Repairing router tearout

[BassUrges]

This has been a week of some serious lutherie fails for me, including a carbon-fiber upper-horn reinforcement that got stuck halfway and had to be drilled out, some dumb but small damage to an ebony fingerboard, and this attempt at cutting a fingerboard contour with an apparently dull flush trim bit:

Kudos to the glue that stuck well enough to cause tearout on the neck blank, with a completely different grain pattern.

Now, I don't want to throw all of this out, so I'm looking to repair. The top of the fretboard is getting a veneer, so the appearance from the front is not a worry. But for both structural and appearance reasons, I'd rather not just use filler. I'm thinking of ways to repair this that would be stronger and, even if not looking great, would look OK.

My thought is to run a router from the other side (so the bit is spinning the other way) and using a template guide and straightedge to trim out 1/16" or so, and then glue in some leftover maple. It won't look original but it should look better than filler.

Am I nuts? Or at least, is this idea nuts?

 

[chinjazz]

Is the left side of the image the maple fretboard, and the tear outs are on the side?

If you haven’t yet made the sides of the neck blank angled you could sand it down or plane it down/out. That is if you have enough wood to play with. When I run into situations like this I usually use a jointer to get it flat. I also sometimes take a long sanding beam and put on some 220 PSA , clamp it in down and run the neck parallel with it evenly (if I’m limited on how much I can take off).

 

[BassUrges]

Yes, the left is the fretboard, the right is the neck.

Unfortunately there is no extra wood; I had my neck blank cut to shape and glued a rectangular board on it and then attempted to flush-cut the fingerboard. This worked with the ebony board, but the maple one is looser-grained and broke up.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

Would it be sacrilege to suggest binding the neck? It could be maple binding, which would be nearly invisible, or a contrasting wood. Any kind of filler is going to look bad, believe me, I've tried it. More routing of course, but by then you'll have gotten a sharp bit.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

If you do decide to bind it, get some of these bits. It’s the only thing I’ve bought from Stewmac I thought was really worth the asking price, absolutely crisp, sharp cuts. You don’t need the whole set, just the cutter and the right diameter bearing for the binding thickness, they sell them separately. LMI has the same set, but around the same price.
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[chinjazz]

100% agree with Gilmourisgod. Very good bits! I bought a few and they work great!

 

[BassUrges]

Binding would be fine—with the veneer, it would be completely invisible—but that leaves the neck tear out untouched.

Basically I’m thinking of doing super wide binding to get at that.

 

[BassUrges]

I should have posted this pic, too.

 

[Beej]

I've seen strips glued on the sides to flank the neck like this before. I think Carl Thompson has done it but others here have. Good way to hide exactly this.

 

[BassUrges]

It routed out clean, and if I use epoxy to glue the strips in, it can fill the remaining gaps.

I probably should do a full-length strip so it looks more intentional, but I’m minimizing how much routing I do lest unexpected problems appear (again!).

I think most of my life is an exercise in error management.

 

[tchristian]

Climb cutting eliminates most tear out problems but it takes some skill and some nerve, and it dulls bits faster.

 

[BassUrges]

I climb cut on the mill but probably won’t be trying it freehand.

 

[Arie X]

so, that's a three piece neck? the first picture seems to show the laminations in the "not the usual" orientation.

you still have a ton of material to whack off so i think that by the time you are all done the evidence of a fill strip will be minimal but will still be there unfortunately. fwiw, i'm not a fan of epoxy all that much. ime, the glue line is pretty thick and visible so i would use titebond original or ca glue for the repair.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

I left an exposed strip of the fingerboard showing below plastic binding on my Ric clone, it could have just as easily been a separate walnut binding strip.

 

[tchristian]

I climb cut on the mill but probably won’t be trying it freehand.

I've made "miles" of handheld "backwards" cuts on a relatively large selection of hard- and softwoods. Like I said, it takes practice but it would have had you in the shop instead of here asking for help.

 

[micguy]

Would it be sacrilege to suggest binding the neck?

Whenever I see binding, my mind wonders if it was invented to cover up something like this, as plastic on the side of a neck seems like a lot of work for no practical benefit.

 

[BassUrges]

so, that's a three piece neck? the first picture seems to show the laminations in the "not the usual" orientation.

you still have a ton of material to whack off so i think that by the time you are all done the evidence of a fill strip will be minimal but will still be there unfortunately. fwiw, i'm not a fan of epoxy all that much. ime, the glue line is pretty thick and visible so i would use titebond original or ca glue for the repair.

Its two pieces: neck and fingerboard. The neck blank was cut to shape before gluing but the fingerboard was still a rectangle. I thought to avoid alignment problems by flush trimming after gluing and wound up with this problem instead.

I've made "miles" of handheld "backwards" cuts on a relatively large selection of hard- and softwoods. Like I said, it takes practice but it would have had you in the shop instead of here asking for help.

I may need to learn how if I continue to do this sort of thing. I’ve had the router catch and run away on me—thankfully damaging my workpiece rather than my arms or legs—so I’m apprehensive.

 

[tchristian]

I may need to learn how if I continue to do this sort of thing. I’ve had the router catch and run away on me—thankfully damaging my workpiece rather than my arms or legs—so I’m apprehensive.

Absolutely dangerous. I didn't mean to come off harsh, if I did. Firm grip, light passes.

 

[bolophonic]

Re-shape the entire thing into a three-string bass neck?

 

[Gilmourisgod]

I haven’t had much luck with anything but the smallest patches, particularly on maple. It’s so light in color, any glue lines tend to show through. Sometimes it’s better to make a “feature” of it rather than trying to hide it and failing. Neck binding is purely decorative of course, but so is a lot of other stuff on a bass, like horn and headstock profiles, shiny metal bits, etc. None of the common bling is “necessary” to a functioning instrument. I’m just a Primate, we like Shiny Things. If you want an almost purely functional bass, get a Steinberger.