Official Luthiers Forum!

Hello! The Stewmac newsletter a few months ago had a tutorial on wicking superglue in to lock the frets in place. They were using wax around the frets to keep the superglue from running all over. For anyone who has done this, can you reccomend a good wax that you have used? I had the Liberon waxes and they worked fine but they all had a distinct smell which I could not fully remove from the fingerboard. Ideally, there is one which is mostly odorless. Any help anyone could give me would be very appreciated. Any tips also for people that do this all the time would be great too. I did okay when I tried it but it can always be better.

Thanks!

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Burton
http://www.legeytinstruments.com
Brookline, MA.

I've used wax before... don't remember what make, but I had to remove some of it afterward. Now, I use crazy glue solvent 10 minutes after the frets have been glued to remove the glue that is in excess on the fretboard. Works great and takes no time at all.

Marc

Butcher's wax.

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Laurent Brondel
West Paris, Maine - USA
http://www.laurentbrondel.com/

Laurent and Todd, thanks very much. I will get some of that.

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Burton
http://www.legeytinstruments.com
Brookline, MA.

What is this do we have it the uk or maybe we call it something else.
is it a bees wax/turps or carnuba/turps mix or something of that ilk simalar to a classic funiture cream?

i would of thought that any past wax might be hard to remove without solvents what would you recomend for cleaning the fret board after using this method?

I only ask becouse i hate getting cynoacrolate on my fingerboard while gluing loose frets etc and would love to find a method other taping (which doesent work well) for keeping the glue off the fretboard.

Joel.

Johnson's Floor Wax.

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Sylvan
http://www.wellsguitars.com

I've only tried the wax method once. I used some Liberon Black Bison. I don't mind the smell of that wax at all, but my problem was that the wax filled the pores of the ebony and was very difficult to get out. Whitish wax-filled pores in ebony - blecchh! It took several cleanings with mineral spirits and a tooth brush. Pain in the rump. How do people avoid that? Use dark-colored wax?

In any case, applying and cleaning off the wax seems unduly time-consuming to me.

I have yet to try the method of simply using CA solvent to clean up excess CA on the board. I would be somewhat concerned about the solvent seeping under the fret ends and into the slots and weakening the bond. Any thoughts on that?

In some ways, CA seems like the best glue for fretting (hard, strong, no water to absorb into the board, no problem releasing it with heat when refretting), but I have yet to find a method that isn't too time consuming. Wicking a little under and quickly wiping with acetone is the closest I've come to a satisfactory method so far, but I find I get a visible thin line of CA right alongside the fret that I don't like the look of. So, then, I'm cleaning that up with a chisel... too much time.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

Todd,

I agree that the wax method (and other CA methods after the fact) are second rate. I think Mario's set-up where he glues each one in and clamps it with the brass caul is what I am going to try to build. If you fret after the board is glued on though it doesn't really work and that is a bummer. I didn't think about an acetone rag, that is a great idea too. Maybe I will try that one and the wax one and see which I am better at.

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Burton
http://www.legeytinstruments.com
Brookline, MA.

At this point I am fretting my boards before gluing them on the neck (on guitars I'm building - obviously not on refrets) and that's working out great for me. I haven't tried Mario's pressing/clamping method. I've tried pressing with an arbor press, but so far have found that method to be nowhere near as easy or quick as tapping the frets in with a hammer, so I just use my small dead blow with the board right on the bench. Very easy, quick, and effective. I think I'll make some dummy boards out of scraps of hardwood and experiment with different viscosities of CA (as well as other glues), putting the glue in the slot first, then tapping in the frets. If I can get the method down so that there is an appropriate amount of glue in the slot and no squeeze-out, it seems that might be the most efficient, cleanest method. Even if I get a little squeeze out, using a thicker CA that doesn't cure so fast, it seems that it would be a lot easier to clean it up before the glue cures.

That would not address the issue of using CA to glue down fret ends on bound boards, but I think that the times I've had to do that it was because I hadn't dialed in the right amount of bend in the fret wire before hammering in the frets. I need to experiment more with that as well, with different types of fret wire, to get that dialed in better. Also, I need to be more careful when radiusing and sanding my boards, not to put too much radius near the edges of the board - that also causes for the fret ends to not want to seat right down on the binding right to the edge. In fact, I'm going to try making the edges of the board almost flat - significantly decreasing the radius near the edges of the board. It would think that would make the fret ends hug the binding more tightly, but we'll see. I'd like to eliminate the need for ever gluing down fret ends. Seems doable.

Any helpful input anyone would have on this stuff would be much appreciated.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

Anyone tried artists masking fluid?

Just a thought may be a bad one

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Formerly JJH

I learn more from my mistakes than my successes