Acoustic Guitar Construction

If you decide to have bound finger-board a special tool is required to prepared the fret end to fit in the slots -- the commercial tool is pretty expensive. The five dollar nippers from Radio Shack and Harbor Freight can be easily converted. The photos show the mods -- if you want to go upscale Klein tools has the exact unit used by SM.

I tried doing that with a pair from radio shack and completely muck it up. Broke down and bought the StewMac set. When I compared them I saw what I did wrong (but I don't remember what it was now). Will definitely work if you do it right.

Yeah it works fine, I just used it on the Ditson cutaway for the bound fretboard.

Used a modified Klein Nibbler on five bound fret boards with excellent results. Great tip.

Unfortunately I believe the Klein nippers have been discontinued. I wish I would have seen this on Friday cause that's when I mucked up the $10 pair I bought from Frys.
Dave, don't you just love your Zyliss vice. I use mine all the time.
Jim.

Zyliss +1 !