Official Luthiers Forum!

1. Fret slotting miter box system from either LMI or StewMac.
2. Table saw system from either...
3. Other?

I'm a rookie and only want to make this purchase once. I already have a cabinet saw so that is not a problem.

So what would you recommend? Advantages, disadvantages?

Thanks in advance for the help!

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Doug

Don't let fear or common sense stop you from trying to build something

I have the StewMac templates and blade, nice steel templates, the blade is sharp and cuts a nice slot.

I have the stewmac miter box, template and saw. Works great but it's a slow process. If I had a readily available table saw I would go that route. Seems soooooooo much faster.

Stewmac blade & Stewmac templates with radial arm saw.

The LMI templates are acrylic & cost less but they do have a potential advantage - look here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bfwUvSc6E4.

Kevin Looker

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I'm not a luthier.
I'm just a guy who builds guitars in his basement.
It's better than playing golf.

Go with a table saw setup if you have a decent table saw. I started out with an LMI miter box setup and built 50 guitars with it. It was fine, but the table saw is so much easier and faster.

Josh

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Josh House

Canadian Luthier Supply
http://www.canadianluthiersupply.com
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House Guitars - Custom Built Acoustic Instruments.
http://www.houseguitars.com

Table saw, no question. Besides the saw itself, the only item I bought was the blade. The rest is fabricated.
Once it is set up, it takes about 90 seconds for me to slot a fingerboard.
I like doing some things with hand tools, but this isn't one of them.

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John

My experience is nearly identical to this.

I started out with the LMI miter box,

Now I have the Stemac blade in my tablesaw, and I use the LMI templates.

I made a slotting carriage, I pulled the pin and guide from my miter box for use in the carriage.

SO much easier, and I believe more accurate, as the hand saw cuts a slightly wider kerf.

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Old growth, shmold growth!

I have neither but at one time I was considering buying the mitre box, until I saw youtube vids of it being used. I came to the conclusion that my homemade measuring rule, xacto and square were quite a bit faster than what I was seeing on the Videos. It's also accurate. You can also cut slots on a Bandsaw if you have the right blade and a homemade template.

Doug

I got a table saw set up, currently with a stewmac blade and homemade sled. Did the first few by hand, but I'd never go back.

Feel free to drop by sometime and test it out.

Joel.

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http://Michaudmade.com

Same as guitar whisperer. Stew mac blade, LMI template.
I made a fence that indexes to my existing table saw sled. Works like a charm. One of the easier processes in building. I also got two blade stabilizers from Lee Valley. Very much worth it. They also really improve the Diablo thin kerf blade that a lot of us use for cutting bindings and other small stuff.
L.

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Cut to size.....Beat to fit.....Paint to match.

Shane's blade, LMI Template, Radial Arm Saw.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

a table saw system and appropriate templates, fixturing, etc..(if you have a table saw) would be first choice. it's fast and final.

i don't have a table saw so i can only comment on the mitre box method. i have one of lmi's black plastic mitre box jigs, lmi templates and homemade ones for odd scales, and just recently stew mac's japanese fret slot saw that they market for their mitre box. at the time i bought it, SM didn't have a mitre box with bearings, just brass or bronze blocks which i thought was a bad idea. so did they, because now they sport bearings as well. in hind sight, i would say that the SM miter box is probably the better of the two should you decide to go this way, because it's actually made of aluminum -not polypropylene, and doesn't have springs supplying alignment pressure to the bearings through the saw carriage. lmi's system can be a little wiggly as a result.

rant #1
i used to use lmi's fret saw made in england as of tuesday in fact, but there were issues:
1) the thing was .002 thou smaller in width (i checked with a starrett .0001 reading micrometer on the kerf in multiple areas) and cutting undersize slots. SM's saw was right on at .023 from end to end and it's long.
2) the brass backbone of the lmi saw wears out fast when riding upon the bearings of the mitre box blade guide. leaving brass dust everywhere and screwing up my depth of cut. my lmi saw has no provisions nor room for that matter, for better guide rails to be mounted. SM's saw which has a steel spine and is a modified Dozuki, cuts way better. 5 pulls with the saw and i'm already at depth and ready for the next slot.

rant #2
it seems that with almost every tool i buy there is something wrong with it. something here or there that just makes the tool not complete. the vendors are kind, nice, and are more then willing to send replacements, but a purchase shouldn't be like throwing dice in vegas, it should be a sure thing. it's not always that cost effective to make every tool one uses and i'm very fortunate to have the skills to fix the ones that i do buy -but man, things need to be better (IMO) i'm old enough to remember a time when tools were better, adjustable, and repairable.
-end of rant.

I use the Stew Mac table saw blade with homemade jig and Stew Mac or LMI templates.

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Arie. When you think about it cutting fret slots should be a very simple and straightforward process. Actually it is simple when you understand why and how it can go wrong. The usual solution is to throw a lot of complex tooling at it in the hope that it solves just a few tiny niggles. The problem with that solution is that it invariably results in other tiny problems that are a direct result of using the piece of complex tooling. Over the method that I use there is no doubt that it also slows down the whole process.
One of the complaints one hears about fret slotting by hand is of the saw binding in the cut, especially on wood such as Ebony. Their complaints are justified. The solution is so simple that you often wonder why they are still selling saws for fretting with such thick gauge steel. Use thinner gauge steel, increase the set on the saw and (as if by magic) the binding problem disappears. But of course it isn't magic, it's simply understanding the simple solution to a simple problem. It's also why the Japanese saw works so much better. The Veritas dovetail saw works extremely well too, except that it has a touch more set. It's not designed for cutting fret slots though. I simply put glue into the slot and the frets hold fine.

what method do you use?

It's based on this:




Which is a homemade fret marker. The marks are actually thin slots cut with a zona saw. I have 4 fret scales on that particular rule. It just gets clamped to the fretboard blank and you locate a knife (I use an xacto) in a slot, put a small nick on the board. Do each fret position. Believe me, it's possible to do it blindfolded. That's the marking taken care of. It's very quick.
Rub White chalk on the board to highlight the marks.
Locate a knife in the first nick, push an engineers set square against the knife. Replace the knife with your saw and cut the slot. The square is used as a guide. Just make sure that the knife is held vertical. You can chamfer the set square so that the set on the saw is taken out of the equation. I don't bother but just tilt the square up by a mm or so. Each fret position is moved over by half the kerf width. That's fine as long as you don't start to work from the other end - i.e. all the frets get moved over.
It's a pretty simple method when using hand tools/saws. Maybe not quite as fast as a table saw but i don't own a table saw. Nor do I want to.

I was recently in the market for a dovetail saw. Ended up going with the Lie-Nielsen thin plate my wife surprised me with, which only makes a .018" kerf (as I measured it). However, Isaac, from Blackburn Tools, was totally up for making a kick-ass fret saw, perfectly set to my specs. He could be a great source for a nice saw.

I just slotted my first board (ebony) manually using LMI's manual slotting system. Pretty slick, but worked up a sweat. If I had a tablesaw, there wouldn't be any love lost by using a powered system. Although, having a nice, heavy, well balanced saw would probably cut the effort in half and make manual slotting a breeze.

How on earth do you work up a sweat cutting 2 1/2" width Ebony to a depth of barely 2 mm's. That slotting system must be a lot harder than I thought!
Anyway, you don't need a heavy saw. The Japanese saws are incredibly light and the Veritas isn't much heavier. It just has to be sharp and thin gauge that allows a decent amount of set.

cool -very nice!

I did a few dozen with a hand saw, steel ruler and a try square early in my building career, can't say I really enjoyed it that much. After getting a decent cabinet saw, one of the first things I bought was the SM blade and templates, I built a simple sled, and the process became a lot easier. Unless you really dislike using the table saw, or you just love using a hand saw, my advice is you get a similar set up, and spend your time on more interesting tasks.

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

After many, many boards, I replaced my LMI blade with a StewMac blade. I like the StewMac blade a lot more. It cuts faster and it doesn't need stabilizers. It takes very little time to make your own template out of 1/4" Plexiglass or Lexan.

If you do go with a handsaw system, it will work a lot better if you sharpen the blade. Saw blades don't come particularly sharp from the manufacturer. The burr you leave when you sharpen the fret saw will make just enough kerf to make the saw glide a lot more easily that it does fresh out of the box.

Maybe I'm just out of shape. I mean, this atlas stone's only 205 lbs. Stone to shoulder.

Doug
You got a table saw. I can't see any reason to do it manually unless you want the experience.

arie...what you wrote...my experience EXACTLY.

The saw's the problem. I ended up so frustrated I waxed it as I cut...then recut it with the SM japan saw cause the kerf is tight.
I hope the waxing doesn't cause lifting..I glue with titebond to build around the tangs...but hopefully the recut remove the wax.
Are you sure the Japan saw won't work in the LMI box?...I didn't try it.
If I didn't have a table saw I would buy the SM box...just to be able to use the japan saw.
Have you considered just buying a small cheap table saw...about $300 or so. A table saw is so useful for woodworking in general...
but I'm a cabinetmaker so...

I finally make the fretting sled for the SM table saw blade this past week...had the blade over a year...lazy...and needed to do minor wiring for my sawstop contractor saw...it doesn't work with 6" blades unless you bypass the safety system.
Yesterday I cut 4 ebony and 2 amazon rw fretboards...so fast I had to slow myself down to make sure everything was set right.
I would have been sweating and puffing to just cut 1/2 a fretboard in the time it took to do all 6 on the table saw.

I didn't buy stablizers and it cuts fine...but I should have maybe. Too late now unless I build a new sled.

Can you buy the fretboard preslotted for the guitar you're building? LMII will cut the slots for any scale length for $9. Hard to beat that.

I prefer to do everything myself, but I bought my fingerboard from LMII preslotted. I actually bought two. Both were very black. One had a bit of twist in it, and the other was perfect.

I had the LMI power slotting rig for years, and liked it. But it went away when I built the cnc so I no longer had a need for it. The CNC is superior in every way except for speed for me, but I know there are ways to speed things up dramatically.
Your other options is to pay Andy Birko to cut them for you...

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."