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does anyone know if it is ok to use curly koa for fretboard inlay. my concern is that it will wear faster or not be as strong as the ebony fretboard and need replacing. also any suggestions for the type of inlay material to use for a realistic looking brown stem on a plant. i have seen some recon stone stuff that has nice dark grained pattern which gives the stem some demension. although i dont know where to get it or what it is called. thanks everyone.

Masecraft carries recon stone. They have about a zillion colors. Also corian might work for you too. I think it comes in 3 zillion colors.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

Koa isn't a good inlay material in the fingerboard. It is too soft and will wear
john hall

You might check with Larry Davis. He might have some acrylic infused koa that would wear better. I know he treats different woods that way.

Maybe he will chime in here... if not email him and ask.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

Matter of fact, I do acrylic impregnate Koa for fingerboards, pen blanks and knife handles. It makes great inlay stock and has been used a lot by Ron Thorn of Thorn Custom Inlay. He did the inlay work on Fender's special 50th anniversary Strat with my acrylized wood. It's not a new process since it's been around since the 1940's, but it has been refined over the years with the development of safer acrylic resins and iniaters. That Cobalt 60 was a train wreck!!!! Think liquid Plexi-Glass injected thru and thru the wood then polymerized into solid form.

Larry, does that create a material that works well for the entire fretboard (wear resistant, good holding power for the frets, etc)? What's the surface like - is it more like bare wood in looks and feel, or is it more like plastic? When I say "like plastic" I don't mean that in a negative sense, I'm just looking for descriptive terms. Another consideration would be whether that surface is resistant to darkening and dirtying over time from fingers. If I had a wood that looked like koa, but worked well for a fretboard, and wouldn't tend to get dirty-looking, I'd use that on some guitars.

Also, how well does it machine and is it tough on tools?

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

thanks for the help. i checked masecraft and i am sure i will find what i need there.

[QUOTE=Todd Rose] Larry, does that create a material that works well for the entire fretboard (wear resistant, good holding power for the frets, etc)? What's the surface like - is it more like bare wood in looks and feel, or is it more like plastic? When I say "like plastic" I don't mean that in a negative sense, I'm just looking for descriptive terms. Another consideration would be whether that surface is resistant to darkening and dirtying over time from fingers. If I had a wood that looked like koa, but worked well for a fretboard, and wouldn't tend to get dirty-looking, I'd use that on some guitars.

Also, how well does it machine and is it tough on tools? [/QUOTE]

Hi Todd...it works like regular wood...same tools, but there is no finish applied. Just sand and buff to gloss desired. The wood fibers do not compress as regular wood does so it takes detail carving better It is regular wood just impregnated with resin and polymerized. Here's a link to a thread on the process and use as electric bass fingerboards.
acrylized wood

Here's another thread (with photos) of wearabilty of a fretless bass with acrylized ebony.
acrylized wearabilityLarry Davis38743.5887384259

Thanks, Larry. I'm getting the picture, here. It sounds like the stuff would resist finger grime well, too - am I right? This would be a factor in my decision of whether to use a relatively light-colored wood for a fretboard.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

[QUOTE=Todd Rose] Thanks, Larry. I'm getting the picture, here. It sounds like the stuff would resist finger grime well, too - am I right? This would be a factor in my decision of whether to use a relatively light-colored wood for a fretboard.[/QUOTE]

It does resist normal pore entry of grime. It can always be buffed out because the acrylized wood needs no finish. Here's another link that's timely about your question. Post #4 deals with answering the grime question from post #3. The bass board is an acrylized birdseye maple in use 2 years. The other link to the wearability thread shows the photo of that fretless acrylized ebony board clean. I'll have several of these boards on display at GAL with a couple bass boards radiused (is that a word) and fretted and unfretted. I can post a photo of a bookmatched curly maple bass board that survived two weeks under water in New Orleans. Didn't even separate at the glue line. The bass belonged to contrabassist Stew McKinsey and he referrred to it as the "Funk Machine"   The board buffed up like new.

acrylized wood grime check

Thanks, Larry. Glad to hear you'll be at the GAL convention. I look forward to seeing your stuff and grilling you with more questions about it . If you have some gorgeous guitar-sized acrylized fretboard blanks with you, I just might relieve you of their ownership.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

   If a player is wearing anything on their fingerboard, they need to adjust their playing style and stop squeezing at contact with the frets. I've done wooden inlays and inlays of metal and shell, all with engraving and have never had an experience or complaint of wearing...of either the material or the engraving.

   You're squeezing way to hard if you're scraping into your fingerboard while playing and beginning the scalloping of its surface. I've seen excessive wear of the fingerboard surface on a few old Gibsons and Martins and have even seen the inlay markers plucked out as the result of the material around them being scraped away by the strings under the attack of an overzealous player with poor technique, but it is so rare that it shouldn't be a consideration.

   Koa is a beautiful material for inlays along with many other woods. I love combinations of shell and wood and ivory and stone for a very warm, organic inlay motif. Jim Olson is offering some of the finest wood vine inlays I've seen to date on his guitars.

Regards,
Kevin Gallagher/Omega GuitarsKevin Gallagher38746.6056597222

[QUOTE=Todd Rose] Thanks, Larry. Glad to hear you'll be at the GAL convention. I look forward to seeing your stuff and grilling you with more questions about it . If you have some gorgeous guitar-sized acrylized fretboard blanks with you, I just might relieve you of their ownership.[/QUOTE]

Maybe a Nigerian Satinwood board?

I think Kevin's point is well taken, and I would agree that a lot of fretboard wear could be avoided by improving technique. Certainly the strings should never contact the fretboard (fretless instruments, of course, are another story). But I'm not so sure that players who put wear on their fretboards are so rare. A lot of people, in my observation, have trouble keeping their fingernails off the board, even if they don't push the strings down into it. I'm lucky in that I have stubby fingernails; where the tip end of my nail is attached leaves a nice big pad of fingertip extending beyond. Other people's nails don't provide that luxury, and even if they're clipped as short as they can be, the nail can still overhang and contact the fretboard. Anyway, different strokes for different folks, but I, for one, will stick to very hard materials on fretboards, from the wear I've seen on many guitars.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/