Refretting

[dstretch]

I just did my first re-fret job, and when you get to the 11th fret it becomes very tricky. To prepare for the next time I do it, what are some tips for the upper frets?

Thank you all for your input.

Danny

[Terry Braund]

Tricky because you don't have good support to tap in the frets and don't want to break anything? One way is to widen the fret slots so you can press the frets in without force and glue them in. Different folks use different glues - epoxy, CA, ... and rig a clamping caul, if needed, to hold them down until the glue dries.

[EdSherry]

StewMac has a very good book on various methods of fretting and refretting:

http://www.stewmac.com/shop....ep.html

[Frank Ford]

Mandolins are tricky because the frets are short and stiff, and often skinny, tippy and downright recalcitrant, too.

I try never to widen fret slots in a portion of any fingerboard, but instead prefer to make the frets fit by filing them. #In particular, mandolin frets become MUCH easier to tap in if you make the bottoms of their tangs pointy:
#
That's jsut one technique for dealing with fret installation problems. #There are lots more here:

http://www.frets.com/FRETSPa....01.html

http://www.frets.com/FRETSPa....le.html


Cheers,

Frank Ford
FRETS.COM
Gryphon Stringed Instruments
My Home Shop Pages

[sunburst]

I'm with Frank on that one. I usually file the tangs so that the frets go into the fret slots pretty easily rather than widen the slots past the ones that are supported by the head block. I just file part of the little bumps off of the tangs until the fret will almost, but not quite, go in with strong finger pressure. I put a piece of padded steel flat stock under the extender (if there's an extender) and lift the mandolin by that while tapping the frets in. After that, I run a squirt of superglue under the frets to help hold them in the slots.

If there's no extender, hopefully there's an oval hole. A bent piece of steel flat stock, padded and inserted into the hole and under the end of the fingerboard does the same job.

Getting those upper frets right is so difficult that I sometimes get mandolins brought to me because of fret buzzes, and find the upper frets not seated well by the last person who put frets in (sometimes the builder).

[Paul Hostetter]

One other tip to add to the above: work from the longest frets to the shortest. In other words, do the hard ones first. Likewise for cutting the frets to length.

I have a weird, rather unsightly little maple jig for holding the frets sideways while I file the little bumps off the tang. I pre-bend the fret and then it fits the curved slot in the jig that holds it in place for the filing step. Makes those upper frets go really fast. After they're done, I do the easy ones.

Having had to contend with others' prior use of Krazy Glue to hold frets down when refretting again, I try to avoid ever using the stuff for frets except in one way: I use thick CA on the very ends of the frets only. This fills the slot on unbound boards and helps anchor the end s snug to the edge of the board.

[james condino]

I always use a small soldering iron with a notch filed in the working end to slightly heat up each fret prior to pulling them. This loosens up any previous CA, epoxy, or hide glue that prior frets have been glued in with. It also heats up the fingerboard a bit and virtually eliminates any chiping or tearout.

I would agree with the others in that I would not open up a fret slot to ease installation. That can open up a huge amount of intonation problems for players with good ears. The old Don Teeter books on acoustic guitar repair used to teach that, but it has gone out of general acceptance. Taking material off the fret tang by filing or crimping is better. If you totally blow it, just cut another fret.

I haven't used a hammer to install frets in about six years. They are all pressed in now. Everything over the neck uses a Stew Mac system in my old Walker Turner drill press. The parts over the body and extension use the same basic idea adapted to a few custom jigs. Everything goes in very easy and uniform. I usually only need to take a few thousandths off the top to level everything exact.
__
james condino
www.condino.com

[sunburst]

James, I think Paul is referring to the 'burning eye' aspect of removing superglued frets rather than any difficulty in getting them to release from the slots.

[Paul Hostetter]

Not only that, but when people wick the CA under frets, it fills up the slot under the fret and kicks off. Getting that stuff outta there in order to obtain sufficient depth for the next frets, especially on a bound board, is a true PITA. I am only slightly more sanguine about people using Titebond under frets.

[Desert Rose]

Hey Paul

On another thread its being discussed, Rick mentioned using the Dremel and a bit to clean the slots works like a charm in removing old glue makes them just like new, I discovered this about five years ago and it was a real eye opener

I would never not glue frets, I consider it mandatory for a top class fret job

Thats just my take and everybody is welcome to have their own style

Scott

[Rick Turner]

For fret removal I use an American Beauty resistance soldering station with a slightly modified tweezer handpiece. The device has a transformer with a Variac and the handpiece has two electrodes. It pumps low voltage at high current through the fret itself, much like an arc welder, and the heat is developed right in the fret, so the heat is localized perfectly. It heats the entire fret up at once, and there's no stray radiant heat and no danger of touching the fingerboard with a soldering iron tip. This will break any fret glue bond in about ten seconds, and with the heat comes a second advantage...it seems to temporarily soften the wood on either side of the fret slot just enough so that I never get any significant fingerboard chip blowouts.

This is quite simply the best method of heating frets to help get them out, bar none, and I am not given to making sweeping statements like that, but in this case it's true. The heat is where you want it for as short a time as possible; the heat is totally controllable with the Variac and timing, and the entire fret heats up at the same time.

[BlueMountain]

Frank Ford has a soldering iron trick on Frets.com similar to Rick's, but he's cut taken one of those soldering irons that have a thick wire that heats up and cut off most of the wire. One puts the remaining two ends onto the fret, the fret completes the circuit, one squeezes the trigger, and in one or two seconds the wood starts smoking. Done right, it's fast and clean and less likely to raise chips that need to be repaired. Done wrong (too many seconds), it can be like a woodburning set and leave quite a hole. It can also fry the binding if one waits a couple extra seconds. I suppose if one touched the fret one could also get electrocuted. Is that right? I've used it to remove superglued frets, and there's no problem at all. EXCEPT (and maybe this is what Paul doesn't like) there may be glue left at the bottom that needs to be sawn or scraped out. If the binding is off, it's fast and easy to saw out the glue, but scraping it out wouldn't be fun.

[Bill Snyder]

I suppose if one touched the fret one could also get electrocuted. Is that right?

Only if touching the end of a non-modified soldering iron would electrocute you. But it would probably burn pretty good.

[Rick Turner]

No, you won't get electocuted. The voltage is very low, but the current is high. The American Beauty hand piece is much, much easier to handle than one of those transformer equipped solding guns. The way these devices work is that there is a power supply that steps the voltage way down and the current capacity goes way up. Your body has sufficient resistance not to pass the low voltage.

I still don't see what the big deal is with cleaning out the slots. Certainly it's easier, cleaner, and less invasive than taking off binding. With the Dremel and the right bit, cleaning or even deepening the slots takes maybe ten minutes or fifteen minutes, even if you're drinking a sip of coffee between each fret slot cleanout. It's just not that difficult to do. I saw the folks up at the Guild/Tacoma factory doing this operation with Dremels in router bases with bound fingerboards. Believe me, they wouldn't be doing this there if it were time consuming. Taking off binding is positively medieval.

[Desert Rose]

Im with you Rick

Ive never had ANY problem at all preping the fretboard for new frets on an instrument that has had glue used.

With the dremel special cutter it takes ten minutes max to refurbish the slots to at least new if not better than new as they are deepened to uniformity

That tool sounds interesting I like the localized heating!

Scott

[Rick Turner]

Scott, I have a couple of the devices. They're made by American Beauty (what a name!) and they are resistance soldering stations with the regular tweezer hand piece. I got them both surplus for very little dough, but they are available. You get the heat developed right in the fret itself because of the resistance of the fret wire. No stray heat, no danger of burning the 'board. On antiques I'll do every other fret, then go back and to the odd ones so as not to build up any more heat than absolutely necessary in the fingerboard itself.

[Desert Rose]

THAT is a great idea!
I like it
Scott