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I've got these two pieces of spruce joined and glued together for a telecaster style body. When I was clamping it I pinched the ends between a couple pieces of plexi-glass with C clamps, and used three bar clamps to squeeze the two pieces together. The ends glued totally flush but in the middle there is a slight lip that causes a gap that measures about .005.

Would the appropriate way to deal with this be taking a small block plane to the seam and than using a ROSander to remove any milling marks?

I know it's not ideal but as Brad Paisley says a telecaster is just a cutting board with a neck attached. So I'm not too worried.

I would level it with a cabinet scraper; A plane, planer or drum sander would all work.

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http://www.Harvestmoonguitars.com

Yep.

If you're not familiar with planes and avoiding tear out, you may want to sand.

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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.

I got that glue line sorted really nicely, I planed, scraped, and sanded. However, I received a really good tear out lesson after routing the body. Yikes!

I have the greatest respect for my routers - they are powerful scary machines that can do a lot of damage to wood or flesh very fast. If you are new to their use, at least read the chapter in Hiscock's book about safety and then think every time you use one about the direction of the cut. Make sure your templates are well attached to the work piece (I tend to not trust carpet tape by itself) and that your work is clamped solidly.

Yes! Respect! I am pretty new to using the router, (and really all of my woodworking stuff) and it suddenly dawned on me that the tool I was so carelessly swinging around had two razor sharp chisels spinning around at incredibly fast speeds, I think because it sat horizontally to the work piece and involved spinning I assumed it was more like a drill. In fact on a slight tangent, with all of the increased power tool/woodworking going on in the garage my family has now instituted a system for entering the garage where they have to knock loudly and wait a moment for me to respond before barging in, startling me and sending a hand into a blade.

I have made sure I clamp and screw templates as much as possible. But I had no clue about the direction of the cut thing, that is until the router ran away from me once, then I noticed it was much friendlier going one way than the other. Which leads me to another question, is it standard practice to do this kind of routing with a table? I just have a small Makita trim router and I've been doing it all from the top holding the router with my hand.

I own four routers at present and use them very differently. First is a dremel on a router base - it does inlay. I have a small "laminate trimmer" which is pretty good for bindings, small cleanup work. I recently bought a 2 hp Rigid for most solid body electric routing - its big and heavy and handles a larger bit fairly well - the weight is actually an advantage for control. And I have a small router table with probably a 1 or 1-1/2 hp drive - it is really handy for anything that needs to be routed against a fence (truss rod channels) or if the template can be attached with flat head screws (outside shape of a solid body). A big router has one advantage that you have to have both hands on the handles - that lessens the chance of getting one close to the bit.

The idea of "climbing cuts" is really important and often times means that you need to route in sections. I think it is also very important to remove as much waste as possible by other means - drilling with large Forstner bits for example. I spend lots of time checking my templates and making practice cuts on scrap to make sure the depth is correct. I'm also a bit anal about the Rigid router - the clerk where I bought it said he had one and loved it but the 1/4 inch collet had a habit of loosing - if I have much to do I stop and check it often.

I also pull the plug out of the wall every time I change bits (I do that with my band saw and table saw too). I worked in industry for so long that the idea of "lock out tag out" is just second nature.

They are powerful useful tools. They scare the hell out of me. I think that is good.

"Make sure your templates are well attached to the work piece (I tend to not trust carpet tape by itself) and that your work is clamped solidly."

I made this mistake on a build I was doing a few weeks ago. Double stick tape came loose and I ended up with a 1cm extra gap on the neck pocket that I wasn't intending. I had to slice it into a square with a chisel and fill it in. I didnt have the same type of wood, and it took stain differently. It's more than obvious, but fortunately, by the nature of the type of build I was making, i was allowed some freedom for "funkiness".

It was definitely a learning curve. This was the first time I routed out and drilled body holes from scratch to make a playable guitar. It came out nicely in the end though and I got paid. All's well that ends well.

But the most important lesson I learned is that I need a cnc machine. Lol.