Some players swear by radiused fretboards and others prefer flat fretboards. Some don’t care either way. A number of players who have some sort of impairment to their fretting hands have told me that a radius is genuinely helpful in forming chords. After a long period of indecision, the pro-radius contingent convinced me that this would be a desirable option. There are a number of ways to radius a board and after trying one of the strenuous manual methods, I built a jig to do the job more quickly and with considerably less effort. The board blank is attached to the jig with double-sided tape. The router is on a carriage that slides both longitudinally and in an arc across the blank. By running the router back and forth along the length of the blank a dozen times or so and incrementing the arc a bit with each pass, the router cuts a smooth and perfectly radiused board. This is always done before slotting. If done after, the router bit can chip the board surface as it hits the slots. Choosing a radiused board sets off a chain reaction of related changes: the top of the nut and the saddle are curved to match, the frets must be bent in an arc matching the board and, while it’s not strictly necessary, I find it aesthetically pleasing to curve the top of the bridge. These details are a nice addition to the appearance of the instrument.
