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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 6:47 am
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What about changing the tone? Is it brighter?


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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 6:57 am
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SS Frets are awesome but know going into it that luthiers charge roughly double to work on them. That being said, they last much longer so unless you're a touring pro you may never need to have them worked on! You absolutely cannot go wrong with Carvin, they will blow your mind AND if you don't like the guitar send it back. Cost you $20 or so in UPS is it. You could also buy a Fender and then a Warmoth neck with SS frets, not cheap but I did that to a MIM Strat and it's butter. You can see it in my avatar.


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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 8:35 am
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atolleter wrote:
What about changing the tone? Is it brighter?

There is no tone change, other than better bending notes............which is good.
Anyone saying different is trying to steer off course the subject of not having to replace necks or paying for luthier work inmo


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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 10:53 am
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atolleter wrote:
What about changing the tone? Is it brighter?


Life is full of opinions, so here's mine. My Carvin with SS frets has a chime or bell like overtones that I don't hear on any of my other guitars. Since I changed the pups out and the chime is still there, I've been thinking it's from the SS frets. Another possibility is the Ebony fretboard since this is the only guitar I have with that. I actually like the overtones I hear, so I'm planning on sticking with SS frets and Ebony as much as I can.

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 12:45 pm
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atolleter wrote:
What about changing the tone? Is it brighter?


My guess is that the change in tone would barely be noticeable.

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 1:41 pm
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atolleter wrote:
What about changing the tone? Is it brighter?


Yes, there would definitely be a change.
Your tone would be better cause you'd spend more time playing...................and less time worrying about....and replacing frets or buying other guitars.


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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 6:12 pm
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One feature that's nice is not worrying about what strings you use. You can play heavy strings of any type without chewing up your frets. Not that I have that problem but I try to use nickel strings. Or letting someone play your guitar (not that I do this either), but some people can dent frets playing open chords in no time. It would help resale value too, lots of times the guitar is great but the frets are gone.

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 6:50 pm
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yomammaaho wrote:
New here, so this has prob. been covered.............I think Fender should offer these, no matter what the up charge.
It's a shame I'll have to consider a Carvin just because I want long term playability on the same neck.
With all the competition maybe Fender will open it's eyes someday.


yomammaaho, welcome to the Forum. Open eyes are good, seeing with them takes some practice. One man's box is another man's recycleable waste. Everyone wants not everyone gets, "no matter what the up charge". I have seen Carvin guitars, personally I'm a Fender guitar player. You've visited a great Forum, enjoy! :D

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Sat Apr 13, 2013 7:08 am
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amx05462 wrote:
ceri if you notice the plyers arent chipped but the metal has been moved on them squashed. thats because they are not properly hardened. if they were too hard and brittle they would have chipped. the thing that you need if you or anyone want to do stainless frets is tool grade steel plyers. made of either a-1 steel or d-1 steel that have been properly hardened and tempered. with that you can cut stainless frets all day and nothing would happen.

Hello amx05462: yes, I know about hardened steel pliers - I have some. The problem is that, like most pliers, the cutting edge is angled back a bit from the nose of the tool. Which is fine in most situations, but no good for nipping fret ends. Here are a couple of pairs of my fret end nippers:

Image

As you see, they are ground so that they cut right up to the front face of the tool, so you can snip the fret flush to the timber, like this:

Image

Those Stew-Mac nippers are the best I have so far found - but, as you say, they are not hard enough to do stainless steel. And everyone else who installs frets is faced with the same problem.

Here are some commercially available fret end nippers:

http://www.lmii.com/products/tools-serv ... et-cutters

$28.55 up to 58.95 - expensive, aren't they? And I can tell you from experience that even those very pricy ones don't last for long on steel frets. The same goes for fret end files and levelling tools: which is why a stainless steel fret job costs more.

If you know of a source for genuinely hard nippers that cut right up flush to the surface I'd be delighted to hear. Not only that, but all the luthiers' tool suppliers would like to know about it too - Stew-Mac, Luthier Mercantile, ToneTech and the rest. There is a hungry market for such a tool.

Anyhow. Despite yomammaaho's "soapbox" remark, as previously indicated I have no strong feelings for or against stainless steel frets. I think they have their role to play and are an option that is of interest to some. Some luthiers work with them, some guitar companies offer them. So they're available for those as want 'em.

Cheers - C

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Sat Apr 13, 2013 7:13 am
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I'm not 100% sure but I'm under a suspicion the frets on my Talon V are stainless steel.. Ill have to get some pics up..

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Wed May 08, 2013 2:56 pm
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A very interesting article was forwarded on the Heritage Owners Forum re. Stainless Steel Frets .

I have to say that I'm about to do a 180 on the whole thing.

cheers!

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Wed May 08, 2013 3:30 pm
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yomammaaho wrote:
New here, so this has prob. been covered.............I think Fender should offer these, no matter what the up charge.
It's a shame I'll have to consider a Carvin just because I want long term playability on the same neck.
With all the competition maybe Fender will open it's eyes someday.


get lost

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Wed May 08, 2013 3:31 pm
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My Carvin with SS frets is my #1 guitar and it gets a lot of play time. I have not seen excessive string wear as an issue, so far. I will admit that I change strings fairly often, usually after about a month of play. I mainly use DR Pure Blues which are pure nickel wound and a little softer than other strings. I'll keep an eye on this, but since I like having newer strings and I like SS frets, I doubt that string wear will get me to change. I belong to GC's String Club, so for $20 I get $60 worth of strings each year, so I'm not real concerned about this issue, if it even is one.

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Wed May 08, 2013 3:50 pm
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What a ridiculous discussion. How often do you people change frets? I've had seventeen years out of a MIM neck that has been thoroughly hammered. Absolutely abused and the frets are nowhere near needing replacing.

You don't have to change em like you change strings, you know.

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Post subject: Re: Stainless steel frets
Posted: Wed May 08, 2013 4:13 pm
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nikininja wrote:
What a ridiculous discussion. How often do you people change frets? I've had seventeen years out of a MIM neck that has been thoroughly hammered. Absolutely abused and the frets are nowhere near needing replacing.

You don't have to change em like you change strings, you know.


Nick nails it here folks!

I played a '73 Strat for 30 years in 3 countries and seventeen states along with some salt water cruise ship gigs and the frets were still decent when I sold it for 5x the price I paid for it - and the buyer is still playing it stock!

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