Best glue for filling gaps in ash, with tru-oil finish?

[Toby Park]

I'm mid way through my first build, and having just put some ebony binding around an ash body, there are a few thin gaps which need filling. I've got plenty of ash sanding dust, and have tried mixing it with a few different glues.

The below picture shows my 4 attempts, which, from left to right are:

1. Packing the gap with dust, and them simply using tru-oil over the top. Even once the true oil is dry, this seems to finish much darker than the surrounding wood, and of course the dust could easily work its way out.

2. titebond original, mixed with dust into a paste. This has since had tru-oil applied. To my eye this looks the best colour match.

3. As above but with araldite epoxy

4. superglue (CA) drips into gap, then dust quickly packed on top.



So it seems the titebond works best, and yet it's still pretty obvious so I'm not particularly happy with the results. Does anyone have any better methods?
Thanks in advance.

[Mark Swanson]

Fill the gaps with Ebony dust, not the ash dust. It is far easier to match the color of the binding than to try and match the color of the body woods. I would fill the slot with dust and then wick in CA, sand and repeat if needed.

[Toby Park]

Thanks, that had occurred to me - however, this would leave the binding slightly inconsistent in it's width, i.e. it would look wider where adjacent gaps have been filled with ebony, which I think might look pretty messy?

Basically, I haven't done that great a job since it was my first time bending any wood. For example, here are the largest gaps that need filling. Some of these would, at their worst, increase the binding from 2mm to more like 2.5-3.0mm which I think might look a bit 'wavy'.

[Chris Richards]

Hi... I don't think you'll have much luck filling the ash. I would fill the ebony and if the binding doesn't follow a smooth curve (on the inside) you could touch-in with a black sharpie to make a nice curve and if the binding looks a bit thick you could sand the outside edge of the binding (from back to front of the body) to a slight taper to thin out the top edge, once the binding has been rounded off a bit I don't think you'd notice any thickness variation in thickness.

[Bryan Bear]

I agree with Mark, fill with ebony. I would also first try to close the gaps if possible. Failing that, fill with ebony and CA.You will need to be careful to keep as much ebony dust out of the pres of the ash as possible, though you will need to to that when sanding anyway. The changes in binding thickness will not be as noticeable as you thing (particularly to people other than yourself). Have you block sanded the sides yet? Typically, a gap in the binding means that the binding is a bit proud on the edge. Back filling with dust and sanding the perimeter will help ease the discrepancy (fortunately you are using ebony).

[Toby Park]

thanks, I'll see how I get on with filling with ebony,

Bryan, you mention another point I'm concerned about - I intend to round over the binding a lot, so the edge of the guitar will be really chamfered with the binding creating a black line within that chamfer (as opposed to forming a sharp solid edge). this means a lot of sanding and so far the little sanding I have done tells me that the ebony dust really 'stains' the ash when it gets into the ash grain.

How can I best avoid this? and how can I remove the inevitable ebony dust from the ash grain, it looks horrible! can it simply be cleaned out?

[Bryan Bear]

I won't be much help here, I have never done ebony next to open pored light wood, I just knew it was a problem. I'm sure you will get some tips here from people smarter than I. My first try would be to blow it out with compressed air or maybe vacuum it out? Hopefully you will get good advice on how to avoid the problem altogether.

BB

[Chris Richards]

Scrape the ebony for the final finishing don't sand it, then you'll avoid the dust, if you don't have a scraper you can use a Stanley knife blade. Sanding ebony is very messy.

[David King]

You can usually blast any sanding dust out of the grain with an air compressor at 120 PSI. Short of that I use a white gum eraser and that will lift most of the smudges out in a couple of passes. I vacuum clean carefully after that.

For grain filling lighter woods I'd recommend you go with a matching, store-bought wood filler or mix up your custom colors with lacquer sticks on a warm soldering iron. Everyone needs to have a set of lacquer sticks for just this situation. I use a temp controlled soldering iron on the lowest setting, about 350ºF.

[Ian Chester]

Hi a quick way of stopping the ebony staining the ash would be to paint the groove first with a coat of cheap clear woman's nail varnish. It forms a protective barrier. I have used this several times and seems to work. Practice on some scrap first to see if you need one or two coats. Ian