Refret or Redress?

[Sea Chief]

Chaps-

I recently bought a used 52 RI jap tele, and a s/h strat neck for a project. Both have wear to the frets but w'out knowledge I can only say its wear: Im not able to tell if 'terrible' or 'thats actually normal/ lightish'. So maybe a refret.. or redress?

There are dented/ dipped few areas on the lower few frets, not too excessive. I will leave these for here, as I know what they are and not so frequent. I can prob live with these.

What Im concerned with here is the flannening of a broad section of frets, say 5th- 15th. On both necks this is the case, the strat the tops are really quite well-flat altho uniformly it seems. Above 15th of course the frets look good. Looking across the bad frets I don't actually discern any noticeable height lessening compared to the top ones in middle of fret.. but surely must be fractionally less if their tops are flat.

I assume, that having the upper 6 frets at normal 'fresh' level (rarely pressed upon) then pressing string down @ 12th, in some cases it will be 'muted' a bit by it touching the last fresh-high frets before the saddle: this is what Im sure I get with the tele. This is a pain of a gtr. The neck I think, has a n/g trussrod which cant allow me any more relief (the nuts spins- and Im too nervous about taking neck off my new pride & joy to brutally apply my knee to the middle etc to 'kick it into gear').

So at the mo the tele plays ok up to 7th, then terribly 12th-20th (the 21st rings again) all the strings v slightly muted, it seems, by touching the top fret(s). I cant up the action as its quite high as it is.. & I cant add relief to see if I can bypass the poss flat fret issue (if it is an issue) to pull the strings naturally away from the upper 6 frets as Id love to do. So I live with it, but I shouldn't be. Honestly these jap fenders are fine in terms of the individual parts (neck finish esp), but dreadfully let down by being thrown together: the bridge is v slightly askew, the neck in its pocket fractionally askew also, the neck pickup sticks out treble side more than bass side/ not quite central, and the control plate isnt parallel with the centreline of the neck. All as I might expcet on a bad squier: but my squier doesnt have these niggles. THAT's why a US fender is best: more care/ better QC.

The 2nd strat neck I can only know the frets are uniformly flatenned as the tele's. I assume/ hope the trussrod works.

Any ideas appreciated- thanks SC.

[David King]

Sea Chief,

Are these neck maple on maple or does either of them have rosewood a fingerboard? What you can do with the frets depends on how much fret is left and what the surface plane of the fingerboard is doing relative to what the tops of the frets are doing. The best bet is to take it to a pro and let them deal with it. If that is not an option then be prepared for a learning curve and a steep investment in tools to figure out what you have and and get it to where you want it to be. A finished maple fingerboard can be leveled but it's going to need a new finish which an expensive option. Tell us what you have in terms of woods.

[Sea Chief]

Ah yes both are maple. One tele a CIJ deep yellowy & heavily laQ'd RI, the other strat a MIM cheapo thin laQ'd satin. Ive never heard of levelling the actual fingerboard.. sounds horrific.. Im not on for going here.

Its just a Q of whether the frets flatenned as they are are -too- much flatenned to be deemed useable, & the order of the day is re-do them (IE a redress).. or if not and they're either perfectly normal wear/ just trim off either flat edge of the frets. Or whether their totally shot. There doesnt seem to be any info on wear 'stages': IE 'if gone to X degree/forget it, neck's junk unless completely removed all frets for a new lot. If only gone down to Y then you're fine, just needs a redress'. Thats the sort of info Im after.

On the strat the worst of them are flatenned the whole width of the fret, the majority flatenned sort of 3/4 the width (on the tele the worst are flat sort of 3/4 the width, the majority 1/" the width). Is that normal in both, or either case-?

[Dave H]

On the strat the worst of them are flatenned the whole width of the fret, the majority flatenned sort of 3/4 the width (on the tele the worst are flat sort of 3/4 the width, the majority 1/" the width). Is that normal in both, or either case-?

It looks like someone has been doing some serious string bending on those necks. The Strat neck is off the guitar. If the neck is flat enough (no relief) you could check for high/low frets with a straight edge (or use a short straight edge just long enough for 3 or 4 frets).

[Sea Chief]

It looks like someone has been doing some serious string bending on those necks. The Strat neck is off the guitar. If the neck is flat enough (no relief) you could check for high/low frets with a straight edge (or use a short straight edge just long enough for 3 or 4 frets).

Exactly Dave. Im now wondering: buy a simple fret file, make a fret leveller-fat-block-whatnot which looks actually easily done/ glue some p100 (or whichever grade) to a dead-cert flat btm'd hardwood block.. I cant see that needing rocket science.. then buy a £12 fret file, a few sheets of fine wet n dry/ one very fine, then brasso for final gritty-polish. Mask the fretboard & nutjob and bobs yer uncle.

Thing is if I make a dog's dinner of the MIM strat neck (actually foc- won for £78 but listed as 'slight wear' when its pretty bad as I describe above, so I crowed & was reimbursed + keep it ) I can get it off for a full refret: £100 or so just about manage. I hope tho if I do it carefully I might get some more life out of it, w'out it twatting up top of neck like my tele.

Is there any point or any way of checking or tweaking a trussrod, with the neck removed?

And do I need a gently-rounded concave fret file to take the edges off my flattened frets, or a flat side thin file?

[Sea Chief]

One of these (looks flat) Fret Dressing File | eBay

Or one like this maybe better.. Triangular Fret Dressing File - Luthier | eBay

[Dave H]

One of these (looks flat) Fret Dressing File | eBay

Or one like this maybe better.. Triangular Fret Dressing File - Luthier | eBay

I'm no luthier but I think those are for the fret ends. I think you want a - fret crowning file

Have a look at - this

[Sea Chief]

But if Im wanting to keep as much 'peak' of the fret, wouldnt I be black marking across, then whittling just the sides away to leave a thin black line? the crowning file surely can't leave that peak.

Someone surely will say. Looks an ok job for a one-off.. but what an arse of a job to do for a living with so many frets & masking etc; crikey not for me.

[John_H]

But if Im wanting to keep as much 'peak' of the fret, wouldnt I be black marking across, then whittling just the sides away to leave a thin black line? the crowning file surely can't leave that peak.

Leveling, and dressing frets is not that difficult, and there are thousands of tutorials on the web. Like any acquired skill there is a learning curve, and actual experience is the best if not only way to achieve this.

One could easily spend hundreds of dollars on "gimmick" tools, and jigs that would supposedly make the job easier, but in all reality the work can be easily done with simple, inexpensive tools. I was apprehensive much like you when I first approached the task, but the trepidation was relieved when the results were very satisfactory. Certainly some of the available tools have utility, but I manage fine with a minimum. For leveling, I use diamond hones. http://www.amazon.com/EZE-LAP-61SF-S...p+diamond+hone, and for fret dressing I use a three point file that has had the corners polished so they wont mar the fingerboard. I have a few other things I use, but I could get by with only these two tools along with a straightedge for alignment. The rest is just common sense, and tool skills.

Most of the Fender necks that I come across have very flat tops on the frets, so what you're seeing is not uncommon. Sometimes there's not much to work with. It can seem like an "arse of a job", but with some practice it can go quickly. From the description that you gave, It doesn't seem either neck would need a re-fret.

[Sea Chief]

So whats a crowning file for, as opposed to a fret file in a triangular or single flat config with a btm edge smoothed off?

A crown suggests addressing the -mid, top- of the fret does it not? surely once the levelling done with the big fatso block whatnot.. the idea's to keep the new fret heights all precisely where they are now, relative to each other. If one starts to fart about with one's 'peaks' with a crowning do-da, one cocks one's job up what?

[big_teee]

https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...=fret+leveling
Like John says, there are tons of tutorials on how to do it.
John knows all about it, he makes custom guitars.
I would start watching the vids, a picture is worth a thousand questions.

[John_H]

..the idea's to keep the new fret heights all precisely where they are...

Of course it is. That is why you dye the tops with a marker, so you'll know where to stop when you're crowning the frets.

[Sea Chief]

So a crowning file actually addresses the sides of the fret top.. rather than the very top (which in my book- is precisely what a crown part is!). Can you see what I mean? eg our queenie aint got her crown arf cocked innit? she got it plonked atop her barnet straight. Now my mate dave has so many crowns on this teeth its mostly gums, but they're on the mid/ top part of his filty teeth, not the sides. An horrible sight.

[g1]

It leaves a crown. Think of it as if you had a flat fret and wanted to put a crown on it. You would get a file for "crowning".

[Sea Chief]

It leaves a crown. Think of it as if you had a flat fret and wanted to put a crown on it. You would get a file for "crowning".

g1 with respect, the term crown isn't clear here.. that's the point. A crown usually goes ontop/ plonked upon (a head is where a crown lives), which implies once the black mark put across this will be removed at the crown of the fret.. if 'crowning'.

I just assume crowning in fret egs refers not to the top (the crown), but to specifically the sides of the fret instead.

So, a fret file and a crowning file are two of the same things/ to do the same job: the trim off the sides of the fret and -leave- in fact the crown untouched.