, but its not self levelling and required a great deal of work to get it nice and level. Real thin coats and lots of sanding. I am awaiting a bass with a mirrorcoat fingerboard, which from research sounds like its really the shizzle. I will report further on it when it arrives.
 

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