@koendb I mean for the inital flattening, getting the board nice, level and straight. I've never tried planing the radius in yet but do fancy trying it, need to get some radius gauges first.

Yup No 5 for a fretboard for me. Thickness it, Make it straight, cut the fretslots. Then, setup the hand plane for smoothing, and take a pass on both outer edges of the fretboard, repeat, and take a p...

@tv101 I put mine through the planer thicknesser but obviously sanding is even smoother. But yeh, lots of people use that set up on various small pieces with good success, me, think I'll just use t...

@tv101 You are correct I think. I did a new fretboard for a professional jazz player two years ago and this is what he said.

@tv101 the thing that gets me is a compound radius, they're often 12 to 16 but there's so little in it it seems a bit pointless. I think between a 7.5 or 9 and a 16 you'd notice it more but those thre...

@robin a tighter radius is meant to be more comfortable for chords but if bending a string doing solos the string can choke out because you're pushing up hill so to speak. With a flatter radius you ca...

Apparently all the young "Shredders" like a flatter radius so they can play fast @robin. 🤣 🙂🎸🎶🙏

My curiosity got the better of me so I rigged up a crude jig and drew a 12, 14 and 16 inch radius to see the difference, needless to say it's not a lot! Looks like you could use a 12 ich bridge with a...

Erm not exactly but I seen it the toobs and thought I'd try, not totally convinced though. They make it look easy to get a perfect finish on the toobs but I've still got slight ripples. Not bad though...

What's the an advantage to having a flatter fretboard, I'm not a player, still learning?

OFFS! Turns out there’s something called Veneer Softener! Who knew! Everybody but me, apparently.

I’m still accumulating little bits of advice from across the internet. Here’s one from Airpress: “When a knife cut veneer (0.6mm) gets wet with glue - it expands. When it expands it buckles and wrinkl...

@jamesbisset ha ha I’ve been using car body filler for years to cover up my poor mold making, so does that mean I’m a professional

@jamesbisset Maybe you've just been unlucky with that veneer James. You'll probably be okay with the next one although given that you don't have unlimited wood it's always worrying to try the next one...

Yup! A volume knob! I can’t resist it — is full sook 11?

@tv101 I reckon the critical factor will be how airtight the bag is. If it doesn’t lose much air in 5 mins then (slowly increasing) pressure is maintained. And the technique would only work if we use...

@jamesbisset Is it the speed with which the wood is being forced that causes the stress? I really do think that you might be onto something there and worth a try. Edit, I've just read TV's concerns...

We’re trying to design assembly techniques that emulate methods Gibson pioneered in the 40s, but without building a factory full of heavy engineering. Here’s the best tour video I’ve seen on the Memph...

@robin I used Titebond for speed because we were only running tests, but I reckon the combination of Titebond AND spray AND thin (and a little warped) sacrificial veneers all contributed.

Conclusion? I can’t afford the time or the wood to do a full set of controlled experiments. There are too many variables: Mould depth The curve of the carve Thickness of veneers Number of layers Vari...