Rosewood fretboard heel chip repair.

[Ben Shelton]

I'm looking for advice on how to repair the end of the fretboard on this stratocaster neck. My original plan was to cut a rabbet and epoxy a rosewood scrap in place. I have a scrap of rosewood that matches the grain nicely so I cut the rabbet but then I started thinking about cleaning up squeeze out and shaping the scrap to match the fingerboard and I thought I better get some advice on how to proceed.

Is epoxy the best choice for glue? I'd like the repair to be as invisible as possible. I don't want the area of the repair to end up with epoxy coated looking splotches. What would be your strategy?

Clamping could get interesting. Any ideas how to clamp this up while the glue sets?

Shaping the patch will be interesting too. I've been trying to figure out how to use my router to trim things flush. I have both a top bearing and a bottom bearing flush cutting bit so I think I'm good to go there.

What are your thoughts?

[Barry Daniels]

Either epoxy or Titebond will work well. Wipe up squeeze out with a rag before it hardens. Dampen the rag with water for Titebond or mineral spirits for epoxy. I would do most of the shaping before gluing the patch then do final shaping with a small scraper.

If you want a less apparent repair I would remove the last fret and cut the rabbet up to the fret slot. Then align the patch to match the grain on the fretboard. This will hide the cross grain joint and make the repair much less visible dependent upon how well the grain matches. When placing this patch, leave an appropriate gap so you can replace the fret later.

[Carl Dickinson]

Use binding tape as the clamp.