Stainless steel frets

[callaway]

No comment, but I'm fairly sure that your question could have been answered by doing a search.

Posts like this are almost useless.

Anyway, seems like I'm the only one on this thread that's going to say that I had one guitar with stainless steel frets and that discouraged me from ever going with stainless steel again. It played very smooth, but there was something about the tone that I fought with for about 5 or 6 years. I got rid of it and have no qualms with good old nickel. It's probably relevant for me to mention that I play in the clean to light crunch region, mostly blues, jazz, and classic rock.

[SlingBass]

I've owned basses with SS fretted necks from Warmoth and other manufacturers.  Acoustically speaking - I find nickel to be more pleasing to the ear.  In live (and reasonably loud) situations *I* can tell little difference.  In softer settings it IS discernible.  I love the way SS frets feel for the most part - unless one is playing more traditional and/or fundamental music.  It's my experience that fret size has more to do with one's take on sound and playability than fret material.

[McNulty]

Hey, new here.

I JUST got my neck with SS.  I'll let you know what I think.  It's a one piece all rosewood with SS6100 and a graphite nut.  425.50 with shipping.

First impressions:

Very nice wood and workmanship, etc.  The frets look very slick.  Not nearly as big as I thought though.  I actually thought it might be a mistake at first.  The fret ends are sharp and will require a bit of filing.  But I can get along with that for now.  That's it for now.  Pics soon I promise.  It's going on my sunburst 96 American Std. Strat.

I'm really interested in the Stainless Frets debate.  I cannot wait to get it hooked up and give my impressions.  The neck is light as hell btw!!  I've heard stories to the contrary about rosewood but that is definitely not the case here.  I think I did good!

[clearerphish]

I went with nickel over Stainless on my first Warmoth build. I asked my luthier about the stainless, it seemed like they would be right up my alley. He advised against them vehemently. His reasoning was that if you ever have to do a refret, it is extremely difficult to get them out of the fretboard without damage. He runs the Atlanta Guitar School and they train luthiers, plus as long as I have known him he has made my guitars feel incredible, so I trust him. Your mileage may vary, he said he liked them better in all other areas but that one aspect had him recommend me nickel. I went with his advice because I got a one piece neck.

[=CB=]

He advised against them vehemently. His reasoning was that if you ever have to do a refret, it is extremely difficult to get them out of the fretboard without damage.

I'm sorry... but thats total and unequivocal horse crap.  Go back and ask him WHY.  What property does stainless have that makes it worse than nickel silver when being pulled out of wood? 

A lot of "luthiers" (ahem... guitar-smiths... fixers) dont like RE-fretting in stainless because stainless must be curved precisely or pulling out the the already-used slot is a greater risk.  They dont like dressing the stainless because its more work.  Their tools are made for nickel silver - and wont cut stainless as nicely, or stainless may even damage their delicate nippers and such.  Its harder to file.  It takes more work.  For best results, instead of just pressing in, you need to glue them in as well - to avoid pull-outs.

I think your luthier friend doesn't like stainless, but given that someone else was doing the work of installing, he made a stab at the only thing he could, in order to still get his jab in.  That was the taking-out part, since putting-in was already covered by somebody else.

Truth is - nickel silver frets are a bitch to get out sometimes too.  You get chips, you get pulled wood, you get splinters, you deal with it and move on.

[clearerphish]

Like I said, your mileage may vary. I'm simply relaying what my close friend the luthier told me. I make no claims to it's veracity. However, my friend builds acoustic and electric instruments from scratch, and trains others in all aspects of instrument repair from cracked necks to nut installation, refrets, acoustic and electric instrument construction, et cetera. He doesn't exactly work in the repair dept of guitar center.

[=CB=]

Well, ask him the why part, and get back to us.  I'm very interested in hearing what he has to say.

[DMRACO]

As far as longevity, I have a nickel fretted guitar from 1986...still plays well.  Granted the frets are Charvel and HUGE and the guitar does not see as much playing now, but its still playing fine even with some wear.

Take it for that it is worth, but I saw an interview with Eddie Van Halen discussing his new EVH wolfgang and the reason for SS frets.  He stated that after a tour, a normal nickel fretted neck would need refretted.  One with SS frets, showed no wear.  Know one plays harder than Eddie but is may have just been a marketing gimick.

to me the re-fretting and dressing was not an issue since this neck and frets are likely to outlive me.  My sons can deal with it when the time comes.  I like them because they are SOOOO slippery and make bends and vibrato a dream!

[stubhead]

It stands to reason that a "luthier" who makes a substantial part of his income from refrets, and level/crown/polishes, isn't going to get emotionally attached to something that only needs to be leveled about 1/4 as often, is harder on his tools and he (probably) can't charge twice as much.... what will happen, as these become more popular, is a certain market setting of the cost of working on SS frets. Because electric guitarists are so ridiculously conservative, I don't think nickle frets will ever go away entirely. But it has nothing to do with tone, jeez turn your treble knob from "4" to "3 1/2."

[callaway]

I went with nickel over Stainless on my first Warmoth build. I asked my luthier about the stainless, it seemed like they would be right up my alley. He advised against them vehemently. His reasoning was that if you ever have to do a refret, it is extremely difficult to get them out of the fretboard without damage. He runs the Atlanta Guitar School and they train luthiers, plus as long as I have known him he has made my guitars feel incredible, so I trust him. Your mileage may vary, he said he liked them better in all other areas but that one aspect had him recommend me nickel. I went with his advice because I got a one piece neck.

But you'd never need to re-fret a neck with stainless steel frets. I mean, they don't wear at all. It would take decades just to see a hint of a groove. Keep in mind, this is coming from someone who prefers nickel frets for a different reason (tone), but I'm serious---stainless steel frets will not wear.

Some people say you can get the same tone by just turning the treble down slightly, but that's entirely not the case in my experience. I guess it might technically be a timbre thing then...

[stubhead]

I have slight grooves in the seven-string I built three years ago, with Warmoth 6105 SS frets. It'll be another two years before I need to do a level, but SS frets do wear. The only way they wouldn't, is if you don't play very much. In that case, nickel frets don't wear either. If I'm playing only one guitar, with nickel frets, I have to level them every year. Sometimes one guitar will assume the position of "main" and receive a lion's share of the playing time. Many years back, I noticed that great guitarists (as opposed to rock stars) usually picked out ONE guitar and learned the intricacies of it's tones, rather than switching all the time - and it works! Those guys who play 12 guitars per concert? FASHION MAVENS.....
I average about four hours playing a day on guitar, seven or eight hours total counting pedal steel, bass & paperwork.

I have the impression that there are two brands of stainless frets out there, but I don't know the original manufacturers... the SS frets on a tele neck I got from USA Custom seem to me to be harder, so far. But they needed to be polished, right out of the box - unlike the Warmoth, which only needed the ends hotdogged. (I don't mind....)
If the fret manufacturers really wanted to, they could make frets out of stainless tool steel hardened to Rockwell 65, you couldn't bend 'em, you couldn't work em and they'd kill your strings - but they wouldn't wear.  

[DMRACO]

I average about four hours playing a day on guitar, seven or eight hours total counting pedal steel, bass & paperwork.

I

I wish I had that kind of time.

[m165]

That is a lot of time, is that practice time or work? Interesting insights into the whole SS fret business.

[stubhead]

I (sometimes) play in a band or three, teach students, and work pretty hard on learning from different areas - it's an bottomless pit, for sure. I've pared my "real" work down to about 25 -30 hours a week... I decided I liked music more than other things, mostly (I've tried 'em all, trust me). I don't have my TV hooked to anything but a DVD player, I don't like Hollywood movies, I do read quite a bit though & stay politically involved. There's a LOT of time in the day if you lose the...
5 hours a day the average adult American watches TV. 

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/TV/02/24/us.video.nielsen/

Ever see somebody who's television has fritzed? They go insane with "boredom", cause they can't sit motionless in front of a box for five hours being, ummm, not bored. When the pod-thingies crawl out of the wreckage in one million A.D. and write "The Decline and Fall of the American Empire" - television will be central. Excuse me - make that...

5 FRIGGIN' hours a day the average adult American watches TV.  It's so goddam dumb, and insulting - the writers and producers are absolutely contemptuous of their audience, "Oh, these morons will watch anything!" - and of course, they're right. Next time you're in a room with somebody watching TV and they say "Look at this crap! Can you believe they'd put anything so dumb on TV?" get up and turn it off, and see what happens. Drooling, hideous strung-out junkies, all.

[Max]

5 FRIGGIN' hours a day the average adult American watches TV.

I generally watch less than that a week...
My guitar is in the same room as the TV, along with my laptop and all. The TV is off most of the time.