1973 Yamaha FG-360 - Neck Reset+

DAY 2 (1/17/24) – Put 3 layers of masking tape around the heel corners and cut thru the lacquer radius, and around the fretboard extension, with a new scalpel blade. Used the .010” saw to separate the heel cap from the binding.

Put the heat shield on the top and heated the fretboard extension with the halogen light, moving the guitar every few minutes, trying to get under it with the spatula after 20 minutes with some progress. I injected some water with a syringe into the small gap I made and continued with the spatulas, injecting some water from each side. The fretboard loosened quickly after that. The hide glue doesn’t soften much by heat alone, it needs moisture. About 25 minutes total.

Wet the 14th and 15th fret area (to lessen the chance of chipping the fretboard while removing the fret) and removed the 14th and 15th frets with the Stew Mac fret puller. Used the black marker to mark the bass side of 14th fret with one mark, and the 15th fret with two marks, which will make reinstalling them easier. (Recognition and orientation).

Used 3D printed drill jig at the 15th fret, with a standard 1/16” diameter drill, to drill compound angle holes into the neck pocket, definitely hitting the neck pocket.

Used another 3D printed drill jig at the 14th fret, and used a 1/16” diameter x 6” long drill (with tape at 3-1/2” to limit the depth, DO NOT drill thru the dovetail into the bottom of the pocket!) to drill compound angle holes on both sides of the dovetail joint. This drilling is done very slowly, removing the drill often to clear the flutes. Vintage Yamaha FG neck joints are typically very tight and many times the steam can’t get to them to soften the glue. I’m hoping this will help.

Setup the steam generator, put the guitar in the neck jig, and turned on the steam with the tip in a bucket on the floor, waiting 4 minutes for it to heat up and be shooting mostly steam. When the spitting turned to full steam, I inserted the tip in the first 15th fret hole, then the second 15th fret hole after a minute, wiping the hot condensed steam off the top often with a face cloth. Then I inserted the tip into each of the 14th fret holes for about 30 seconds each, then back to the 15th fret holes. I turned the steam off after 6 minutes, removed the tip and the clamp on the fretboard, and wiggled the neck a bit. No movement.

I removed the guitar from the neck jig, applied the tape to the heel corners, and cut deeper into the corners. The scalpel went in fairly far and the wood felt soft for most of the bass side (except for the bottom), not so much for the treble side.

I put the guitar back in the neck jig, turned the steam on, alternating holes for 7 minutes, turned the steam off, pulled the tip, removed the clamp, applied end pressure, and wiggled. A lot of movement in the top 2/3rds. I’ll let it sit for another 15 minutes to cool and allow the moisture to seep in further. Cut deeper into the lower half of the heel corners.

Turned the steam on again, alternating holes. After 4 minutes I wiggled the neck a little each time after moving the tip. At 7 minutes the neck was about to pop, turned the steam off and wiggled it out. 20 minutes of steaming, and 30 minutes of waiting between sessions.

I used the steam to remove most of the finish blushing on the sides of the fretboard near the heel (caused by the steam) and attempted to remove some on the top. The steam softens the lacquer slightly and moisture gets inside. Steam puts it there, and the steam will remove it. Later I will use the hair drier to heat the rest of the moisture out of the lacquer, or polish it.

Just a little bit of the top was dug into, and only a small piece was stuck to the bottom of the fretboard. I removed the small piece with the spatula while the glue was still wet, but it was so small it wasn’t worth saving. On the top, I removed any small pieces of loose wood fibers and paper (from removing the fretboard) with the scalpel and realigned any fibers out of position, applied wood glue to both surfaces, and clamped them together; with a piece of wax paper (so nothing sticks to the top), a piece of thin foam (for any irregularities), a ¾” block of wood, a custom clamping caul for inside the guitar (with cutouts to avoid the braces), and (2) squeeze type clamps. I left it clamped for a couple of minutes, removed everything, wiped up the glue squeeze out, and reclamped.

I don’t know if the 14th fret drilled holes helped, although they did intersect the dovetail joint on both sides. But putting steam in those holes also took steam time away from the 15th fret holes, although only a minute or so per session.

Looking at the neck joint, a small piece of the bass dovetail was stuck in the body dovetail, which I removed with the chisel, along with all of the hide glue before it cooled and hardened. What was hanging up the treble side was a shim, which tore vertically, leaving most of it in the neck pocket, and a small strip on the neck dovetail. The same happened on the upper bass side, but I think that tore early as the neck loosened.

Overall, it was an average neck removal, tough (3 steam sessions), with some minor finish damage from the steam, but there is no heel lamination crack, which happens often because of the steam and wiggling.


Separating the heel cap from the binding.


Done.  The part of the heel cap attached to the binding will get filed off later.  I'd rather not cut into the side of the guitar.


Cut into the heel corners with the scalpel.




And the corners of the fretboard extension.






Heating the fretboard extension.


Got the spatula partially under the fretboard extension.  Injected hot water into the gap to soften the glue.


I use the paper to keep the spatula from damaging the top.  But the water causes wet pieces of paper to get pushed under the fretboard extension.


Wet the fretboard at the 14th & 15th frets.  Softening the wood reduces the chance of wood chips being pulled out during fret removal.


The 14th & 15th frets are out.  The chips.


Marked the frets for later identification and orientation.  Put them in the bag for the job.


The drill jig to drill the steam holes at the 15th fret.


The holes drilled.


The drill jig for the holes at the 14th fret (intersect the dovetail joint).


The (4) holes.


The steam setup.


The guitar clamped in the neck jig.


The steam tip in and some glue bubbles coming out of the heel corner, which is rare.


The neck is off.


The ugly detail.


Part of the shim on the treble side.


And part of the shim on the bass side.


The ugliness of the neck.  Lots of glue!!


You can see the 14th fret drilled hole, which went right thru the shim.


And the hole on the other side went thru the shim.


All the glue on the end!!  I had a hard time cutting into the bottom of the heel because the guitar was well glued to the side of the guitar.  Solme of the side is still stuck to the bottom of the heel.


After cleaning up most of the glue.




Yoy can see the piece of the bass side dovetail stuck in the neck pocket.








The chunk of the side stuck to the bottom of the heel.


The glue I scraped off, and one of my steam proof gloves.


About to glue the pieces back to the top.


The top clamped.


This is how much water my steam trap collected.  Too much water in the neck joint makes a mess.

DAY 4 (1/20/24) – Put a strip of Teflon in the 14th fret slot, tape on the fretboard, pushed rosewood dust into the steam hole that wasn’t centered on the slot (and a small chip), dropped water thin super glue on the hole, added more dust and super glue, removed the Teflon and tape, scraped and sanded the area smooth. Cleaned out the 14th & 15th fret slots, and banged the frets back in.

Before checking the fret level, I first checked the truss rod nut, which was loose. Snuggled it up and gave it a ¼ turn to have some tension on it. Checking the fret level on the bass side, I find the straight edge touching the 4th thru 9th, a slight even gap at the 1st thru 3rd, and a nearly even .005” to .007” gap from the 10th thru 15th. The treble side was slightly better. And the middle was maybe a little better. A fret level is certainly needed.

Taped the fretboard to protect it and keep it clean. I started with the 16” radius x 4” long block with worn 120 grit, to take down the high frets in the middle. Then I changed to the 8” long block with 320 grit to take the middle down to very close to the rest. Then the 21” long beam with 320 grit to level them all, up to the 15th, the rest have a slight fall away, which is normal. Only the ends of the 13th fret didn’t clean up, but they are very close, it’s not worth taking all the frets down any further.


The fret slot cleaning saw.


I use a 1/16" diameter drill for the steam hole because they will be covered by the fret.  The bass side 14th fret hole is off center and needs to be plugged with rosewood dust.


And hardened with water thin superglue.


And a chip on the treble side of the 15th fret.


The filled area.


After scraping and sanding.


The file to break the corners of the fret slots.  That makes it easier to get them back in.


The frets reinstalled!




Getting ready to level the frets.


Getting started with the 4" long block.  I had marked the 4th thru 9th fret area, to concentrate sanding on it.


The 4th thru 9th fret area sanded mostly level.


Starting with the 21" long leveling beam.






DONE!!!

DAY 6 (1/23/24) – Made a new bone saddle. The saddle slot is .118”/.119” wide (measured with precision gage blocks) x .10”/.15”/.10” (Bass/Middle/Treble) deep. The new saddle sticks out .18”/.15” (Bass/Treble). A good place to start.

Made a new bone nut. The rough dimensions are .22” thick x 1.75” wide, slotted with 1.50” string spacing (center of E to E). I’ll finish the nut after the neck reset is done.

Made center marks on the neck at the 1st & 12th frets, and on the bridge. The neck is very close to being centered. The neck projection looks to be .06” above the top of the bridge, but these measurements are a little rough due to the heel not sitting completely flush on the side of the guitar, and the fretboard extension not completely flush on the top.

Set the tape on the heel at .03”. Filed & sanded to the tape. The neck is centered and projects .10” above the top of the bridge. It’s also sitting much better, with a little gap at the top of the heel on both sides.

I didn’t have to sand as much off of the heel as I expected because of cutting the heel cap and sanding that off, which could have been .03”/.04”.

Put the guitar in the neck jig, tuned to “D”, with the original strings to see where the neck angle is. The neck is perfectly centered. There is minimal neck relief. The nut action is high, as expected. Capoed a .013” feeler gage at the 1st fret to simulate approximate proper nut action. The action is 3/32” low D and a little under 3/32” high D.



The finished saddle.


Filing the nut slots.



File the end of the heel to the tape.  that is done so the pull sanding doesn't pop the heel cap off.


First stringing!!  It's close!

DAY 8 (1/27/24) – Tuned to D#, the action is a hair over 5/64” low D# and a hair under 5/64” high D#. The saddle sticks out .16”/.15”. Again, I’d like to see .18”/.15”. Since the treble action is 1/64” high, that end of the saddle needs to come down .03”, which would leave the saddle at .15”/.12”, .03” low. If I raise the saddle .03” only on bass side, then the action with be 1/64” high overall, so I’ll need to sand the heel a little more.

So I made a new saddle. It sticks out .19”/.16”. Put the guitar back in the neck jig, tuned to D#, and the action is a little over 3/32” low D# and a little over 5/64” high D#. exactly where I expected it to be.

Set the tape on the heel at .012”, filed & pull sanded to the tape. Put the guitar back in the neck jig, tuned to D#, and the action is 5/64” low D# and a little over 1/16” high D#. Good!!

Next, I need to polish the sanded lacquer radius on the side of the guitar. I applied the GluBoost MasterShield tape next to the heel area of the body and used the Fret Erasers to polish the lacquer radius area that had been sanded, then polished with the Dremel and small buffing wheel. The tape is .005” thick and not flexible, so I had to cover the area with 2 pieces. It sticks great and easily held up the Fret Erasers, and will certainly work with 80 grit sandpaper.

Made two .02” x 3/8” x 1” maple shims and used super glue to attach them to the neck dovetail. I cut a strip of carbon paper, folded it in half, inserted into the neck pocket, inserted the neck into the neck pocket (a few times), removed the neck, observed the black patterns on the shims, sanded the black area, reinserted the neck into the neck pocket, and found it fits perfectly. That is rare!!

Next is to touch up any areas in the heel area with a mahogany marker, then polish again with the Dremel and polishing wheel.

I applied fish glue to both surfaces of the dovetail and fretboard extension, put the neck in the neck pocket, put the guitar in the neck jig, installed the (4) outer strings, tuned them to get some string tension to pull the neck into the body, put a screw type clamp at the 15th fret, used a custom caul and squeeze type clamp at the end of the fretboard.  Once I was satisfied with the fretboard clamping, I loosened the strings. Any glue squeeze out is cleaned up with a toothpick and paper towel.

After pull sanding.  The action is done!


I just bought this for this purpose.


Applied.


The Fret Erasers, normally used for polishing frets.


After using the Fret Erasers.


A huge difference!


Both sides done.  It's hard to see because of the reflections.


Another try and fail!  Too many reflections.


Making the dovetail shims.


The shim glued in place.


The carbon paper in the neck pocket.


The carbon transferred to the shim.


The fish glue applied.


And clamped!!

DAY 10 (1/31/24) – Tuned to D#, the action is 5/64” low D# and 1/16” high D#.

DAY 12 (2/3/24) – I compared his guitar to a few of mine – measuring the usable 1st fret and nut width. I decided to make the new nut at 1.46" string spacing. Right now there's .05" space from the edge of the strings to the round on the edge of the 1st fret. Going from 1.50" to 1.44" will increase that gap by .03". It looks like a lot, in comparison. That gap increases for every fret. I think 1.46" is a reasonable compromise. Made a new rough nut with 1.46” string spacing. It’ll be finished after the frets are done.

Played every note fairly hard with a pick and no buzzes. Check the fret level in sections, with my 6” precision scale, and they are very level, maybe .001” over 6”.

Colored the tops of the frets with black marker. Used the Stew Mac Z-file to crown the frets, leaving a thin back line in the center of the fret, that is where the string will contact. Used the Stew Mac extra fine fret end file to file the sides of the frets to remove the file marks from crowning. Used 600 grit sandpaper to remove all the filing marks and the original leveling sanding marks. Used the Stew Mac Fret Erasers (220 thru 8000 grit) to polish the frets. Removed the tape from the fretboard.

The tools.


The frets crowned.


The frets sanded.


The first 3 frets polished.


All the frets polished.  I'll clean & oil the fretboard tomorrow.