Stainless steel fretwire

octavedoctor

octavedoctor

New member
Considering that i first advocated the idea of stainlesss steel fretwire about 15 years ago (to universal apathy, i might add) it's taken me a while to get around to trying it out.

It took a customer to specifically request it as a remedy for his nickel contact dermatitis.

I'm now thinking of going over to using it exclusively for all refrets, except perhaps for vintage guitars where I want to retain authenticity.

It's a lot tougher than Nickel silver but oddly, much easier to install as I don't seem to have had the problems of the fret ends springing up which often plagues refrets.

I've another guitar to refret with it, so i'll reserve judgement on it until then but so far I'm impressed.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

I could definitely see it as an alternative for someone with nickel allergies, though I hadn't thought of it. My biggest concern was it being tougher on the tools, causing them to dull quicker. I take it you didn't notice any difference?
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

Ed Roman hates them, but Ed Roman hates lots of perfectly respectable things. I wonder how much of a difference a few ounces of metal makes to the sound... never having them wear down sounds good.

slade
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

larry_emder said:
Any sound difference? also, do they come stock on any guitars?
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They're supposedly a bit brighter.

Most of the brands that do SS frets are on the obscure/exotic side, including Parker, Tom Anderson and Driskill.

Warmoth will do SS frets on replacement necks, too.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

I've got a neck laying around with SS fretwire. I liked it when I was using it. At the moment I dont have anything for it. I might wind up selling it. I didnt notice any tone difference. I did notice that with my .13-.58 strings and daily playing I didnt even begin to pit the frets.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

danglybanger said:
Ed Roman hates them, but Ed Roman hates lots of perfectly respectable things. I wonder how much of a difference a few ounces of metal makes to the sound... never having them wear down sounds good.
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Ed Roman molests Collies - variation on Caddyshack

I have SS on my 73 Les Paul Deluxe and my 73 Strat.

Yeah, a little brighter, but not so much that it makes the instrument sound brittle or unplayable.

I can live with it for the fact that my kids will be able to not have to have it re-fretted.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

Skarekrough said:
Ed Roman molests Collies - variation on Caddyshack

I have SS on my 73 Les Paul Deluxe and my 73 Strat.

Yeah, a little brighter, but not so much that it makes the instrument sound brittle or unplayable.

I can live with it for the fact that my kids will be able to not have to have it re-fretted.
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I keep hearing that Ed Roman is full of crap regarding Stainless steel frets. If they were that useless, why would Tom Anderson and many other reputable boutique dealers use them on their guitars? He makes it sound like they are so bright, that they are useless.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

davedvdy said:
I keep hearing that Ed Roman is full of crap regarding Stainless steel frets. If they were that useless, why would Tom Anderson and many other reputable boutique dealers use them on their guitars? He makes it sound like they are so bright, that they are useless.
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To Ed's ears that may very well be the case.

If it is...damned shame....the rest of the world seems to function. If it bothers him that much I'll send him an icepick and he can make his own remedy from it.

Anderson makes great guitars. He probably uses them for his own reasons. Considering the price of the guitars and the typical lifespan and those that will pony up the cake for one, it kind of makes sense to use something that will keep the need for a luthier to hack away at it as far off as possible.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

Skarekrough said:
To Ed's ears that may very well be the case.

If it is...damned shame....the rest of the world seems to function. If it bothers him that much I'll send him an icepick and he can make his own remedy from it.

Anderson makes great guitars. He probably uses them for his own reasons. Considering the price of the guitars and the typical lifespan and those that will pony up the cake for one, it kind of makes sense to use something that will keep the need for a luthier to hack away at it as far off as possible.
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It could be to his ears and I wish I could make a personal comment on them, but I have never heard or played a guitar with stainless frets. Everyone that I hear explain them says they are a little brighter.

Ed even mentions that he doesn't like the fact that his guitar techs have to throw away their tools after a stainless job, as they destroy their tools. Maybe that is the real reason for his rant, LOL.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

I doubt that you could hear the difference in tone between stainless and nickel silver, although theoretically a harder metal will be less absorbent of high frequency harmonics.

Perhaps more significant is the (I presume!) slower wear rate. Parker Flys use SS and I have yet to see one with significant fret wear, although i've seen a few with frets that have fallen off...

The fret's stability has a much more dramatic effect on tone than the material it's made of. The one's I've just installed seem very much more stable than NS, where you usually have some problems with sprung ends. I may just have been lucky with this one, it's a brand new mexican P-Bass.

A the moment, the effect on my tools seems negligible. I use a Xuron Micro-Shears track cutter and this doesn't seem to have suffered from contact, although it was much harder to cut the wire with it. In future i will probably use a mini bolt cutters for cutting the install lengths then use the micro-shears for the flush trimming bit.

Xuron Micro-Shear Track Cutter


track_cutter_o.jpg
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

octavedoctor said:
I doubt that you could hear the difference in tone between stainless and nickel silver, although theoretically a harder metal will be less absorbent of high frequency harmonics.
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Why is it hard to believe? If nut material affects tone, why wouldn't fret material? Most folks accept that maple fretboards are brighter than rosewood and the string never even touches the fretboard.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

davedvdy said:
Ed even mentions that he doesn't like the fact that his guitar techs have to throw away their tools after a stainless job, as they destroy their tools. Maybe that is the real reason for his rant, LOL.
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Pardon my slepticism, but the only person I think Ed is actually ever concerned about is Ed.

"Destroy" the tools? Unlikely. I'll agree that a harder material may make them harder to work with and cause them to not last as long, but "destroy?"
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

this is a good thread as i was wondering about SS fretwire on my mustang neck. i just didn't know how much brighter it would be
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

I had a Warmoth neck with SS fretwire. As you know, they just press it in and clip it off, so the ends needed beveling and smoothing. It cut great with my little file.

The only thing I noticed is it doesn't smooth itself. With nickel frets, I can bend strings on 'em and they'll wear smooth. SS is so hard that the smallest imperfections can be felt when bending strings. I had to polish the bejeebers out of 'em with #0000 steel wool to finally get them smooth.

After that, WOW! It's like playing on glass. I over-bent and over-vibrato'd for a while until I got used to it. I did notice a tiny bit more 'zing' to the clatter when fretting a note and using steel strings. Nickel wound strings softened that inital clank against the frets. And this was with EMG's, mind you, so they pick up more of that stuff anyway.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

I have a Warmoth neck with stainless steel frets on one of my kit guitars. The tone is slightly brighter, so basically if you're a dyed in the wool vintage purist maybe you won't like them, but I don't think it's a huge difference, kind of like the difference between new strings and strings that were played a few times. It's not as much a difference between playing a rosewood compared to ebony fretboard

As far as playability, it outweighs the neg;igible difference in tone. They are soooo smooth to bend strings and play on, almost as if you put fast fret on your strings. I'm slowly converting all my guitars to stainless frets.

Oh- the other place that criticizes stainless frets is USACG- but they are aimed at the vintage purists.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

jmh151 said:
Oh- the other place that criticizes stainless frets is USACG- but they are aimed at the vintage purists.
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not always. they can contemporary. they offer paint jobs that are more "contemporary" from what i've seen
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

danglybanger said:
Ed Roman hates them, but Ed Roman hates lots of perfectly respectable things. I wonder how much of a difference a few ounces of metal makes to the sound... never having them wear down sounds good. slade
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I'm surprised you wasted your breath even mentioning that man's name. I'm trying not to sound hateful, but my frustration ranges from the nuissance of his pages being #1 on some seaches in Google for various things (and his half-truth half-lie explanations that are on those pages) and what I've heard about his business practices. Much less that his guitars are horribly overpriced (because the desire to support an American business goes out the window when I see his name, therefore I'm left with much fewer reasons to desire one of them). I'd much rather buy something from someone else, such as Warmoth.

Anyways.... I see no problem with stainless frets. Should be brighter than nickel.

I didn't know you could have nickel allergies either. That's enlightening.

So, nickel = warmer, stainless = brighter, brass = super bright, right? Are there any other fret materials? I've always been curious.
 
Re: Stainless steel fretwire

Brass shouldn't be super bright. Nickel Silver frets are supposedly brass with a small percentage of nickel added, which turns the color silver and adds hardness.

Brass is relatively soft, alot softer than stainless steel. I've easily stripped brass screws and bolts, stainless is alot harder to strip
 
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