Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

I think now you know why fret levels are usually left to the pros with the tools, techniques, and experience to make them right. It is not easy even with the correct tools, and involves certain wrist rolling techniques which are hard to master. And it's why I charge a premium to do it, and get it. But drive on - don't let me stop you from learning, which is always a good thing.
 
Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

Honestly, it's mind numbingly boring and time consuming, but doesn't seem to be too difficult. So far, the hardest/scariest thing for me by a long shot was hammering in the frets. All this fiddly work seems to be mostly a matter of patience and stubbornness. I think that the stainless steel frets actually end up helping me here . . . if I'm a little too rambunctious when doing something they're tougher and are don't get screwed up quite as fast as regular frets would. It also means that everything takes forever though.

The neck was feeling/looking pretty good last night. We'll see how she plays when she's all together with some fresh strings slapped on.

One thing that this has definitely shown me is how ****ty some of the techs I have taken guitars to in the past actually are. The last fret level that my Epi Dot got, I'm 100% certain the guy just filed all the frets flat, didn't crown them at all and did some polishing. They're completely flat across the top. When I got it back it didn't sound quite right, but I wasn't quite sure exactly what the issue was. When I complained, he told me that the guitar needed to be refretted (which, I guess it did after the fret work) and that was the best anyone could do. Never took it back to that guy.
 
Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

Honestly, it's mind numbingly boring and time consuming...... this fiddly work seems to be mostly a matter of patience and stubbornness.
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Yes. Most real work is like that. I had a couple apprentices who thought it would be exciting or glamourous and found out it was mostly endless sanding on wood or metal, or sanding and polishing a finish endlessly until it shined. Only one kid made it through the year-long program.

One thing that this has definitely shown me is how ****ty some of the techs I have taken guitars to in the past actually are. The last fret level that my Epi Dot got, I'm 100% certain the guy just filed all the frets flat, didn't crown them at all and did some polishing. They're completely flat across the top. When I got it back it didn't sound quite right, but I wasn't quite sure exactly what the issue was.
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Yes, again - and thus my daily posting here and elsewhere. Crowning - or rounding over the top of the frets is hard, and some guys don't do it. What happens is the intonation is thrown off and it feels wrong on your fingers. I've had to fix several guitars partially done by hacks who got paid good money, but didn't deliver. Then the client pays me again to make it right.
 
Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

Replaced all the bad switches, changed the solo/rhythm switch to a blower, and and tested that all the electronics were working last night. Also, all of the little screws holding everything into the body of the guitar (truss cover, pickguard, bridge) were stripped when I was taking them out, and about half of them actually had rust on the threads. Which is weird, I've never seen that before. I think I was lucky to get them out of the body in the first place while disassembling. So, I threw out the Phillips screws after finding some matching size ones with a Robertson head, and screwed everything back into the guitar body.

48633439041_90c242fec0_z.jpg


Then I wanted to see if the sanding I had done was enough, so popped the neck back on, then the nut on the neck and strung everything up for a test. Definitely jumped the gun there. Frets still kinda feel gritty for one . . . it's like bending strings across high grit sandpaper. :P I also found three frets that I missed which are a touch too high and causing buzzing, so I guess it'll be back to filing and leveling tonight. Sigh. I feel like getting a dremel on this would be a better way to do things.

Good news is that the guitar sounds great now (blower switch is kinda awesome on it - and the pickups are kinda cool . . . all three on at the same time in parallel is definitely a different sound), and the frets feel good to play on right up to the 21st (with the exception of the high ones and the gritty bending). I put some 12-52s on, which feel about right for the 24 inch scale.
 
Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

gritting bending seems about right on a guitar like this. seems like a cool little ax to play with once you get the frets fixed
 
Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

jeremy said:
gritting bending seems about right on a guitar like this. seems like a cool little ax to play with once you get the frets fixed
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The gritty feel and buzzing frets were pissing me off, so I pulled the strings and carefully went over the three remaining high spots with the file again to get them perfect (Important to note - take your time on this . . . it's really annoying to have to do it a second time). Then polished that bastard for three days of spare time straight. Now the frets are like glass. Nicer than any frets I've used before. Also threw away the crappy plastic nut and filed down the bone nut from my last guitar to fit.

Went 200 - 300 - 400 - 600 - 800 - 1000 - 1200 grit sandpaper, and spent a good couple minutes per fret for each different polishing method. Definitely need to get myself a Dremel and some polishing attachments if I'm going to do this **** again.



Guitar plays really nicely now. It's still a kooky oddball guitar, but between the new wiring and the frets she should have lots of life left in her. Sounds great too . . . I was goofing around and did a quick recording today:

https://www.soundclick.com/html5/v4/player.cfm?songID=13916427

0:00 - Clean - Neck + Bridge
1:13 - Crunch - Mid + Bridge w/Solo switch
2:26 - OD - Neck w/Solo switch - OD
3:12 - OD - Mid
3:58 - Hi-Gain - Bridge

I don't like the 24 inch scale neck. The frets are great, but my hands feel too big playing on it, and I'm tripping over myself. Maybe I'll get used to it, but I think I'll probably end up selling it (I'd be happy to get back the costs of the crap I bought for fretting). This is a fun guitar just for making noises though - it's pretty easy to get controllable feedback with the gain up. The pickups are unpotted and also pretty microphonic - but surprisingly not too buzzy. At the very end you can hear me tapping on the pickguard with my fingers and it's coming through the pickups quite clearly under higher gain. Bet I could use 'em as a weird mic effect for vocals.
 
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Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

Well, After the refret she played nicely, but I couldn't get along with the short scale neck.



So I just sold it to a guy for 400$, who loved the way it played and sounded. :P Covers the cost of all my fretting supplies, and then some . . . and taught me enough that I was able to successfully re-fret my Epi Dot too! (****, it's awful fretting a guitar when you can't remove the neck).







Turns out it's not a Teisco but a Fujigen-Gakki guitar. At least that's what a random guy on Craigslist told me . . . and the pickups seem to match the ones on these guitars: https://drowninginguitars.com/2016/06/24/the-1967-68-imperial-fujigen-electric-guitars/. Hopefully this tidbit of information helps someone somewhere on the interwebs at some point.
 
Re: Watch me ruin a guitar I kinda hate!

I like the look of some Ibanez guitars, but have never found one that I liked the neck on.
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Try more of them. Ibanez has a broad array of neck shapes and profiles.
 
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