Veneer - White Glue Method

I am starting to explore using veneers for some of my guitar work.  The following is a brief description of some of the work I have done using veneers.  I have used the following site as a reference.

http://www.oakwoodveneer.com/tips/ironon.html


Veneer comes in packages of very thin sheets, mine were very curled and cracked.   I decided to use a Veneer Softener.  I sprayed the veneer sheet I was going to use.  I soaked it down, not to the point of saturation but I did want to ensure a good 'spread' of the softener.  I knew I would be giving the veneer plenty of chance to dry back out.  After wetting down the veneer I gently wrapped it in paper towels and put it in a cold press for more than 24 hours.  The veneer came out much straighter and some of the cracks had healed but I won't know how good until I apply...

The basic premise as I understand it is that preparation work must done to the veneer then glue is applied to the veneer and the wood that will be veneered. The glue is then allowed to dry while separate.  Once dry you can then placed on top of each other. Using an iron you then apply heat to the veneer through cloth or some type of intermediate heat transfer media in between the veneer and the iron which will reverse the glue and allow it to mix together. Than you put it back into your cold press to dry.

My first test is with TiteBond 3.  I really did not allow much time for the glue to dry, perhaps 30 min so we'll see how it comes out...  I used a foam roller for the application of glue to the wood.  I squirted out some glue, ran the roller over a couple of times to spread the glue out then applied to the surfaces of the wood.  I put enough on that provided the ability to see the glue on the surface but no more.  The first layer soaked into the wood pretty well on both pieces so I did reapply the glue once.

 

Here is a photo of the veneer applied to a thin board.  The board is on top of the sheet that I cut it from.  The two blue oval objects next to it is something my wife worked up in polymer clay.

I imagine veneer doesn't have much tolerance for sanding so I started at 220 and went to 340.  It was enough to move all of the adhered fibers and dirt off.  It was nice and smooth.

I treated the wood with my fingerboard oil (Dr. Fret).  The result I think is excellent.  The edges I think will be the most difficult part.  

I did want to try some stains, so I prepped the veneer with a pre-stain.

 

Ibanez GAX 70 Project

I had an Ibanez GAX 70 that I never really played.  After sucess with the Stratocaster Conversion I decided to try and tackle this one. 

Originally I was going to redo the fretboard with the vine inlay and leave the body intact.  I actually completed the vine inlay project only to find out that the fretboard scale was a Gibson vs Fender. 

So I purchased an additional fretboard slotted to that scale length and started over.  I went to Andy DePaul's website and selected the Lotus, I decided to do the white mother of pearl because initially I was going to keep the body black. 

The first step to inlay is making sure you have your pieces correctly setup.  I have almost inlayed some pieces out of order but caught it before I routed the wood.  So now I always line my pieces up and keep them in the order they will be applied.  This helps with not losing any (yes I have lost pieces and have had to buy individual replacements) and keeping you on track.

The next step is preparation of the fretboard.  I knew that with this design, ensuring the inlay was dead center was going to be paramount.  I marked the center of each of the frets I was going to inlay.  This would help me when placing the pieces so I at least knew where center was.

As I normally do, I paint the area with white out, then while still wet I put the inlay piece on top so that the white out will hold the piece in place when it is dried.  I do this because I have had problems in the past with contact cement and other adhesive where I break the inlay getting it back off.  This seems to hold it in place firmly enough so I can do the scribing but is fairly easy to remove. 

  

Once I scribe the general outline I then follow up with a mallet and chisel so that I have a stop line when routing.  This helps considerably in preventing a 'run' with the router.  I usually do the general outline with a 3/32 bit then go in after the crude shape is cut and then use a 1/32 bit to fine tune it.  Then I use a chip knife and chisel for the final fit. 

Just a word about the final fitting, this is really the most crucial part.  You can try to just fit the entire piece in and trim back where there is overlap but in the past I have gotten a 'drift' of the rout as one side fits and the other doesn't so you trim that side.  You can end up 'chasing yourself' and end up with more of a 'pool' effect where the inlay doesn't fit snugly.  Now I usually choose to fit from the bottom or top first.  In this case the bottom was larger and flatter so I tried to fit the bottom in first.  Once I had a snug fit I could then trim the top to fit.  This prevented the bottom from floating as much.  I did run into a little chip out close to some of the fret slots and will have to fill these later with epoxy.

Glueing in the inlay is also tricky.  I use epoxy and hardener from Stew Mac and then mix in ebony dust I have from routing.  I create a fairly thick mixture, more of a paste.  I then put the paste into the rout and press the inlay piece in.  If your rout is somewhat of a pool, you have to be careful that piece doesn't slide once covered.  I have a caul to fit over the fretboard when I am ready to press and dry.  Also if your pieces had broken during the fitting phase, you will have to reassemble them and ensure that they have a clean fit again.  I then cover with wax paper, put the caul with the reverse radius over it and clamp and let dry.

Once I let it dry for 24 hours I am ready for sanding.  You can see some air pockets are the inlay which will need to be filled.  Usually glueing ends up being a two part process.  First is to affix the inlay in the route, the second is to even out the drying of the glue.  As the expoxy hardens it does contract and if there are air bubbles you will get pockets.

I usually will use flat 80-100 grit just to remove a percentage of the glue. In this case I really didn't need to. I started in with the 180 grit on a 9.5 radius sanding block. This picture shows it sanded down to the point just before I will change to 220 grit for the final sanding. You will also notice some of the fret slots will need to be re-cut but not all of them.  The most important part with sanding is paying attention that you don't apply a lopsided radius.  It is easy to do.  I usually stand so that the finger board is horizontal to by body.  I will then rock my body and arms from the left to the right which minimize the turn you apply when you use your arms only.  This is slow work and you have to pay attention to inlay and how far you have sanded it.  Most inlay's are only a few mm in thickness.

Here is the fretboard, sanded and frets re-cut.  It is ready for it's first coat of oil.  These boards are usually very dry by the time I get them and since I live in a very arid part of the county they get bone dry.  At this stage I will normally oil it up once to let the wood recover before I put the frets in.  At this point you can evaluate the inlay.  In this case I did fairly well but 2 of the inlays were just slightly off.  It will be interesting to see if it becomes more obvious once the frets and strings provide a basic grid...  My goal is never perfection, if I wanted that then CNC would be the obvious choice, so a little bit of patience with yourself goes a long way.

Here is the fretboard after its first drink.  You can see the natural color of ebony coming out and the grains are more pronounced.  This will all settle down after a couple of days.  I usually won't do any sanding after oil application.  The next step will be the installation of the frets.

Now we can turn our attention to the headstock.

I am not sure what the headstock was made of.  I believe it to be an ebony veneer but am not sure.  The lotus design had two pieces to it designed to make one whole flower, I decided to split them apart.  You should be able to see the center line running through the center of the headstock.

 The procedure remains the same, whiteout, attach the pieces, scribe around the pieces, provide a stop cut with the chisel and then rout out the main part of the design with the 3/32 then trim with the 1/32 inch bit except this time it was done by my son :-)

For most of my routing I use the Dremel Drill with Router Base.  It seems to meet the need nicely.

Here is the headstock inlayed, sanded down to 400 grit and oiled.  I will apply whatever finish I do to the body.  I haven't decided that yet, although I do have some Spray Nitro that I have ben wanting to try.  It just hasn't been that warm yet.  While the work was being done on the neck I began prepping the body.  I soaked it in paint stripper for a couple of days then scraped the paint of which came off quite easily.  Underneath the paint is what I call the "zoot suit".  I have not found a stripper or toxic chemical yet that will remove the "zoot suit".  This is when the random orbital sander comes in handy, but the sides and horns need to be done by hand which is tedious at best.  Make sure you are wearing a good breathing filtration device, you don't want to inhale this stuff.

This is an important picture.  It is the first glimpse of the vision.  The wood is .  It was a butcher block three piece which is fairly standard on cheap guitars.  One of the boards looked exactly like mahogany.  One looked a little like ash and the other was just ugly (IMHO).  I had in mind an opaque color for the body to match the fretboard and headstock.  I thought of putting a 'racing stripe' of elm burl veneer down the middle and up the black.  I tested the veneer process and painted three swatches on them.  Ebony, natural and Cherry.  Everyone like the cherry but me.  I liked the natural and ebony.

I researched several different ways to "ebonize" the body.  I wanted a very deep opaque black.  I had  the materials for 3 Ways.  One was a Color Tone Stain, another was oil stain that they use for leather and a mini-wax ebony stain that I had used on the Stratocaster.  I pre-treated the wood with a pre-stain and let that dry for about 30 min.  I was decided on the oil stain and was read to go for it when I just had a desire to do it Cherry and see how it would turn out, if it didn't work out I could always 'ebonize' it.  So I put one coat of the cherry on pretty thickly,  waited 10 minutes and wiped it dry.  Let it dry for 4 hours and then I applied a second coat pretty thickly also.  Let that dry for another 10-15 minutes and wiped that off.

Here is the shot from the rear.  Really not a bad lookin guitar...  I am thinking of doing a quick wipe with the ebony mini-wax and see what turns up, I can always try my black spray paint :-)

Well ended up not opting for the black spray paint but finished with a Watco Danish Oil Finish and a nitro finish on top of that.  For the Danish Oil I 'soak' the guitar in the oil, let it dry for about 10-15min then wipe it down.  The next time I repeat with wet sanding 400 grit.  This creates a slurry which fills the pores and any uneveness.  I let it dry for 10-15 min.  Then I wipe it down.  Then let dry overnight.  I will repeat this until I get to about 1000 grit and the guitar is very smooth to touch.  I let dry for at least 48 hours. 

This provides an excellant base for the nitrocellulose finish.  I am trying out the spray can version since I don't currently have an airbrush.  I did the last guitar with a hair brush so I figured one step at a time...  I improvised a spray booth in my garden shed.  I warmed the spray can to about 80 degrees by sitting it in a hot water bath.  I have never spray painted so it took a little getting used to.  I got some beading and a couple of small runs which seemed to resolve a little with second and third coats.  I spaced the coats out by 2 hours and then will let it dry overnight.  Tomorrow night I will sand and apply more coats.

In the meantime I was working on attaching the fingerboard to the neck.  Having never worked wtih this scale neck before it was a little different.  Where the stratocaster finger boards have space for a nut, the Ibanez did not.  Trying to glue the nut square to the fingerboard was a little tricky and I did have a little uneveness where the 6th string would go over the nut.  I then drilled three guide holes for the fingerboard, applied glue and clamped together.  Unfortuntately I did not think ahead and I was already gluing something so the number of clamps became an issue.  I also forgot I have a fingerboard caul...  So I ended up using only three clamps.  It came out ok, but with some gaps between the finger board and the neck.

I decided to move forward anyway and trip the fretboard to the neck.  Normally I do this with a hammer and chisel.  I forgot I had purchased a scroll saw which would have made quick and efficient work of the overhang...  Once I roughed it in with the chisel I sanded it down to approximate width.

I also noticed some rattling (never a good thing) from in the neck.  I decided due to the poor glue job and the rattling I was going to have to re-glue the fingerboard,which meant taking off the fingerboard I just glued on.  Using an iron and a spatula I separated the fingerboard from the neck and found the problem.  The top of the truss rod had come free from the threads.  I don't know if it's repairable or not, will have to look at it more closely in the morning.

Stratocaster Project Part III

Although originally I had wanted the hexagon fretboard to be the fretboard for this project, I ended up starting another fretboard project which ultimately become the final fretboard.  I decided on a vine inlay design that I saw in Andy DePaul's gallery.

The piece is derived from the Ibanez Line.  I decided on Gold MOP because initially the guitar was to all black and thought it would make a nice contrast.

As with any inlay project I layout my pieces to get a feel for how they will fit.  There were 2 issues that I needed to deal with right away.  Some of the pieces were large and could only fit one way.  This made it imperative that the vine flow just right or it would pus the larger pieces off the fretboard.  The second was the vine itself, it ran through the entire piece and its location had to be precise.

I put the pieces in order on an 81/2 X 11 piece of paper and marked off the frets.  Unfortunately for me the paper fell on the floor and the pieces were mixed.  It was almost impossible to recreate the design so I went with the flow and improvised.

I had done a few inlays by this point so I had a bit of a process.  I always ordered my fretboards pre-slotted.  I normally get them from stew-mac but have purchased some from other suppliers.  After laying out all the pieces and putting together the map, I paint white out over the area to be inlayed.  I will put the piece on the white out before it dries.  After about 10-20min the piece usually is held fairly tightly.  I then trace with a scribe the outline of the piece.  I then pop off the shell and use a chisel to outline the shape.  I then take the dremel and carefully route out the area.  I leave any fine detail or corners to a chisel and/or chip knife.

This process can take some time but usually once I have all my materials I can complete the inlay routing process in 2-4 hours.  The most important aspect I think is planning the work and working the plan.  The routing just takes patience and practice.  Fortunately Ebony is fairly forgiving.  It is not the easiest wood to work with, it is hard and usually dry and chips easily.  The positive side is you can mix in ebony shavings into the epoxy and after sanding it is very difficult to tell.  Once finished and oiled I think Ebony is absolutely beautiful.  I never die my fretboards, I love the natural variation.  Here is a pic of the finished fretboard with a fresh coat of oil.  Notice the grain and color towards the right hand side.  This is characteristic of un-dyed ebony, you can get some visual swirling that is just visible to the naked eye.

One issue I run into consistently is the breaking of the inlay pieces.  They are rather intricate and delicate and trying to fit them into a rout on a surface with a radius can be tricky.  I also break them when I clamp the board to glue them.  They actually add character to it (IMHO) but some times it can be tricky sanding it out if the ends do not line up just right.

Once I am done with routing it is time to glue.  Epoxy is nasty stuff.  Exposure needs to be limited and proper planning is called for.  It all needs to be done in one smooth step.  Usually I will mix the epoxy and hardner in a 1:1.  I always eyeball it.  I then mix in the ebony dust until it becomes more of a paste.  I will stir this for a good 5 min.  I then apply the paste in the route, press the inlay piece in, wipe any gross glue squeeze and continue down fret by fret.  I then have a caul which has the reverse radius of the fretboard.  I put wax paper over the fretboard then clamp on the caul on the wax paper and let it sit for 24 hours.
The next day when you unclamp it you will see an absolute mess.  It will look horrible.  Now I get my radius sanding block and start working.  I use the stew mac ones, they seem to work fine.  The trick is not to move your arms, but your whole body.  This produces a more consistent stroke and you won't get an uneven radius.

For sanding I will take 120 grit (Flat) sandpaper and start to take off the glue.  I don't care if I flatten the fingerboard a little, I will be re-applying a radius later on.  When I have the major gunk off I start with a radius sanding block with 180 gold bond sandpaper and start working it.  You need to have a bit of perspective here.  The inlay has a radius from the caul pressing on it but sometimes the piece will break or sit un-even due to a bad route or something.  So taking into account the thickness of the inlay you sand carefully until most of the glue and whiteout is gone.  At this point you will start to see some gaps or wholes from air bubbles.  I will then clean the area with an exacto knife and re-apply the epoxy and do the whole thing one more time.

The second time around with 180 grit sandpaper, I will continue sanding for another 5 minutes until the white out is almost gone and there is very little to no glue over the shell.  Then I will switch to 220 for the remainder.  I like 220 because it really smooths the board out but doesn't put a high gloss on the ebony.  I love that high gloss look but not on my fingerboards.  I prefer porous but smooth.  I sand until the radius is firmly in place, the inlay is clear in all areas and the wood is smooth and uniform.

You will notice that a lot of the fret slots will be filled in with epoxy at this point.  You can try and prevent this by putting razor blades into the slots.  This particular inlay ran across allt he fret lines anyway so I knew I would have to recut them anyway. 

I have a fret saw from Stew Mac but the fret size seems just a tad large for there frets.  So when I re-saw my fret slots I usually need to epoxy the frets also.

Here is the finished product.  I did the headstock in a matching motif.  I installed gold frets, they are fairly large and seem comfortable.  I go through the entire fretting process which is to install them with a fret hammer.  Trim, file, dress, level, sand, polish.  Usually all said this takes about 4-6 hours.  I am fussy about my frets...

Meanwhile I have stained the body ebony.  It came out with a streaked effect but pretty nice looking.  I decided not to re-apply the stain but let the streaks and grain really stand out.  I then attached the neck to the guitar.  I usually do some checks to ensure that the finger board is straight and a straight edge on the frets will point to a spot about 2-3 mm above where the bridge saddles will sit.  I will double check the levelness of the frets and correct any issues.  Other than that I just bolt it on.  Once I string it up I will do a full setup on it which includes the tension rod and intonation.

In retrospect I probably should have applied the finished without the neck attached, but oh well, for some reason I did not.  I put the guitar in a tub and began a series of Danish Oil baths. 

The general idea here was to apply enough oil to saturate the wood.  What was extra hardened on the surface of the wood.  You then wet sand that down creating a slurry which fills the peaks and valleys, the goal being as flat a surface as you get.  This took me about 8 baths with graduating sand paper.  With a day between baths for drying it was about a 2 week process.

I was personally impressed with the finished product.  It was very smooth and flat.  The appearence was a matte with a medium gloss.  The issue with oil finishes are that they are not very protective. Normally you are going to want something on top of that for added protection. 

I decided to try and do poly-urethane.  Not having spray equipment (yet) I went the brush route.  I won't go into it here but it was a very long process but very satisfying.  I applied about a dozen coats in total (with a day drying between each).  I then used a polishing wheel to buff.  There are numerous websites already that details this process quite well.  I was very pleased with the gloss I was able to obtain with the wheel and several varying grit polishing solutions.

I of course had to also do the headstock.  I took a piece of ebony I had and cut out the shape of the headstock on my jigsaw.  I then inlayed the ebony headstock onto the maple one.  I had a little tear out I had to repair in the headstock when I drilled the tuner holes out.  I also did an inlay on the headstock.

In between the drying and sanding times for the finishes I went pick guard shopping.  Since I already had a yin-yang in the body, I thought that one on the pick guard would work also.  I found this one on a custom site some where.  I ordered one with the bridge pick up to be a humbucker.

 I also started to evaluate wiring schema and pickups.  I had enough pickups on hand to complete the guitar but don't know if it will be the final configuration.  I have all Seymour Duncan Pickups, in the Bridge Alnico's V's, middle cool rails and neck are dumbuckers.  My standard wiring includes the neck pup on demand and a 5-way switch.  I insulated the cavities and internal pick guard surface with copper foil and grounded it.  This makes a huge difference in hum and I do it consistently.  I also had three ebony knobs on hand for the volume and tone controls.  Right now I have a chrome output jack but will probably swap that out with a black one later.  I used black screws for the pickguard.

The project took just about one year.  I did have an issue when I strung it up.  I had a bit of a back bow to the neck.  When I put a straight edge across the top there was a slight rock (about a mm or so) right around the 6th and 7th frets.  I loosened the tension on the truss rod and put a single string on to check for the buzz.  The buzz was fairly noticeable but alleviates after the 7th fret.  From my perspective I had two choices, I could have re-filed the fret around the 5-9 fret area or put some heavy gauge strings on and see how it worked out.  I did the latter putting on .12's on the tops and that seemed to provide the necessary pull and resulted in moving the neck into a very slight relief, almost perfect :-)

The finished guitar plays very well.  As I have been playing I keep a list of touch up's for the next string change where I can address anything I need to.  Right now there are a couple of areas where I need to polish the frets a little smoother.  I am also contemplating some poly on the back of the neck, but am evaluating just the wood and oil finish I have on the neck now...