how to fix low spot on back of neck?

[Micha Schellhaas]

I have this cool strat neck, it's still unfinished and I am wondering how to fix a small problem:

The profile is great , but right where the thumb rests in the first position there is a little dip in the neck. I was wondering if there is any way to ADD material in this spot during the finishing process or if there is another way to fix that.

[Micha Schellhaas]

The area is actually smaller than the red circle, maybe the size of a penny. I was thinking of leveling it with wood filler?

[William F.Eden]

Micha is there not enough wood on the neck that you could change the profile  a little to get rid of the deprestion??? Bill......

[Micha Schellhaas]

I guess that's what I'll end up doing, I was thinking of all kinds of fixes like build up some layers of superglue etc but I think I should just make peace with it and have a little thinner neck than I wanted.

[Greg Mirken]

If you are planning a transparent finish any sort of opaque filler will look horrible. No matter how well you think it matches, at some angles it will be glaringly obvious. How deep is the depression? You could fill it with additional coats of finish, but if the finish winds up too thick you risk checking in the area.

[Micha Schellhaas]

it's really not that deep, I dont even think I can measure it, but I can feel it. I sanded it out a little bit more but I don't dare taking away more from the neck. Additional coats of finish might be the solution!

[steve hewitt]

Hard to see what you have going on there but could you not shape it into some sort of V, maintaining the depth at the centre?

[Robbie Collins]

How was the dip made ... sanding, impact?

[Micha Schellhaas]

sanding, not by me, haha... :-(

[Robbie Collins]

Here's an idea ... sell the neck as blemished and buy or make another one.

[Joshua Levin-Epstein]

Have you tried steaming the area?

[Dave Yelverton]

Seems to me like the shaping of the headstock/neck join is off-centre compared to the placing of the walnut strip. This being the case, I would reshape that area carefully to make it more central and in the process, hopefully, lose the dip.

[Russell Vance]

Thanks Dave,

This has gone on enough, either reshape the neck as Dave and Bill Eden has suggested, or  finish the neck with successive coats of sanding sealer, taking each coat back to bare wood until the divot is filled and then finishing with a further sealer coat and then finish coats.  You will get some shrinkage with the sanding sealer but the finish coats can then be further leveled over time and scrubbed with some steel wool or rebuffed.  If you are not equipped to spray then a reshape will do the trick.

As a start for a reshape bear in mind that the depth of the neck does not need to change change but the shoulders are removed slightly, think very soft "V"  profile versus a full "C".   Many players like the feel of a soft V to C transition neck anyway.   The removal of some of the shoulder material will change the distance around the back of the neck so it will feel thinner but the distance that the thumb rests on the spine from the front of the board remains the same.  

Rusty.