Official Luthiers Forum!

Never again. I'm in the process of resetting the neck on my number 1where I tried CA because the slots were cut with a dull blade I've since fixed that. Getting CA out of the slots , yes slots was very tedious work. I had to remove all of the end frets because they lifted when I heated them in the neck removal. Just 1 wouldn't have been too bad. I can only imagine doing the whole fretboard. Oh yeah, this is a bound board.

I'm going to use titebond this time. I'm also considering hide glue since it's brittle but resists heat. Opinions?

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

What am I missing……hide glue resists heat? Not in my shop.

It does when no moisture is present. Frank Ford proved this.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

The frets and the slots must fit well so much so that glue is insurance and an after thought. If the slots are too large CA is not the only glue that won't hold it's not a gap filler.

We've used quality (Bob Smith Industries) thin CA for hundreds of refrets for nearly 20 years and have never had a fret to our knowledge that has lifted or come loose. Our clients are not transients for the most part and they do come back to us and many are regulars so we would know if our work was substandard AND we are one of the very few shops in the world that offers a 100% guarantee on our work that we have never had to honor not once.

Getting CA out of the slots I find one of the easiest glues to clean out of the slots. You can save time too and use a rotary tool we have the one the Looth Group is offering but we are not thrilled with the level of runout.... We never used Dremels for cleaning out slots because of the high amount of runout and again we are all about the fit of the fret in the slot before ever gluing anything. I use the SM hook tool to clean glue out even on bound boards. Old school, works great.

Frets and nuts have something in common. In both cases the fit should be good enough that no glue is required but instead insurance. We make our nuts to "snap" fit into the channel and we want to feel some resistance (we press frets so we can feel how they fit) of the frets when clamping down the Jaws II tools that we use for seating frets.

In the Martin world pre truss rod Martins early 70's and before did not have truss rods making a refret totally an exercise in how the slots and the frets are prepared for each other. We shape the neck using some frets that fit snugger than other frets to intentionally induce perhaps a little back bow where there might be forward bow we don't want. It's add four frets in strategic places, string and tune to pitch and look at the neck, add more frets and restring and retune and look at the neck. This is what is called a "compression refret." Again it is done where there is no truss rod to shape the neck. A compression refret takes a snug fret expectation and fit and makes it a feature of the refret procedure.

So the fit of the frets to the slots is key. I'll add that although some people get on fine with a hammer in my my experience most hobby builders may only fret an instrument once a year or less. You forget all you learned or some of it so much time passes with no practice or need to do it again. More blows from the hammer to the fret can start to damage the slot and cause room for play and wiggle. It can also "spring" the radius in the fret wire making the ends require glue to stay down which is not a good idea they should stay down with no glue.

So once again, we like pressing frets for the feedback that is provided that we can feel and the act of pressing them when the slot is prepared well does not damage the slot like the wrong hammer blow may.

Lastly regarding using HHG or Titebond there is a huge difference in the sequence of fretting if you change glues. These glues must be applied first which is not a big deal but with CA we apply or can apply it at any time after the fret has been pressed in place. We do not use glue to be relied on to hold the ends down we instead over radius the fret wire intentionally so the wire's own radius, tighter radius holds the ends down. With stainless steel that won't bend likely ever... the ends will never lift and we have not seen any lifting with EVO or NS either.

The methods, glues, tools I'm describing here is shop tested we do around 2 refrets a week that's over 100 year for nearly 20 years now and again we have never had a CA glued, well fit fret that we pressed in place with our methods lift, not a one.

Those who some are still with the OLF who took our classes will remember much of this, hopefully... PS: We no longer offer classes, far too busy for that so please no requests for a class.

I reiterate, the only reason for the sloppy fit is because my slotting saw was dull. My slots henceforth shouldn't need any glue and I like you, over bend my frets a bit. That is where my problem occurred. Because the slots were loose, when I applied heat to loosen the fretboard extension, the over bent frets popped up in the middle from the heat.

That said, on future guitars, ill get a tight fit and no glue.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

I would not nix the glue use on frets, frets need to be glued because that insurance that I spoke of in my prior post is necessary with guitars.

Your original post does suggest that CA was part of the problem and it's not and I want to so some reiterating of my own here. CA, quality CA is a fine choice for fretting and many, many pro luthiers use it and have used it for a very long time.

CA can also be very easy to clean up with the right set-up to do so.

With any glue choice the application and the fit is key.

Thanks Richard

Slightly off topic, but I would like to thank the OLFer (possibly Chris Pile or Hesh?) who recommended applying Howard Feed and Wax to the fretboard before gluing the frets with CA. I tried that for the first time on the guitar I finished a week ago and it worked great.

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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

Hesh, I don't have the credentials to argue the point. I will use CA again.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

Probably Hesh. Him and Dave got me using Howards years ago after I went up for one of their setup classes. Works good huh

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

You're very welcome J that was me and we do that. The butcher's wax on the board has been around for so long I have no idea who came up with it but the use of Howards on the board was something I posted about here and we do a lot of. Howards is really nice stuff to have around for some of these unique applications.

When I work on someone's guitar I often use Howards on the bridge, truss rod cover and for jazz Archies with a wooden pic guard I use it there too. Recently I waxed the box I made for my nut files that is made of EIRW and the box I made for our Andy Birko super Duper Fret Caul set and it really brought those to life too.

Another use is when installing a strap button. After I put masking tape on the neck heel and then mark where I want the button to go and maybe if applicable check with magnets for any bolts on a bolt on neck I drill the hole. Then I chamfer the hole edges to reduce or eliminate chipping and then I put a dab of Howards on the screw and that lubricates the screw being screwed into the neck heel.

We install strap buttons for free including the quality button in conjunction with any other service so we do a lot of those.

We have three dogs in the shop and they look a little nervous around me now when I get out the Howards...

Thanks J I'm glad it works well for you.

I am sure opinions vary but I think there is something to be said for filling the air gap beneath the fret with something. I just use the Tightbond bottled hide glue . It dries hard. I lay it in the fret slot with a syringe and 22G needle.

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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 use fish glue, after a recommendation from John Hall. I'm happy with it.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Terry and Colin make great points there are alternatives. My ONLY interest here is to push back on any notion suggested, implied or otherwise that CA is not suitable for fret work. With proper prep it is a great glue choice and we have well over a decade with hundreds of examples of it being used in the wild and it works great.

Now If we had two identical guitars (impossible I know wood varies) and they both needed to be fretted and they both were fretted with the same frets by the same person at the same time relatively speaking and then we conducted blind playing and listening tests with 100 individuals and asked them which guitar was fretted with say bottled hide glue or fish glue and which was done with CA how accurate would the results describe the facts?

For years I maintained that I would not use stainless frets on an acoustic because to my ear they sound tinny. So Dave disagreed and since I'm someone who is dumb... but not stupid... there is a difference.... I should have just relented because he is nearly always right on guitar stuff.

He calls up Elderly and tells his friends there he needs an "as is" mule to be sent to us for him to refret. He receives a Yamaha electric and proceeds to refret it with some stainless and some NS (nickel Silver) and he records which frets went where.

Next he asks a couple dozen people with me being one of them to sit and play the guitar and then tell him which frets are which. Everyone failed the test including me and none of us could tell which frets were stainless.

Now I still maintain that this was an electric and an acoustic is a different animal so this test might be done again some day, hope so. But the point is that on an electric two dozen seasoned players many gigging musicians and several luthiers could not tell the difference between stainless and NS frets even though we all, nearly all of us thought we could and had opinions on stainless.

We couldn't tell.

I call it "potting" potting the frets in glue may couple them better, it seems like it does but again we work hard to make sure our frets fit the slots very well and glue is only insurance which I think also increases the coupling of the fret to the board.

Potting frets has no harm either associated with it and cleaning out slots when you are tooled up to do so is easy so it is another option but as to if there is any benefit for me tonally or otherwise the jury is out and what ever position I take I am likely wrong

Remember too for us we had bridges lift that were glued with fish and we stopped using it. We were not alone there were a number of similar reports here on the OLF where others have fish fail in humid conditions. It was a humidity thing that caused our fish joints to fail. Again if the frets are well fit to the slots there should be no issue. But if fish glue is the only thing holding a fret in place gigging in a humid place might not be a good idea...

I'm going into the shop now to install these frets. I have Butchers wax. I'm going to cover the area between the frets with it. Im going to put the frets and and add CA, press the fret and spray accelerant.

I've never used wax on a fretboard before but I guess I'll need to wax the rest of the board as we'll to match the finish.

I'm not going to wait for a response, I don't gave the patience. See you on the other side. I'd like to get the neck set this morning.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

I heard ya Hutch you are not waiting.

Here's what we do:

1) We lightly wax the board with Howards taking care not to get it in the fret slots. It only takes a smear of Howards on the a paper towel to wipe the board.

2) We press a fret with the Jaws II press and the Andy Birko caul set that Dave Collins my business partner helped Andy determine what radius cauls the set should include. For say a 16" radius slot and fret we might use a 14.5 caul to add a bit more power to the fret ends when pressing.

3) We use Jescar wire that we buy by the spool/pound right off the spool radius wise most of the time.

4) We press a fret in place.

5) With the jaws tool and caul still in place clamping the fret we use a quality thin CA (thin is a must for this to work) in a pipette and lay a bead down next to one side of the fret. The bead disappears before our eyes and you can often see the glue wick up on the other side of the fret and wet the slot. That is the goal.

6) A quick wipe or two (on both sides of the fret) with a paper towel (don't throw the towel away yet CA can ignite paper and we don't want that in the trash until the CA is cured). Since the board was waxed there is no clean up of glue beyond a wipe or two with a paper towel.

6) We spray accelerator, wait maybe 5 seconds or more and release the Jaws tool and move on to the next fret to repeat the process.

7) When the entire board is fretted we use OOOO steel wool (I know Chris Pyle my friend but we take precautions and clean it all up and also tape off any electronics, never had a problem). Steel wool removes the Howards and any glue we missed and freshens up the board. When the instrument is set-up we relax the board with a thicker coat of Howard's to freshen it up and pop figure. I wax bridges, truss rod covers, etc. too.

8) Every fret is checked with a Starrette engineers scale tapping each fret on both ends and in the middle listening for a loose fret. We never find any but we check. I like Starrett because they are heavy and any heavier engineer's scale will work.

9) Fretting stuff gets put away and then it's fret dress time. A fret dress is a must and for some who have posted here they they found a fret dress not necessary you're wrong. A fret dress is a must whenever an instrument has had frets one or all replaced or the neck on an acoustic has been removed. Stuff moves.... and it has to be dialed in again.

Now for you acoustic guys especially the bluegrass crowd with 13's and action of 5 and 7 (64th" at the 12 this is a Martin spec for flat picking dreadnought with 13's) high precision fret work may not be necessary for you. But if anyone wants low action and from where I sit 99% of the world wants low action precision fret work becomes a must and very important.

Hutch thanks for letting me use your thread to help everyone with some expanding on the subject here. Sorry for the highjack and I hope what you did works well for you. I'm always a PM away and happy to help.

Lastly we always fret with the board on the neck and the neck on the instrument. Others do it other ways but any movement when things are glued or attached never gets addressed unless you do the board on the neck and the neck on the guitar.

I know there are people who can pull it off with what they do (board off the neck) but the precision will never be tight enough for a jazz player with a 335 who wants action of 2.5 and 3.5/64th" at the 12th.

Good fret work is an art and takes time to learn but can be very rewarding when you can help the most demanding people finally, finally get what they want.

And really lastly don't over bevel the ends. Everyone over bevels the ends including some major makers. Fret top real estate is super valuable to experienced players and what you see on factory guitars as far as the ends are concerned should not be repeated. I would guess our bevel angle is less than 20 degrees maybe around 15 degrees. If your frets are flush with the neck this is not felt by the player beyond they can pull strings more when they want to.

Next time I'll be more careful with the wax .

Goid enough for this guitar. It's now time to reset the neck, after I finish my coffee.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

Yeah part of the reason we like Howards over butchers wax is it's in a bottle