3 questions from a first time modder - Nut shelf, relocating pickup cover and coating removal

Unorthodox

So following on from my previous post were I fudged the nut removal, I've taken Wes's advice and picked up the keyboard before the clawhammer for this one.

The guitar is a Harley Benton CST24T I got from Thomann. Knew that it was going to be hit and miss with some things, so I'm looking to correct a few of the issues and upgrade as I go. First thing's first...



IGNORE, got my measurements very, very wrong...
Nut shelf

Slotted a Graphtech Tusq nut in place of the old and measured the height of the low E string above the first fret when fretted at the third. According to Graphtech's site the ideal height should be 2.5mm for the low E, I was getting about half that so I'm assuming I need a shim in the nut shelf to increase that height a tad.

I've seen some reports on using playing cards or just paper glued together, but others said that wasn't good for a permanent fix (yet failed to mention something more suited).

What's my best course of action to up the height a little?




Relocating pickup cover

The bridge pickup cover is out of alignment and you can see the cavity from the outside (Thomann said not to worry as "the pickup issue is only an optical „damage“."...)



My current idea is to fill the currently existing holes with some filed down dowel and redrill the correctly aligned holes. Anything I need to be aware of with this? I wanted to fill the old holes as the new ones will be quite close.

Here's an extra hole that I've added dowel to, more just to test out the fitting than anything.



Approximately where the new holes need to be drilled:-




Removing neck coating

The neck has a very thick glossy coat on it and ideally I'd love to have the wood satin finish. I would guess that they added such a thick coating to cover any rough fret edges (obviously if removed the frets would need some work).

My initial plan was to sand the coating off, moving to finer grits once the thick of it is off, but hadn't anticipated on there being THAT much coating on there. It's like an extra binding at this point.

What would be the best course of action to tackle this?



Thanks in advance for anyone that could share their expertise Cheers.

SteveRobinson

0.01" is 0.25mm. If your gap is 1.25mm you need to get the nut files out.

I think your fret ends need dressing, they look positively dangerous! I'd leave the finish on the neck and if you really want a satin feel, use some Scotchbrite scourer to knock the gloss off.

Unorthodox

Ah, missed a decimal place in my measurements. Thanks for your help Steve.

Couldn't get this shit much wronger could I?  

Alvin

The neck now looks like it has had a refret that isn't finished , how did you manage that ?

    My suggestion is to stop there before you take to much material away from the neck  . You need to sort the fret ends out . Various ways of doing this , i would run a file along the edges to get them closer to the edge of the board then go over (the ends)with an oilstone , be carefull of the angle you don't want to take away to much fret area off the top. Depending on the result you may want to round the edges slightly with a file and after that some wet and dry paper to make them nice and smooth ( just the ends not the tops - you haven't touched them have you ? ) .   I would have lived with the pickup surround if it's only on the bottom you wouldn't notice it when playing but another thing you could have done is just filled the gap with a little coloured epoxy which is a pretty easy fix .  

   It might only be a Harley Benton but does that matter ? If it plays great it doesn't matter how much it cost , i bet plenty of people have spent an awfull lot more on guitars and still found minor faults .  They look pretty cool guitars .

Unorthodox

I haven't touched the frets, that's how it arrived. That picture of the frets was when it first arrived. Thomann gave me €17 credit for the flaws. Everything is smooth, nothing feels sharp to the touch.

I've partially sanded the coating of the back of the neck, looking good at the minute, will tackle the rest tomorrow and update with a few pictures of my progress.