Official Luthiers Forum!

So your not up to it?

No. It's a ridiculous and immature thing to ask me to do.

I see nothing either ridiculous or immature or both in wanting to learn what methods produce the best results for one's clients. In fact it's a very worthy goal in my view. Combined with helping a couple of vets and also considering insulating others on the forum from trolling.... what could be wrong with this challenge..... That was a rhetorical question my friend....

No problem, I understand......

Back to our regularly scheduled program - discussing ...... proper...... fret work.....

Yes. Use accurate straightedges, an accurate fret rocker and feeler gauges. The rest is your skill.

Thanks Michael.

Here is a great video from our friends at Stew-Mac showing the very basics of a method similar to what we do. There is a lot more to it that is not shown in the video and of course the skill, experience, and "touch" of the craftsperson is important as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJDb-ICqU90

What's not shown is using bluing or a quick swipe on the fret crowns with magic marker. Because the method uses the presence or absence of the marker ink as an indicator the tolerances here are basically the thickness of the marker ink.... or to quantify that more precisely likely better than .0002" or .00508mm.

Additionally since the fret plane is treated and leveled as a whole with the beam spanning the entire fret plane or the frets that you are addressing in the case of inducing fall-away accuracy is assured, predictable, and repeatable over and over again. Beams should be checked periodically for trueness and we have a calibrated although calibration is out of date... surface plate that we made our beams on and check them on.

Interestingly too in this video with Eric Coleman who really knows his stuff by the way he is also inducing fall-away as discussed earlier in this thread and indicating that it's important for acoustic guitars (likely meaning steel string but I can't know what his intent actually was).

Lots of veteran repair folks use a similar method and some even use precision flattened long bed planes (with the blade retracted or absent...) to again level the entire fret plane as a whole.

Also I'm not keen to enlarge fret slots to the point where the frets fall into place. We want a snug fit, great contact and the glue is only there for insurance should the thing sustain an impact. The barbs are there for a reason and not taking advantage of the barbs to mechanically hold frets in place leaves only the glue as what's holding things in place. This also means that the glue of choice should be a gap filler since the fret slot is so very huge... and highly resistant to glue failures from say the RH (relative humidity not rectal hydration...) being too high. There is also, although subjective as hell..., the issue of tone of frets potted in glue with little wood contact. But again that's subjective but still troublesome to consider frets only held in place with glue.

Additionally an instrument built in such a manner where the fret barbs are not engaged and the slots are over sized relying only on the glue to keep the frets on board... is also committing the instrument to a life of limited options come refret time. It's not easy to retrofit an instrument for frets to be installed in the traditional, use the barbs.... manner once the slots have been enlarged to not firmly engage the barbs. This creates serviceability issues down the road too in my view. A better method in my view if one insists on only using glue to hold frets in would be to debarb the tang and then glue. At least then come refret time traditional frets "as-is" could be employed. But again those barbs are there for a reason...

I looked at Stew-Mac's Dan video regarding the fret rocker and we have a couple of the rockers too but only use them for a quick check and never for a verification and/or validation of trueness for the entire board because they are not capable of same. Dan uses the rocker to discover a high fret and not in the medical marijuana sense either. Dan is also known to use his current iteration of the neck jig too with dial indicators to dial in a fret job.

Stew-Mac sells leveling beams as does our OLF friend Murray on eBay as well. Stew-Mac also sells the neck jig as well as the fret rocker. I know Stew-Mac to be a quality company as well and not known for selling snake oil.

And we all know Dan to be one of the most knowledgable folks in the trade. It defies reason to me that these offerings would be so very widely used and available if they are snake oil. I also know personally that these tools work well for the intended purpose. The Fret rocker is not intended to be a leveling tool but simply a quick, unquantified check for high or loose frets. The beams, neck jig, radiused sanding cauls all are intended to be a method to address most or all of the fret plane at the same time.

I may put together a toot using beams much like what you can get from Murray and Stew-Mac showing the basics of the method that we currently use to level and dress frets. I've been wanting to do this for a while so don't be surprised if it shows up here one day.

Different strokes (in my case with precision leveling beams) for different folks....

I've traditionally used sandpaper in a radius block. I level the fretboard as well as I can, make sure the slots are absolutely dust free with compressed air and an exacto blade, hammer the frets in with a black deadblow mallet, run some marker over the tops, then sand lightly until all is gone but no further.

I've been helping a friend teach 5-8th graders to make cigar box guitars in woodshop. Coolest charter school ever. He apprenticed under a classical maker in Germany for three years before coming back to the states, and the whole experience has exposed to me to new ways of doing just about everything. His method is more similar to what we saw in the video Hesh posted.

For the recreational guys like me, I wonder how good is good enough. I feel that I get pretty good and level results, but I know a 12" block won't be as accurate as the long beams in the video.

I'm interested in learning more about fall away and clamping frets. Hesh, what do you use as a caul when you clamp?

I've posted this before. A test I did with a standard sized slot, hammered in (no glue) and one with a slightly larger slot (0.7 mm Veritas saw) and glued in with fish glue, clamped until dry. The far fret in the picture is the standard slot. The near one, the glued fret. The overhang of both frets was pulled up with a finger. That's the result, tested a number of times. If you do this on a fretboard off the Neck you will find that the induced backbow is zero or minimal. Certainly a lot less than using the standard slot.
It also works with HHG, not quite as effective and you have much less working time. For it to 'work' requires a certain mechanical hold from the barbs and the glue filling the space around those barbs. It does not work if the slot is too wide (I've tested that too)
To remove a fret requires steaming with a soldering iron and damp cloth. The fret then releases relatively easily with no chipping. The disadvantage of the method (there always is) is that it takes longer and it's a lengthy wait for Fish glue to thoroughly dry/harden.
As always, if you wish to try it do your own tests. I used this method because I had a couple of Ebony fretboards split (hammered in frets) on Romantic Guitars, which tend to have very thin fretboards. It seemed the obvious solution. The other reason was because those frets were intended for Mandolins, yet they suit the size of these small Guitars. Unfortunately they are pretty low frets and I wanted to minimise the amount removed off the fret tops when it came to the levelling process. Gluing/clamping gave me more accurate results than straight hammering but you also need to be aware that the clamps and the type of caul can give different results. Initially I thought that a soft wood for the caul would give better results, it actually turned out to be worse than a medium density hardwood.

Very cool James and I wish that I had went to a school that did fun stuff such as making cigar box instruments!

For clamping we use the Jaws II from Stew-Mac along with a complete set of the fretting cauls that John Watkins used to offer. Dave got his set as a gift for hosting what was the largest OLF gathering ever with nearly 50 folks at the Black Elks Lodge in Ann Arbor. I had to buy my set .... and it was the last set that John had made before he stopped selling to individuals. Can't remember the exact range but I believe that our cauls start around 6" and go all the way to flat with .5" graduations in the middle of the pack. I also think from memory that there are more than 20 of them as well.

Since we do compound radius fret jobs we need every possible radius that we might encounter and since we do so very many fret jobs we have to have two sets of everything and we do.

If you are wondering how the Jaws II works in every single location on the board on the guitar, because fretting the board off the guitar is not what is encountered in the repair work or recommended for a new build by yours truly..., Dave has invented some very cool jigs that permit the Jaws II to install every single fret safely and completely in every location on the neck. I'd post pics but it's not my IP (intellectual property).

In a nut shell the fall away that we want to see can be milled into the frets (board too in advance of fretting if folks would get over being scared of fretting on the finished instrument...) simply by marking and then with a long beam seeing where it hits. The eventual goal is to hit only the 1st through the 12th and not show signs of beam contact on the 13th though the last. If you do see contact on the 13th through the last use a short beam with a piece of masking tape on the first 3/4" of one end. Position the tape over the 12th and try to keep it there as you mill the 13th through the last. The tape elevates the beam a bit concentrating on milling a new, additional angle into the remaining frets. This is by definition fall-away.

The video of Eric that I posted a link to briefly shows him doing this too with a short beam. Not sure if I saw tape used so it's not required but we believe it's a great way to keep the 12th in the same fret plane as the 1st. Eric's and our method are very similar.

How much fall-away do we want? On my new builds (I hate the word builds...) I like to see about .010" for say an OM and up to .015" for a dread sized instrument. On refrets or fret dresses I shoot for about the same or a bit less. It's not the number or a specific number it's what does the job that is important and getting the 13th through the last beneath the fret plane of the 1st through the 12th is really the goal as well.

Regarding what's good enough. This is a great question and very applicable to this thread and many threads on the forum.

When I was a hobby builder good enough was a lower standard than being an industry pro who accepts the trust and funds of our clients. As a hobby builder I don't think that the expectation is there that folks will go to any length just because they are chasing someone's idea of acceptable level of precision. More specifically what works for you.

If you sell your creations my take is that the expectations may go up and may go up dramatically depending on the level of results obtained as a hobby builder. It's supposed to be fun too which I try to keep in mind.

We all want our name on quality work as well. So all things considered you may not encounter the grease ball weekend wedding player with his Les Paul who wants action of 2/64th" and 3/64th" at the 12th but we frequently do. We are also in a very musical town with hundreds of semi-pro and pro musicians. Additionally we are in the general neighborhood of Elderly instruments who are very well known for high quality work and an outstanding resource for folks needing excellent repair work.

All things considered for us seeing over 1,100 instruments annually the expectations that we place on ourselves are quite high. As such many of the methods that we use were developed by Dave Collins and are constantly in flux as he envisions even greater degrees of precision but always with the idea of providing realizable value to our clients. We won't chase our tails and the methods and practices that I tend to describe will always be far from academic and instead real life solutions for real life issues. That's the intent anyway.

So "good enough" is relative to the market or vacuum that one plays in I suspect and as such variable as all get out....

Not a great answer but I did try to consider the important stuff...

Here's a pic of my fret caul set and a little box that I whipped out one evening.

Nice set, Hesh... I'm salivating ... and also trying to figure out how David's jig works to allow the Jaws to install the upper frets over the body ...

There is some very useful information in this thread. Thanks for that, fellas.

Out of curiosity, about how long does it take the rest of you to execute a complete fret job? At my current work rate I think I could probably do about eleven a year. (Note: That's 11, not 1100!)
I haven't bothered doing the math, but just off the top of my head I don't think that would pencil out for me opening my own repair shop.

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George :-)

Yeah the fret cauls are very cool and excellent for lots of fretting uses beyond simply seating frets. We all have seen instruments with loose fret ends. Using a caul radius that is too tight is perfect for reseating loose ends and clamping until the glue dries.

We are also very much into compound radius fret work necessitating having multiple radius cauls available and this set does the trick very nicely.

It depends on lots of factors and who's doing it in our shop too the geezer or the middle aged guy....

Some factors to consider are is it a bound board which takes longer having to detang the ends of the frets. Is it a new build with perfect, clean slots or do we have to clean out copious amounts of old glue..... and or repair fret slots from the prior work...

Anyway on a new build and unbound board I suspect that I could fret, level, recrown, and polish in two hours. On a refret you have fret removal, leveling a board which can be a bear I tell ya... cleaning and at times repairing the slots, etc so they can take much longer.

I did one last week that took me 5 hours..... The client had very demanding requirements too such as very low action, custom strings with a wound G and very light gauges - lighter strings lash more by the way as counter intuitive as this may seem - they have less inertia and it was a refret so there was the removal process which is pretty easy and the board leveling that can suck big time....

I've also done precision fret dressing in one hour so it varies widely.

Dave did a refret last week in under two hours which may be a shop record for us....

For builders there is a lot to be said for building in serviceability meaning proper neck angles, no body hump...., fall-away milled into the board etc. For repair folks we have to deal with the ravages of what the manufacturer did not do well.... and that means more time to complete....

Good question and very much in keeping with my prior statement that as a builder only I only had the opportunity to do fret work each time I produced a new guitar.... So I tended to forget some of what I learned being someone who greatly benefits from practice, practice, practice....

It is fun and relaxing work for me though with some tunes on and the sights and sounds of a busy university community outside our windows.

1/16" action at the high e and 5/64" at the low e is easily achievable for me, but that's because I play relatively light. A lot (I would say nearly all) SLAMS on the strings in such a way that they really need higher (as in nearly 1/8 at the low E) actions in order to not buzz. I often set up many guitars like this following a fret dress, it plays nice but some (mainly beginners) will come back complaining about fret buzz.

So your setup will depend on what your customers want. I find a lot of acoustic players like to slam on their strings and therefore may want higher actions.

And for electric guitars like strats, 1/32" action at the low E should be achievable, but again, that's if you play like Joe Satriani. A lot of people play like they want to kill the string or something.

_________________
Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

Hi ya Tai Fu:

1/16" is 4/64th" and actually the Martin spec for the high e on new dreads and smaller bodied instruments and easy to obtain and 5/64th" is also the Martin spec for the low e and the same instruments with lights so not difficult to do by any means.

With mediums for say a bluegrass player (they slam too trying to hear themselves over the stinkin banjo..... ) the Martin spec is 5 and 7 always in 64th of an inch. 1/8" for the low e is pretty high IME and rarely necessary for anyone.

You are correct that set-ups are client dependent to a large degree but not entirely. Some clients want things that their instrument is not capable of (and neither are they at times....) so the customer is not always correct. But we won't tell them or at least try to be nice about it....

Your statement about action of 1/32" or harmonized to 64th 2/64th" for a low e is really pushing it and rarely available in my experience. I understand the "touch" thing and that some people can play very low action, I can play very low action and slam too which is necessary in the repair biz to duplicate how the gorilla that you will delivering the instrument to plays. But 2/64" on a low e is something that many necks and fret jobs will not support or players could play buzz free.

If you noticed the string gauge plays a huge roll too with different Martin specs for mediums and lights. As such when discussing action a critical element of the consideration given to what's possible and what's a fairly vivid imagination... are the specific strings that are targeted for the specific beast. To my surprise when I learned this lighter strings may require higher action depending on the player because they have less inertia to overcome making them lash out further than larger gauge, more massive strings.

Lots of things to consider and in our business we have to take all of these things into consideration.

I'm fond of having my clients play for me if there is any question as to what I can realistically promise that will, and here is the kicker.... work for them. Once I see how they hit I'm far more informed to suggest a set-up that will be of value to them when complete.

Interestingly too since guitars are all different so too are players and some pretty amazing things can be done with some of the better players as well. Set-ups that you would not think likely or even possible in terms of being buzz free in the hands of that specific player.

It's always interesting though and the end game is a very happy camper/client and that just makes my day - always!

I think the last customer who did that had super light strings (9-42 electric) and he wants very low action that doesn't buzz despite gorilla playing...

_________________
Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

From now on, I will always glue the frets.
I hammered in two frets and was surprised that I could pry them out with a fingernail.
Even though the frets looked seated under magnification, a fret rocker proved otherwise.
Thanks to all for the helpful tips!
Dan

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wah
Wah-wah-wah-wah
Wah

I love the look of that neck, Dan - very nice work!!!

Yeah a bit of glue is cheap insurance and can make the fretting easier too since depending on the glue it can be a lubricant as well.

Moving on with the thread fret wire is worth some thought too.

Not all fret wires are equal.....

We are big Jescar fans and have likely thousands of dollars of the stuff since we buy entire rolls by the pound. Being a Martin authorized service center, Taylor too and since we work on everything we have to carry likely 20 or more sizes at all times.

What we like about Jescar is the consistency and quality of their products as well as some minute differences that can make a big difference when time is money. We also like the EVO stuff too.

For years now on the forum when discussed someone will bring up the idea of lightly breaking the edge on the top of the fret slot with a 3 corner file to help avoid chipping later in life during refret time. I'm always keen to do stuff that addresses serviceability in how we work and what I build. So I've been a 3 corner file guy too.

The other justification for breaking that edge besides avoiding chipping when removing frets is that some fret wire won't seat completely flush if you don't break that fret slot edge. Much like breaking the inner edge of wood binding for a snugger fit by the way.

Under magnification Jescar wire has far less of a "filet" at the transition point under the crown and to the tang. As such seating the wire in a slot that has not had it's edge filed is no problem with this quality wire.

Since our world in the repair business is not dealing with virgin slots very often although this feature of Jescar wire has value we can't exploit it to the fullest but builders can. There will remain the issue of chip free removal but for us since we wick in super thin, very fresh CA for gluing frets the CA tends to fill every nook and cranny resulting in for lack of a better word a stratified fret slot likely less prone to chipping.

What results for us is no need to take the time to get the three corner files out, there is risk in using the files to break the edge too in terms of chipping. So Jescar wire saves us money by saving us time and we also believe it to be of the highest quality available - our kind of product.

A bonus is that we are currently evaluating OLFer Rick Rosenberg's Glue Boost offerings with great results. Jescar is a distributor for Rick's very fine Glue Boost offering making Jescar a one-stop for us now for both fret wire and CA and CA related products. Jescar also has a polish that we are currently evaluating as well and so far we really like the stuff.

As such not all fret wires are created equally and we like Jescar. It saves us time, it's the highest quality available IMO, they have all the sizes and different types of wire such as stainless, evo and of course ns wire too. Now with quality CA and polish available from Jescar we are happy as pigs in mud.

Yep, I kissed the top edges of the slots with a triangular file.
I used a Zona saw to cut fret slots, and the kerf is probably not ideal.
I'll look into Jescar frets. I bought some wire from Gizzly that was pitted and not useable.
The fretboard is home cut Mesquite.
I polished the board up to 600 grit and applied truoil prior to fretting.
I used titbond glue which was a snap to wipe off of the board during fretting.
Dan

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wah
Wah-wah-wah-wah
Wah

I like Zona saws too and much more that the inexacto saws. With the wooden handles on Zona saws suiting me personally better than plastic handles as well. Zona saws can have different versions with different TPIs and the cut width, although I never measured one may be not idea for fretting. But you suspected this...

Something that can make glue clean-up easier is to wax the board prior to driving the frets home. Howard's Feed-n-wax available at "real" hardware stores works well for this and also pops wood figure, conditions the board, and looks great.

Hesh thanks for the thread. Lots of help. Would love to have a compilation of your writings.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I like playing the evo. A of a ich to cut though. We use the triangle as well just lightly. And thin ca.
Cut the tip on the ca fresh and squeeze the tip together with needle nose ,then it fits in the slot.

deleted.

A luthier should have the ability to improvise anyways. Just because you got enough bank to buy everything from Stewmac/LMI doesn't make you a luthier. You should be able to perform fret work from about 50 dollars (at most) in tool investments.

_________________
Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

And an auto mechanic should be able to restore my Mercedes with no more than $100 in tools.

Sorry, but I object to the idea of a professional trade being simplified to a romanticized image of some esoteric art.

Yes, I could probably excecute nearly flawless fret work with a very cheap and rudimentary set of tools - after which I spent countless hours tuning and calibrating them by classic methods, at which time I would have invested easily hundreds of dollars of my time. I'm sorry, but no.

To some this is a hobby, and that's fine. To others it is an artistic field that they naively imagine to be some artist in an attic toiling away with simple basic historic utensils. In reality, this is a skilled trade like many others. Plumber, auto mechanic, electrician, welder - it takes a lot of time and money to build up your skills, and good facilities and tools for a professional to make a living in the trade even after a level of mastery is achieved.

Want a romanticized notion of the trade? Sure, I could flint knapp out a blade from stone and mount it in a plane body carved from a tree I cut down with my own teeth. Real world professional trade issues though, I'm sorry, but you need to invest in your tooling as much as you do your skills. An ambitious and sadistic enthusiast may be able to do a halfway decent fret dress with $50 in basic tools. A "luthier" however, is one who does this for a living, paying their mortgage, health care, kid's education, food on the table, etc. A luthier is going to do about as well in fret work as a plumber or carpenter would with just $50 worth of tools.

To do top quality fret work as a professional luthier, that sort of tooling investment isn't even going to get you started.

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Eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation.

We can agree to disagree. I've done good fret jobs with improvised tools, and continued using those tools in my professional career. I've invested in professional tools only when the tool resulted in increased quality or improved speed. And those investments were carefully made because I didnt make that much money at all.

_________________
Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com