mop. inlay

[rocket]

I have some gold mop. block inlay to to fit into an ebony fretboard, would it be a good idea to paint the inside of the cavity with some silver paint first so the black of the ebony doesn't dull the pearl as much?
Cheers,,,

Rod.

[Kim]

Rod, I don't think it will make any difference. The only gold MOP I have seen is not opaque in anyway that would allow light to refract back through from the substrate like it can with fake tortoise etc. I could be wrong, but refraction appears to occur from 'within' the shell itself.

Cheers

Kim

[Allen]

I use gold MOP all the time and don't need to do anything out of the norm when inlaying it. It's my preference over white MOP which I find a little cold and unappealing.

[Dominic]

Although I saw a post somewhere of a guy making a rosette out of crushed shell and epoxy. He lined the channel with silver foil first as he had a few gaps and this looked great. Otherwise you don't need any backing.

I also like the gold, a bit more aged looking. And I like the black MOP which gives a nice paua colour but a lot less in your face.

Coolest markers I have seen were on a Russian electric copy of James Hetfields custom Explorer. It used fibre optics to run a red light the the side markers. Looked really cool.

Dom

[Nick]

As everyone has already stated Rod, no special pre treatments required, cut your inlay pocket & epoxy away! Unless it's really really thin & you can see light through it when held up (Like a piece of supermarket Bacon ), then it shouldn't show any colour other than the gold. If you can see light through it then it's too thin for fretboards anyways .

[rocket]

The stuff is 1.5 mm thick, i'll lose a bit of body with the radius but that should be only about .25-.3mm at the most, should still be plenty left.
Rod.
By the way Nick, glad to see you're still in one piece over there!!!

[Nick]

By the way Nick, glad to see you're still in one piece over there!!!

Thanks Rod, I think anything that is going to fall down already has They told us the other day that we can expect aftershocks for the next 30 years but diminishing in intensity & frequency of course. But so far we're still getting at least one 5+ a day (sounds like a food makeup recomendation!) but getting used to it now, most people just roll their eyes when one rocks through now or play Richter Bingo (guess the size to the nearest decimal point, closest wins).

Back on topic,
We demand pictures of course, of the finished inlays.....merely for quality control you understand

[rocket]

Of course Nick, i wouldn't dream of not showing it off. Some might recall quite a while back i was making enquiries about ES335 plans, well Lillian was quite generous and posted some over to me, and well, i'm quite a good way through this project, first thin body semi-hollow i've tried, as you can gather the neck is nearly there , got the wiring in and out again, started the back, so i may have body with a neck attached in a week or two, so i'll post some pic's when i've got it in the white.
Cheers,,, keep it steady.

Rod.

[rocket]

I finally worked out how to resize pics on my new puter, anyways here's some pics of the gold mop. inlay as proof for my mate Nick

[rocket]

Another

[Nick]

Thanks Rod, you're a star! Nicely bound board by the way, they always look good when the headstock purf runs into the fingerboard I think, just adds that 'extra' touch.