Norbertocaster, part 12: fretwork and side markers

norbertocaster (build 1)

Started: July 15, 2025 • Ended: September 13, 2025

Working on the neck (again)

At this stage, things started to feel a bit chaotic and tricky to describe, since so much was happening at once. A few tasks were left for the neck: drilling holes for the tuners, completing the fretwork, and adding the side markers. Drilling the holes is straightforward if you follow the template, but getting them perfectly straight is still a challenge — and mine aren’t flawless either.

Fretwork quickly turned out to be my nemesis. I definitely should have watched more videos and learned more before diving in, because the result is far from perfect — even though I had all the necessary luthier tools. I started by taping the fretboard to protect it while working on the frets.

And... that’s the only photo I took of this process — it was just too frustrating and full of mistakes. The good news is that in the end, the guitar turned out to be playable (as I found out after finishing all the steps). My advice: watch some fretwork tutorials online — I’ll definitely do that before my next build.

The next step was adding side fret markers. Since the process required precision, there was no room for mistakes. To keep the neck steady, we built a simple rig and drilled the holes with a hand drill and a handy attachment (though, to be fair, a bench drill would have been much better).

Inspired by some YouTube videos, we made a small DIY “tool” for cutting the marker material — and it turned out to be surprisingly useful. The idea is simple: drill a hole through a thin piece of wood, insert the material, and then use a chisel to cut it to the desired length.

I have to admit, the final effect was really satisfying. After sanding the sides of the fretboard to level the markers with the wood, it was time for the most rewarding part of the whole build — oiling and waxing the neck. I applied three layers of Tru-Oil (only on the neck, not the fretboard) and finished it off with wax. I won’t go into the full process here since it’s perfectly explained in this video: oiling and waxing the neck.

At this point, the neck was finished. Later (after stringing the guitar), I attached the string guides to the headstock. Oh, wait! Before waxing, I also tried using the waterslide decal technique to add some text and an image to the headstock. Honestly, I’m not happy with the result — I only had an inkjet printer, and it really requires a laser printer or at least some sealing spray to work well. Next time, I’ll definitely go with a laser printer.