Winter Buildoff 2022: Still A Diva

Razor blade then sandpaper? Dremel mini cutoff wheel then sandpaper?

 

Flush cut trim saw.
I have both of these. I'd pick the DeWalt style for that. The HF saw leaves little marks from the side of the kerf.
Or a razor blade. But a nice flush cut makes it super easy with less chance of a slip.

 

Are you talking trimming the top/bottom so they're flush to the original piece, or something else?

 

I'd have used it as a horizontal boring drill for this job, methinks. Lay the work down flat on the table and drill into the side of it, flatways... One of the "tricks" that make it better than the average drill press, IMHO.

 

I'd probably use a file

 

Or an Iwasaki style carving rasp - the flat ones are awesome at truing up small parts like this, kind of like a combo of a file and a plane. That's what I use for truing up ears glued on a headstock which is pretty much the same operation from the sounds of it.

 

You could probably just use the fret saw and just leave a hair sticking up. The fret saw should make a fine enough cut that it won't tear them up or take much pressure to cut them.

 

That kind of tearout/shredding nightmare is why I've more or less given up on template routing stuff like bodies and headstocks. When it goes wrong it's pretty violent. I've settled on the Robosander for all that kind of work. It's slow and tedious, but no risk of destruction, shrapnel, or tearout, all of which has happened to me. Plus it can be chucked into a cordless drill as a mini-drum sander, which hadn't occurred to me until Mapleglo did it.

 

Ha! Same experience with the HF "flush cut" saw which isn't... flush. I used to have a superb one made by Veritas that finally wore out. I should probably suck it up and get another one.

 

I could swear I had at least 2-3 pics somewhere. I checked the phone again and 2 laptops and this is the only other one I could find.

 

How much are you trying to rout off? Not to teach you how to suck eggs etc but I would draw round your template and then bandsaw (or jigsaw) as close to the line as you dare before sticking your template on and routing. Ideally you are taking off less than 1mm with the router.

 

I feel you. Not having a band saw has provided me with expert level of doing all of the things all of the hard ways so far

 

The markers look good other than the tear out. I think I'd clean the missing spots out with an exacto knife, make maple dust and glue slurry, then spackle the voids.

 

Oops, this was not a good recommendation. I know you didn't use it, but I was actually thinking you were trying to get the profile of the sides of the neck blank to match the sides of the existing fretboard. Duh.

For the thin fret marker strips, I probably would have carefully trimmed them close with an exacto and then sanded them down to final dimensions.