dotbot wrote:There's a bit too much neck angle and every fret below the 9th sounds like the 9th. Plays fine above that but, like I guess most people, I spend a lot more time below the 9th than above it.
Just place a capo at the 9th fret and you'll be fine.
If this fretboard is thick enough you can taper it towards the bridge without taking it off. I have done this many times as a repair of older instruments, and I find it is easiest to use a block plane. Start at the bridge-end of the fretboard and keep planing an incrementally increasing area extending towards the nut-end. You can use the plane with the grain or, if it is a very hard or stubborn wood across the grain with a temporarily glued on strip of wood to the exit edge to prevent blow-out. In any case take very light shavings and check progress often in order to establish a flat and not a crooked fretboard surface. When I have established the desired taper I use long sanding block (100 grit followed by 180 and/or 240 grit) to even out eventual irregularities, especially after planing across the grain.
You could also only use sanding blocks (60 or 80 grit) to create the taper. I have done it this way too, but I found it much more difficult to create a straight, not crooked surface. Regardless of whether you use a plane or just sanding blocks, checking progress frequently is very important or you very quickly might overshoot your goal at one or another corner of the fretboard. You
must be conscious of how fast work is progressing to be able to take off the exact amounts of wood you want and where you want it to come off.
If the fretboard is too thin to taper it down you still have three options:
As yo said you could take it off completely and then make a new one. most epoxies start to release at about 180 -200°C. I have never de-glued off such a large epoxied surface, but it should be possible. Pull the frets so a clothes iron will make full contact with the fretboard. Planing off the greatest part of the fretboard will help too. The faster the heat penetrates the less deep it will have penetrated at the point the board will release. This can be important to not put in danger other glue joints (head/neck and heel/sides).
The second option would be to plane off the fretboard completely. I had to do this once with a fretboard that apparently was glued on with PU glue (heat would have charcoaled the wood before releasing the PU glue). I don't know what soundboard wood you used, but I see a bit of a problem when thinking of planing epoxy off a softwood surface.
The third possibility would be to plane down the fretboard until fret slots disappear, then glue another (correctly tapered) piece of wood on top of the thinned down old fretboard. With some woods (especially dark ones) it will hardly be noticeable that there is actually a "laminated fretboard", but on figured or light coloured woods it may show quite clearly.
. Now I'm just desperate.
