Building bridges, sticking out necks

It's been a good couple of days.

Yesterday, I decided to make some banjo bridges. The design is based on (that is, outright ripped off from) the work of a few folks on the banjohangout.com. Great site. Go there.

At the bandsaw, I ripped some strips of maple. I also used some tulipwood and koa wood.

Making the edges nice and straight at the sander.

I also flattened some ebony scraps at the sander.

A nice pile of woods and strips.

One piece clamped up. Man, it takes a lot of clamps.

Sheesh. I'm running out of clamps!

Dried and ready, I have my ruler ready for layout.

Layout was done with a knife, so I would have very accurate lines. I made lines for height, string spacing, and location of holes.

After some drilling, sanding, and cutting, I had a rough first bridge.

Hey, not bad! Sounds fine, too.

Today, I received a goody in the mail.

What's in the box???

Most of a Guild neck!

Now, I'm going to be very critical of the neck, and of the guitar as well. This criticism is NOT directed at the fantastic person who gave me the neck, free of charge, even paying for shipping. This criticism is for me to understand the job at hand. 

A little crack in the heel, not a problem...

Some super glue worked in...

And a clamp to send it home. Might as well get it done.

Somebody shimmed a nut at some point.

Lots of cracks in the finish. It also seems that there is some wax on the finish, so I will need to dewax this finish as much as possible before attempting any touch-up work.

I pulled the truss rod cover, and found that the nut has probably never been adjusted - a chunk of finish was on the nut still! Did they finish these necks after installing and adjusting the truss rod?

My makeshift truss rod wrench.

After pulling the nut, I added some petroleum jelly. It should be lubed up for the rest of it's life now.

And I put the nut on, just tight enough not to fall off.

Now, here is something interesting. When you click on this picture, look for the crack in the fret. I've never seen this before. It's just one of those things, ya know? 

Now I face a decision - do I try to combine the two fretboards to fix this guitar, or just get a new fretboard and set it up from scratch? I have a fretboard on the way, but I'm not sure if I will use it.