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I'm presently building a guitar for a friend and he wants abalone going up close to the edges of the fret board. This will be a first for me and I'm considering a few different ways of doing it and I'm hoping for some advice.

I've got 3/64" abalone strips and I figure I'll put them about 1/16" away from the fret board edges. What I am trying to decide is if it would be better to route some channels for the abalone and inlay them into the fret board as a first step or saw the fret board to size, route a ledge for the abalone then add binding.

If I take the first option, I can simply run the fret slotting saw through the inlayed abalone. However, I don't know if there would be any advantage to this as I don't think the fret tangs would seat in the abalone and I don't know if the 1/16" wood outside of the abalone would be holding the tang any eithor. So this brings me to my next question. Should I trim off the fret tangs before they reach the abalone or should try to get them to seat in the abalone/ebony edges. Also, when trimming back fret tangs for a bound fret board, how far back can you trim the tangs before the strength of the fret end becomes in jepardy?

Thanks in advance.

Pat

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There are three kinds of people:

Those that make things happen,
those that watch things happen,
and those that wondered what happened.

Usually they are sandwiched between two strips of a binding. Like they do around a body. You would have to undercut the fret tang like you do on a standard neck with binding. I'm sure the experts on inlays and pearl will chime in soon. And you get some better answers then I can give you. Mike

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