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I am a fairly agressive player and hard on frets, especially in the B string 7 to 14 fret area where I grind in flat spots from bending. I installed stew-mac 18% wide-medium on my first build, a large non-cutaway archtop. Has anybody out there experimented with ways to treat frets after the fact to increase hardness and wear resistance? Like stainless steel paints or epoxies or chemical hardeners that could be applied after dressing to make the job last longer? What about claims that different buffing methods increase hardness?Next time around I might try harder wire but for now I'm just trying to keep up with myself. The obvious no-brainer "play softer" isn't really a practical option. Stringbender

I can't imagine there is a paint-on solution or treatment. When it comes time to re-fret, use stainless or LMI's EVO wire. They aren't that much more difficult to work with and are a no brainer for people with a heavy grip.

BTW, welcome!

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http://www.chassonguitars.com

I have a guitar and a bass both built with Stainless Steel fret wire. The guitar is going on 10 years old and the frets pretty much look - and play - like the day I brought them home from the shop... My mexi strat w/ standard frets on the other hand? also about 10 years old and the frets are much like you described yours, and gets played less than the other two...

Maybe that's an option? I've not worked with stainless fret wire before, so someone smarter and more experienced than I will hopefully chime in...

Stainless is the way to go. Not only do the last longer (if not forever) but they bend super smooth after you have polished them up. It's worth every penny to get stainless frets.

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John Thiessen
http://www.iszacguitars.com

Have not tried stainless but have used EVO and it works very nicely.I'll not go back to regular fret wire.
Tom

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A person who has never made a mistake has never made anything!!!

If you bend and unbend the lengths of wire rapidly several times, that will increase the hardness of the wire marginally.
I'd just use stainless steel frets instead, if it's a refret.

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Old growth, shmold growth!

+1 on that. I've been playing one with EVO wire for several years (I play a lot) and it barely shows any string marks.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Burnish them: http://www.buy.com/pr/product.aspx?sku= ... d=23032500

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https://soundcloud.com/jeffreylsuits/he ... -runnin-13

Three is nothing you can do to extend the life of standard fret wire. Like so many have said above, install harder fretwire.

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"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered." G. K. Chesterton.

Is there a down side to harder wire? I mean if not then why do they even continue making soft fret wire? Tone? What?

Stainless steel fretwire is harder to manufacture, it's tougher on the equipment. The raw material is fairly expensive as well, and there's not as much demand for it due to the fact that people are lazy and don't want to work with it, so instead they trash it and say it cuts strings and make the guitar too bright.

I've done partial refrets with stainless steel, and no one has been able to point out to me which frets are steel and which are nickel silver when playing across them.

It's much harder to level, crown and polish than nickel silver fretwire, which is a downside, but it also lasts incredibly longer, which is a plus or minus depending on how you look at it. A luthier criticized me once, for reducing the available jobs in the area, instead of using nickel silver to guarantee future fret dresses and refrets on the same guitar.

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Old growth, shmold growth!

Why do people keep doing dovetails...?
Tom

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A person who has never made a mistake has never made anything!!!

Or tapered end pins....

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http://www.chassonguitars.com

Planned obsolescence. Keeps repair people in business. All part of a master plan.

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Ken Franklin
clumsy yet persistent
https://www.kenfranklinukulele.com

You might try going to stainless strings if you're not planning on a stainless fret re-fret. The problem is with similar metals wanting to micro gaul every time they are rubbed together.

Similar metals like to "stick" to each other on a microscopic level. The brass in the strings and the frets like to gaul. There's a problem though, as the stainless string would be harder than the nickel silver(which is really nickel bronze, bronze and brass are really the same metal other than the amounts of copper in the alloy) it would likely increase wear than help.

My experience with stainless frets is it also wears but the wear is on the strings and not the frets. Once the strings are replaced ....no problem, again!

This was one reason why the stainless .44 auto mag was not such a popular weapon, stainless against stainless would wear each other out quickly. If the metals are dissimilar that property is cut down somewhat.

I've heard of, and used in aerospace, treatments like dicronite that cuts down on friction substantially which is quite effective and relatively cheap but weather it can be used while the frets are still on the guitar, I don't know. I think it can. Phosphorous compounds/treatments are also used to cut down wear but are not familiar with any uses that are not liquid. I believe some of the Dow anti-friction treatments are phosphorous based. Dicronite is cold applied and is non-toxic but I don't know much more about it. Best and simplest bet is to re-fret.

You can also wipe down the strings and frets well after every time you play. The oils from your hands will attract dirt, combine, and will essentially make rubbing compound between the fret and the string increasing wear. Pick the string up by a cleaning rag and wipe under it especially. Also wash and dry your hands well before playing will help.

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Billy Dean Thomas
Covina, CA

"Multi famam, conscientiam, pauci verentur."
(Many fear their reputation, few their conscience)

+1.

I can vouch for the fact that Jeffrey is a man who knows whereof he speaks.

I can also vouch for the fact that burnishing frets will indeed contribute to longer fret life, irrespective of what metal the fret is manufactured from.

I have never tried the multi-flexing approach (which I believe was first mooted by Harry Fleishman) so I have no idea if it works or not. Personally, I doubt that it is possible to work harden the surface of a 2" fret by repeated bending, but hey, I could be wrong. I was wrong once before.

Burnishing the top of the fret with a suitably lubricated burnisher, however, will certainly work harden the surface, just like burnishing a scraper not only turns the edge, but also work hardens it.

Hey maybe you can heat them with a torch and quickly douse them in a bucket of water several times, like sword craftsmen do to harden their swords! I bet that would harden them up some..

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Old growth, shmold growth!

Right...the same master plan that eventually bit US auto manufacturers in the butt.

Everything effects tone and SS does have a different tone. I prefer SS on my electric and standard fret wire on my acoustic instruments. If you do your own SS fret jobs it requires different tools. My typical fret nipper and end cutter wear fast with SS and they file harder. Diamond files are great for this stuff.

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Another day, another dollar.

metal must be heated to aneal and temper it. Evo wire will work pretty well and can be installed with standard fretting tools. Jescar carries it and is a lot cheaper than the other suppliers
Stainless will last longer than you will but it requires diamond files to work properly.

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

Stainless will last longer than you will but it requires diamond files to work properly.

No.

I've used SS fretwire exclusively since 2005. I've not had to buy different files, nor have I even worn any of my old files. Even my StewMac fret tang nipper is still just fine, and I've owned it since around 1998 and it had a lot of use and abuse before the SS fretwire.

Really, SS frets aren't THAT much harder.

I've also not noted any tone differences, and having NOT told my clients that I was using SS fretwire, none of them noticed, either. I'm sure that if I had made a point of saying so, someone(many/most, even) would have suddenly "noticed a difference in tone".

Enough with the wives tales. SS fretwire isn't that much harder to work with, doesn't kill our tools and doesn't alter the guitar's tone. But it'll likely outlast the guitar player......

Look forward, folks, not backwards.

Well, yes, and no, John.

High carbon tool steel requires to be heated , quenched, and reheated to bring it to the correct hardness for tool purposes, but nobody is likely to making frets out of high carbon steel any time soon.

Standard nickel silver fretwire is mostly copper, and copper cannot be hardened by heating and quenching, in fact this is the very process by which copper is annealed, and made softer. As far as I am aware, the only way to make copper harder is by work hardening it, which in the case of N/S fretwire may be able to be accomplished by bending it multiple times, but can certainly be achieved by burnishing the fret with a hardened burnisher.

Stainless steel, on the other hand, with its high chromium content, cannot be hardened beyond its natural hardness by heating and quenching, the only way to improve the hardness and wear resistance is by cryogenic treatment using liquid nitrogen. This is the process used by the manufacturer of the "alternative" 5° and 3° bridgepin reamers, manufactured from stainless steel.

Any surface coating or treatments you apply to frets is going to be moot once you level and dress them.

Also I don't recommend using stainless steel strings on an acoustic guitar, because I've noticed that they exert a LOT more tension than regular electric guitar strings... I know this because I've had to do a complete setup to go from regular to stainless steel electric strings, also I doubt they make acoustic stainless steel strings. The tremolo needed much more tightening to even out on SS strings, I ditched it because I didn't really like the feel of those strings...

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

Diamond files do a cleaner job and don't leave chatter marks.
which files are you using Mario ? I tried smooth 2nd cut mill and bastard also fine and med pillars. The diamond files seem to cut to a finer finish with less work.

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

I'm an "EVO convert", and install it on all new instruments and refrets, unless the customer (stubbronly...) insists on more traditional wire. I wish it came in more sizes, too. I find it very easy to work, and it polishes better than German silver. I have never used SS, but I'v seen Paul Hostetter, who probably does more refrets than most here, after trying both over a period of several years, claim that EVO wears better than SS. According to some, the theory is that EVO will work harden with use, possibly due to the copper content. I do know that it wears a lot better than German silver, anyways. It feels especially nice on electrics, where you bend the strings a lot, and the smooth surface helps accommodate this.

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin