Neck Inlay Questions

[Spagbol]

I hope none of this has been covered before (I can't find the threads if it has been). I have a few questions about how Ibanez (or anyone else) do neck inlays.

1) What used to keep the inlay in the neck? Is it the same for the clear plastic in the vine necks?

2) With Vine necks, do the inlays go right through the fretboard? I saw a picture from the Hoshino factory once that had some vine fretboards cut ready for the inlays and they seemed to be cut right through... They were labelled as fretboards, but maybe they were templates for the CNC machines?

3) What actually is used as filler? (not that I see it very often on Ibanez necks!)

Sorry for the novice questions!

Richard

[Project Guitar]

I have seen that very same picture your talking about....

I can tell you that on the BFP Jem neck I have they used plastic cut outs and embeded them in resin which you can find in most home craft hobby stores...then they polished the top down to a smooth level finish even with the fret board......

using an underscore,which means the bottom of the inlay cavity is actally wider than the top helps to keep the inlay in place.......

I dont have the answer for you about question number 2 sorry....

The techniqe is different for different types of material you are going to use in the inlay.....

Here is a website that deals with pearl inlays....

http://inlay.com/inlay/pearl/pearl-1.html

* * * * *hope this helps you........

[Spagbol]

Thanks for the info. I was just curious to know how it's all done. So the inlays in a vine neck aren't held in place by any adhesive, just by the underscore? What about normal dot inlays? is it the same thing with them, or are they glued in somehow?
Wow, the vine routing must be a tough one if it's not a straight cut given the intricacy of the pattern.
Does anybody know how the actual vine is done (not the leaves)?

Can anyone else elaborate on inlaying techniques?

How many questions can I ask in one post?!

Richard

[Project Guitar]

As many as are relevant to that particular post,then of course we always end up in tangents......

And yes they do use different glues to do different *dots and types of inlays......

read the article on that link above I think it may open your eyes up a bit about doing your own inlay.....

As far as the vine is concerned I think you can rest assured that the techs at Ibanez have a machine programmed to cut the slot for the inlay........

[Spagbol]

I've seen the CNC machines at Hoshino
Reading the article as I write...