A bit more neck work and a surprise.....

I spent some time tonight after work getting the neck a little closer to the final shape and size. I cut the volute to size, cleaned up the neck/headstock transition and removed a lot of wood on the neck. It is pretty close to the final shape, but I left some wood to final sand out any dings that I might get while I am working on it. Also looking at the heel size, I think I am going to remove some more wood as it looks a bit thick to me. I want this one to have a fairly small and thin looking heel, without removing too much wood as to make it weak. One thing I noticed was a hidden surprise in the heel as I was sanding it down. There are two dark spots that look like either sap pockets or dark grain spots that are on the heel. Unfortunately they are very noticeable and look like a ding in the wood. I am hoping that if I thin the heel down a little more I might be able to sand through them. Oh well, I guess that is what is called character! I guess that also means I will be staining this neck. I really wanted to keep this neck light so the ebony would stand out, but I really don't want to see those marks so if I can't sand them out, I will have to stain it.

Here is the back of the peg head. I cleaned the volute, and shaped the edges to a point. The volute isn't quite as nice as a Martin volute but since is is my first try at it, I am pretty happy with it. The transition from mahogany to ebony around the volute needs some cleaning but I will do that just before the finishing stage.

Here you can see the flaws in the heel I mentioned. There are two fingernail shaped black marks on the left side, and one lighter line towards the right center. Bummer! Looks like this neck is going to get some dark stain.

You can see that the heel is a bit thick. I want to thin it down a bit more to make it look a little more delicate without being weak. You can also see that the back of the neck isn't perfectly straight yet. It is a little fat in the middle. If you look at the neck just above the heel, you can see it is a little thinner. That is the actual thickness I want and it will taper up to the peg head. I wanted to leave a bit of wood to fine tune after the fingerboard is installed and the neck has been fit to the body.

A side view of the volute.