Order of Operations question - Guitar Building Tricks and Tips

RE: Order of Operations question

NSJ — Tue, 23 Dec 2025 23:42:12 +0000

With osmo I finish the neck first then oil, that's what I did on the copper tele with oak board. Worked great.

RE: Order of Operations question

Russ — Sat, 20 Dec 2025 10:32:05 +0000

@somethingnicer

You can do all of the above. You're right about all the things that could happen whichever way you choose. You can fit little strips of Teflon into the slots to stop them clogging up fully if you decide to go for the finish before fretting. You'll probably still have to do some clearing out afterwards. I would probably apply the finish over the frets and then clear them up later. You've just got to be very patient and careful.

Good luck with it all.

🙏🙂🎵🎸

Order of Operations question

SomethingNicer — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 18:51:16 +0000

Hello all, I'm I'm working on a maple neck with a maple fretboard (bolt on). I'm at the point where I'm struggling on what order to do things, My fret slots are the right depth and my side dots are in. My plan is to use Osmo oil to finish on both the neck and fretboard.

So my thought was should I finish sand the entire neck so I can put the oil on the whole thing all at once? Can I just oil the fretboard and then oil the back of the neck later? Probably not huh?

If I oil the fretboard before putting the frets in, won't the oil clog the slots? Or will I have to re-clear the slots after oiling?

Or would it be better to just put the frets in now, and oil over them and clean off the oil when crowning?