Hi John – thank you, sincerely, for your good advice. I “thought” I was taking off small amounts, but obviously not. I will get a spiral bit and really take off smaller amounts from now on. Best regards, Dom

Never mind, I just found the answer in Giuliano’s book!

It looks as if you’re trying to take off too much material at one time. A good rule of thumb is no more than half the width of the bit at any one time. When routing body templates I usually take no more than 1/8″ of material off. Less is better.

A spiral bit will significantly reduce the chances of tear out.

What software is this?? In addition to these guidelines, do you have recommendations for software settings we should be using for frequency analysis?

On another point, I appreciate your efforts to keep your soundboard consistent in thickness but I just do not think that some sanding in on area is going to make any perceptible change on the sound of your guitar. It’s near the sides and that’s a place that some people remove thickness anyway. Obviously you need to send a larger area to get…

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I too think stainless changes the tone. It’s definitely brighter. Maybe “pingy” sounding for lack of a better term. I have used EVO when it was available and found it wasn’t quite as bright as stainless, but still brighter than nickel silver.

I just re-fretted an original Taylor for a customer in Stainless and the customer was over the moon with the results and can’t get over how well it plays now. Really depends on the player I think. I just about exclusively use stainless on all fretting jobs and have yet to have complaint.