Uh-oh! Well that explains why the warranty is unlikely to help, anyhow...

Still, (in the absence of pictures) it really doesn't sound like an insuperable problem, does it?

Cheers - C

i have spoken to fender and they want to see the guitar, were trying to hash out costs and see if shipping makes sense or not, there is concern with others that this wire was used on more than one guitar and across several models at the M factory!

let me know if any of you have these marking on your fret wires,
these markings on mine are on every fret wire both sides !

Fascinating! Thank you for those excellent quality photos: very helpful.

Never seen that before. I'm not sure about it affecting playability; but if Fender want to put it right for you - let 'em! Not beautiful, is it?

Good luck with it - C

On reflection, that's not entirely true. I have seen something like it before - the first time I used a crowning file. Not sure, but those look something like file "chatter" marks - when the teeth of a file dig into the metal instead of scraping it down.

New guy on the fret dressing station that day, perhaps?

...Whatever. Let Fender put it right for you.

Cheers - C

I could be wrong but I'm inclined to think too that these mysterious fret lines are something the OP did with his altering of the frets and that's why to date, no pictures have appeared.

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You dig?

Oh, I didn't go back far enough, silly me!:oops:

To me, they are some sort of vertical abrasions which looks like the aftermath of a file. They can be removed easily enough. You can see the difference in varying degrees where the OP had worked on the frets. A more thorough silicone carbide rub before final polishing will surely eliminate them.

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You dig?

You are correct they are file markings. Someone has work the frets and did that. Who dressed the frets

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The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.

Thomas Jefferson

no one has worked on those frets unless at store prior to my purchase, for me guitar is 4 wks old, all i did was to attempt to take some of the side burrs off so the strings would stop getting caught on them and breaking,

those markings are machine made in my opinion, they are too equal and the same size distance to be made by file, i'd guess some sort of machine that grips the wired as its inserted to board, or in manufacturing process of wire going thru wheels,

i guess could be any number of reasons, i have dialog with fender so we'll see what they say and i'll let you all know,

Looks like bad file chatter to me. Note the near identical angle of the lines, not sandpaper lines. Could it be proof that frets are crowned by machine not hand? Which model strat is it?

[Sorry didnt see Ceri's post above. Foolhardy me just looked at the pictures and posted. Sorry old chap]

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No no and no

After reading this thread, I took a good look at my 06' Baja Tele (MIM) and I see that it has markings along the frets that are quite similar to the ones in standish's photos. Also it looks like some of the sliver coating is wearing off of the fretwire. None of this affects the playability, and I have had no issues with string breakage as the OP has mentioned.

I cant say for sure that it came from the factory it this shape as I purchased the guitar used.

***EDIT*** It is a few hours later and I just got back from Guitar Center (checking out their Midnight Madness sale...blah, blah). While there I took a look at 5 different MIM Teles and a few MIM strats. Almost all of them had markings similar to the ones in the OP's pictures, albeit not quite so pronounced; but they were there just the same.

...Though I've just changed my mind - again!

Rereading the thread, standish says the marks are the same on every single fret. Not even the most cack-handed fret dresser could produce those marks consistently on all the frets with a file - even if he was trying to!

Gotta be something else. Some kind of machine produced manufacturing flaw which, as has been said earlier, likely is on an entire batch of frets and so on other guitars. If so, that's a bit of a QC failure, isn't it?

From what standish has said it sounds like Fender are being accommodating on this one, even though he's taken the guitar across a border (warranties usually apply within a given country) and has apparently had a go at the frets himself with emery paper.

Sounds like Fender know something we don't, perhaps about a whole batch of guitars...

Cheers - C