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Hi all,

Just some updates on my guitar building.
I have just glued up the bridge using HHG (Hot hide glue) and strung up my guitar.
Well I love HHG, from now on I will only use HHG for my gluing.

Wow the sound is loud, full round bass good sustain for the open strings.
Initially I though of tuning the top board abit but it doesnt seem that necessary now.
However I haven't install the frets yet so to test the high notes I simply put a piece of metal wire at the frets position and play it.
Well the treble isn't too bad, the sustain wasn't that long but I guess this should improve as the guitar opens up.

Usually I know most makers will install the frets first before gluing the bridge but I wasn't sure if my fretboard relief was enough.
So the best way is to glue in the bridge and take the actual measurement.
True enough my neck has abit too much forward angle.
The action at 12th fret is about 5mm on both the bass and treble side.
My bridge is about 9mm in height (from topboard to the part of the bridge before the saddle protrudes).
The saddle protrudes for about 1mm or so.
Taking the fret's height (1mm) I have about 4mm or so for both treble and bass ends.
Thanks to the kind advice of Mike Collins (not for this guitar actually but both of them have the same problem) I removed the strings and plane the nut end of the fret board.
After planing some more relief at the bass side and I managed to reduce about .5mm for both sides
For the rest of the setup, I guess it can be adjusted by filing down the saddle.

Now I am about to install frets on my classical guitar.
From I have seen on various sites, (mostly for acoustic guitar with fretboard binding), they actually recommend the nipping of the fret tang at the frets end.
However upon inspection of my various classical guitar (w/o fingerboard bindings), I can clearly see the tang at the ends.
As my fingerboard doesn't have any binding, so is nipping of the fret tangs necessary?

Thanks for taking the time to read!

Sen


My 18 hole bridge.


My guitar w/o the frets yet.

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Sen CL Goh
http://senguitar.blogspot.com

I believe some people nip the ends of tangs and then fill in the end of the slots after installing the frets. Most of the time the ends and tangs are just filed flush after installing. I normally use bound borads on new builds. On re frets I do them however they were originally.

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I didn't mean to say it, but I meant what I said.
http://www.brackettinstruments.com/

You can do it either way. If you decide not to trim the end of the fret tang, you may have a slightly more difficult leveling job later should the fret board shrink. What happens to many a fretboard is that when they are exposed to low humidity, they shrink across the width, and the fret does not, requiring a future trim on the ends. If the tang needs trimmed, you run a higher risk of damaging the finsh on the edge of the board.....

Chuck

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Thanks Chuck and Woody.

I think I'll proceed w/o the trimming.
So far my other classical guitar hasn't experience any shrinkage.
My guess is that this likely wont experience any either in the same climate.
Thanks for the advice!

Sen

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Sen CL Goh
http://senguitar.blogspot.com

The key to it, at least for me is to make sure the board is dry and stable, and the humidity is low enough when I fret it.

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I didn't mean to say it, but I meant what I said.
http://www.brackettinstruments.com/

The first guitar I did I just filed the frets flush with the side of the neck - now after 5 years they are protruding ever so slightly, just enough to be annoying - and requiring a re-file.

Since that guitar I've always nipped off a little tang underneath the crown, and for the last several years I've also switched to binding all of my fretboards (sometimes with the offcuts after cutting the taper if I want it uniform-looking). It is more work but playing-wise, I like it MUCH better.

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The member formerly known as erikbojerik....