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Stew-Mac says their current fret tang nipper will do small fret wire without mangling it. The old ones I had, which I've long since discarded, totally mangled mando size wire. The expensive Euro one I have also does that. Anyone know if the new Stew-Mac tang nipper one will actually do small fret wire? It's not a big deal to do it manually, but an actual nipper would be nice. Thanks, Bob

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“ The meaning of life is to find your gift and the purpose of life is to give it away” Pablo Picasso

I don't think so. Looks like .075" is the minimum, and their mando wire is .053".



You can make your own nipper by using a dremel cutoff wheel to grind a slot in the face of a sheet metal nibbling tool. Mine doesn't cut the tang perfectly flush, but it's still a lot faster than using regular flush ground nippers. One bite instead of two, and the remaining burr is smaller.

I just checked, and it looks like it will be possible to do small and medium sized wire with a single tool by flipping the faceplate around and grinding another slot on the other side. It's 1/8" thick steel, so there should be enough material left that it won't be overly weakened. The screw will stick up a bit without the countersunk hole on the back side, but that shouldn't cause any problems. Large wire will need its own faceplate, but probably easier to just buy another nibbler than to make a faceplate from raw stock, unless you happen to have a rotary broach or something that can drill a square hole

Thanks. I don't know how the current version of the Stew-Mac tool differs from previous versions. I've had a couple of their nippers maybe 10 years ago and never was able to modify them to my liking. Just went back to 2 nips with the flush ground nippers and then a quick clean-up on the edge of a 1" knife sharpening belt sander.Does a very clean smooth job, but takes extra time. I have a Euro version of nippers that does larger wire, but even then I still finish off on the belt.-Bob

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“ The meaning of life is to find your gift and the purpose of life is to give it away” Pablo Picasso

The current photos look very similar to mine. Just a regular nibbler with a slotted faceplate, which will most likely mangle any wire too small for the slot. I remember the older version had some sort of spring sticking out the front, which I never quite understood the purpose of. But I think it was fundamentally the same as well.

Did you ever try flipping the faceplate around and slotting the back side for narrow wire? I've also used the flush ground nipper two-nip method on the few small wire instruments I've built, and always thought about buying another nibbler, but never actually got around to it. I only came up with that two-in-one idea a few hours ago when writing my previous post.

The couple that I had did have had the spring and I did try modifying them with no success. It is possible that the narrow fretwire is just too fragile to withstand the shearing force on the tang. I also have a Euro one with a bunch of interchageable plates, but it distorts the crown too. I have seen a jig that used a Dremel and a cutoff wheel and might try that next. Thanks for the replies. -Bob

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“ The meaning of life is to find your gift and the purpose of life is to give it away” Pablo Picasso

I’ve had good success with the Summit tool on uke wire, but the best I’ve found is the Frank Ford device where you use a file to file off the tang. It takes a lot longer of course but gets very predictable results.


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the only one that I found that worked is the LMI unit with the file
all the nippers I had just crushes the tang on the smaller fret wires

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

+1 for the Frank Ford jig. Cut with the hand fret nippers and then clean up with the file.
Hard to screw up. All I want for Christmas is a set of fret tang nippers that will do mando
wire! -Paul

I don't know about the current StewMac nipper, but I used my older version (with the spring on top) on mando wire for the first time last spring. After mangling several fret ends, I found that I could make it work by taking a series of very small bites working in slowly from the end of each fret. It was not ideal but it worked in the end.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Just tried J's method. Seems to work purdy good!

Pat

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Pat

I still have the old Stewmac type with the spring on the top.

They work a lot better if you hold the tool in the left hand and the fret in the right hand.

Try it before you mock it!

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Trevor Gore, Luthier. Australian hand made acoustic guitars, classical guitars; custom guitar design and build; guitar design instruction.

http://www.goreguitars.com.au

I have this one, and it works well. I used medium frets though. Not sure that makes a difference based on how this cuts, however.

https://www.philadelphialuthiertools.co ... r-sintoms/

My current fave. You can get adjustable plates for different sized fretwire.

https://www.jescarguitar.com/shop/summi ... universal/

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

I bought the one from Jescar and it works great. I get all my fretwire from them now, but I tried it on some old StewMac banjo-type wire I bought twenty years ago and it worked well. It's pretty small wire and they only shipped it in straight 2' lengths. Should be similar to mando size.

Looks like Stew Mac has a new fret nipper that will work on their small fret wire.
This might be the the nipper that works for ukuleles?

https://www.stewmac.com/luthier-tools-a ... ipper.html

Looks very similar to the Jescar...

Dave

This is my set up. Simple, quick, and consistent.

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Brad Hall
Mystic Dawg Guitars

Wow brad, that's awesome! Does it work in one pass, or do you have to go back and forth nibbling on it and looking at it until it's right?

Pat

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Pat

That is indeed pretty great, and I can see the SM dremel base peeking out so you can truly just dial in the height. Cool!

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I can’t take credit for the concept. I saw something along that line somewhere several years ago. I just adapted to what I had on hand. Yes, one cut does the horizontal cut nicely. I over cut the length a tad and then just nip it off with flush cutters. You may have noticed the cup of water. The fret gets hot enough to burn a little so I dip it before I switch ends.

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Brad Hall
Mystic Dawg Guitars

Is the surface the fret wire sits on to feed into the cutter radiused?

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

No. I suppose an engineer would find fault for me not putting a radius on the platform. It is such a minuscule portion of a fretboard radius I think you would need a specialized tool to measure it. Besides, that portion of the fret wire gets tapped down installing it and dressed when done.

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Brad Hall
Mystic Dawg Guitars

Wow! Brad you really thought that one through!

Brad, are you pushing it straight into that cutter from the side or dropping it down from the top?

Pat

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Pat

Straight in from the side. The saw cut is just wide enough to hold the fret wire tang without wobble. The Dremel diamond blade is recessed to the bottom edge of the wire. Easily adjusted to make a nice clean cut of the tang. Since the blade is fully coated it leaves a smooth surface that seats nicely on the edge.

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Brad Hall
Mystic Dawg Guitars