Guitar Fret Assessment
Source: Guitar Assessment – Fret Repair
Guitar Fret Assessment:
The frets on our stringed instruments take the brunt of the abuse that guitar players can dish out. Outside of strings that is. Because of the direct interaction of the strings to the frets, there are a lot of fret repair issues.
Some repair shops report that fret repair accounts for 1/3 of their business. Therefore, becoming a fret repair expert is paramount for a successful guitar repair business.
I have included a list of some of the more common fret related issues you may run into. There are of course many more.
Worn Frets:
Worn frets are by far the most common fret repair opportunity that you will have. Worn frets are usually concentrated on the first 3 or 4 frets because that is were the guitar player spends most of his/her time. As you go up the neck, you will see the wearing diminish exponentially.
There are some exceptions to this. For instance a Bluegrass Guitar flatpicker will capo the 2nd, 4th and 5th frets quite a bit. Mostly the 2nd fret to play in the key of D and A for the Mandolin and Fiddle, so the wearing of the frets will be extended 2 more frets up the neck.
Also if you inspect the guitar of a really advanced guitar player, you will see fret wear all the way to the 10th and 12 frets.
Poor Fret Job:
This is a sad sight. Someone did a fret job on the guitar and really botched it. Frets are uneven, ends are uneven and sharp.
If the fret slots are cut with the wrong thickness saw blade or the wood of the fret channels have wood chipped out, frets can be crooked and the wrong sized frets were used.
Other Reasons For Fret Repair:
Item #1:
If a guitar does not have an adjustable truss rod, occasionally frets are used to take a cup out of the neck. This is accomplished by removal of all the frets and the replacement frets have a thicker tang to provide a wedging action against the sides of the fret channel in the fingerboard. As each fret provides just a slight pressure, together they bow the neck upward just enough to remedy the problem.
Item #2:
Another reason I have come across is that the musician is just not happy with the fret size that his guitar is equipped with. They can be too wide, too high, too low etc.. This then requires a complete fret job as well.
Item #3:
One more that I can think of is really the opposite condition of #1 above. The guitar does not have an truss rod adjustment and the neck bows upward.
One way to repair that is to remove all the frets, sand the fingerboard level and replace frets by gluing them into the fret channels, being careful not to introduce any wedging action by the fret tangs.
Time Allotment for Fret Repair:
A complete fret job can take anywhere from 2 to 4 hours, depending of what you run into. This means a down time of at least one day from beginning to end. This is because of the glue dry time.
In our fretting articles we will discuss the different methods for fret repair, tools you should have on hand and how to complete the “Perfect Fret Job”.
If you are doing this for just your own guitar, you can expect that by using my methods, you can have a fret job that is in the top 20% of all fret jobs that are completed out there.
Tags: fret job, Fret Repair, fret repair tools, guitar fret assessment, guitar fret repair, how to replace frets, worn frets
