Suggestion for a fret slot saw?

[Dave Bagwill]

Kevin, you be da man!

20 minutes work is just fine. I was pricing slotted fb's on the interweb today, and they ran from $40 or so to - believe it or not - $94 for a simple ziricote board with slots in it. I got so incensed at that, that I shopped around for ziricote blanks and found them for under $20. C'mon, that's a no-brainer. Which means, I can understand it. :-)

Thanks ya'll.

Oh hey - how do you control the depth of the slot?

[Tim Benware]

Oh hey - how do you control the depth of the slot?

I was thinking the same thing. Looks like 13-15 good strokes does it. But I'd need something more precise or I'd be cutting the thing in half!

[ken cierp]

The spine on the saw becomes the stop -- you can make a bolt on slide (up/down) with a slot, one on front guide and one on the back guide. Or you can simply stack a couple of pieces of wood on the top edge of the guide front and back -- use tape to hold them in place. I'll post a pic of Teeter's adjustable stop --- its simple and effective.

As for the need to have a clamp --- do it! Think about a how a wedge works -- its the tiny bit of misalignment that locks something into position --if when cutting a slot the board moves the slightest fraction of an inch the saw will bind and stop dead. Its a friction fact of life -- Been there done it.

[TonyinNYC]

Kevin,
How much did you save over the whole LMII set up? I am too lazy to look!

[Kevin in California]

The template I got as part of a trade for a one of my handmade knives....I got all kinds of stuff, but they sell for around $35. The saw was about $25. The mitre box was about $3, but they go regular for about $7. I used a drill bit shank for a registration pin installed in the box.
That's it!
$180 for the whole deal at LMI, which isn't too bad really either. I just like making my own jigs and stuff when I can.
I really do not have a problem with the fretboard moving while I saw....the registration pin hold it in place laterally, and I have spacers to keep it from moving forward and back, but I know what Ken is talking about, and the saw can bind easily.
For depth, I have spacers under the template to raise the fretboard up to a point that when I saw, as Ken said, the spine on the saw bottoms out on the top of my mitre box, and I have the depth I want. I usually go back anyway and finesse the depth, especially if I'm going to bind the fretboard.
I think it works pretty good for about 1/3 of the cost of the LMI or Stewmac setup.

Kevin