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Joined:
October 2005
Posts: 4081
Location: Utah | There's one loose end on the 13th fret which causes the 12th fret to sound buzzy and the 13th fret to sound quite dull. The fret fails to grab the fingerboard at all on that end, it can be pressed in easily by hand and then springs right back out.
The guitar will need a refretting at some point a few years down the road so I don't want to do anything that will make that impossible or difficult. The general interweb consensus on sites like frets.com is to run some thin superglue under the fret. Is this going to cause bigger problems down the road?
Or would it make sense to have just the one fret replaced by a competent luthier and filed down to match the others? |
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Joined:
September 2006
Posts: 10777
Location: Keepin' It Weird in Portland, OR | I was gonna say Crazy Glue... But you don't like that idea.
I can only think that it is loose cuz the wood has shrunk...
So you would need re-hydrate the wood...
But on Stew-mac Tips they discussed super-gluing frets down to stop buzzing and improve tone.
If you only use a teeny bit of glue, that fret should come right out later on in life...
They use farriers pliers to yank them out.
Which guitar are we discussing? |
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Joined:
October 2005
Posts: 4081
Location: Utah | OMA, I'm not 100% against the super glue yet, I just don't want to do something stupid. The guitar is the new-to-me Patriot. I believe it has had a fret dressing in the past, and there isn't enough fret left to do another. There is a little bit of cowboy chord fret wear now, which I don't dare dress out. I figure there's probably another 5 yrs fret life, maybe more, but the re-fret is eventually inevitable.
The fingerboard seems reasonably hydrated. The guitar has been here 6 weeks or so in the humidified music room, plus I've given it a lemon oil treatment. The fret probably just sprung loose and the tangs on that end have stripped the slot.
This guitar is really great sounding. It gets picked up more than the 2080, especially for finger style. I love how the different guitars inspire different styles of playing them. Heck, even the girls and their friends play it more than any other guitar in the music room. (If I find out which boyfriend has the greasy fingers he is getting banned). |
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Joined:
December 2009
Posts: 686
Location: Route 66, just east of the Cadillac Ranch | I'm sure curious to see where this thread goes. My early Balladeer has several loose frets that sound dead when you land on them. In The Book , Rickard is quoted as saying, "We had a lot of trouble doing good fret work." It also mentions that they "developed a system of epoxying the frets in." The Book doesn't say when they started epoxying the frets in, or if/when they stopped. I'm still undecided as to whether this is something I can fix, or does the guitar need to go back to the MS.
Watching with great interest...
Nick |
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Joined:
November 2009
Posts: 152
Location: Corpus Christi, TX | I'd go the super glue route - just use it sparingly. Make a note of what you have done and at refret time inform the luthier.
He should run a hot iron over that fret to break the glue bond befor pulling it.
Since you are gluing disimilar materials the bond should break much easier than wood to wood.
I wouldn't use the gel type glue, plain ole supe thin super glue.
Just my 1 1/2 cents worth. |
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Joined:
December 2008
Posts: 1456
Location: Texas | edit: inadvertent post… (sorry!) |
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Fixing a loose fret