Tapping out frets

[unit11]

What's the DIY forum's advice for tapping out frets? I'm interested in converting one of my guitars to a fretless and want to know what I should know before attempting such a procedure.

 

Thanks!

[WRGKMC]

Tapping out frets? You may tap them in but you dont tap them out. You need special plyers that pry them out without destroying the fingerboard in the process. They also double for cutting new frets.

 

As some advice on it though. Guitars without frets sound like total dog crap so dont bother. If you have experience playing violin you would know this. i played fiddel for many years and about the best you can do is 2 notes at a time. Forget full chords sounding good. Guitars arent like bases where the notes sustain. Its nearly impossible to play chords in lower positions. For an experiment, Try to finger a chord directly on top of the frets. Its nearly impossible to do accurately every time in the lower positions.

 

If it was a bass I'd say go for it, but a guitar, they really do suck for sound without the sustain. The notes hold about 1~2 seconds thats it. I dont know anyone who hasnt regretted removing them and would say its a good idea. The best you might get is a cello type pizzacado type sound. Even then a cello will sound a hundres times better. You also have to have the strings real high like 1/" to prevent buzzing and use reall thick strings like 13~56 to get any sustain at all.

[unit11]

Ah, I see. I was under the impression that most fret jobs could be removed in a similar method to the how they were put in.

 

As to the question of tone, I'm actually a big fan of the sound of finger to fingerboard instruments, such as the shamisen and the fiddle - I really enjoy the sound of a plucked (pizzicato? I think that's the word for it) and even a strummed fiddle, and I know that you are fairly limited as far as playing more than one note at a time. Nonetheless, I'd really like to try it out.

 

Also, I reject the notion that it would be too difficult to find a note. You can do it on fiddle, where a small nudge as little as rolling the finger can alter the pitch by a quarter tone or more, and you can do it with slide, which is much more accurate for purposes of testing one's ability at finding pitches on guitar. It's a matter of practice and memory.

 

Thanks for the tip about the pliers, though!

[WRGKMC]

Yes I have played fiddel for 40+ years starting a 9. The instruments are hollow and resonate which give them a good portion of their sound along with the type of flatwound alluminum or gut strings.

 

The plyers are flush cut nippers that grip the frets from the sides. You pry them side ways bending the fret up out of the hole. This also puts downward pressure on the fretboard to keep chuknls from coming out. Some heat the frets up during removal with a soldering iron, but I think this is kind of useless unless the frets were glued in. Save all if any chunks for regluing them back in with wood glue. If the fretboard is finished, I use a sheetrock knife to cut along the fret to cut through the finish so the frets dont damaged it. This may make putting a finish back on easier. There again if you're going fretless, you're going to have to sand down to the wood anyway to get the hole fills smooth.

 

Give it a shot. You'll need to fill in the holes. You can use wood strips glued in. I used epoxy putty on the last bass I converted. Worked out really good. Just forced it down in there with a butter knife, left a slight dome on each, then sanded it down smooth. Epoxy Putty is sandable and its a lighter color than a fretboard which act as markers for fingering. The only thing that throws you off is the normal fret markers, which are way off from the new fingering positions. If the necks Rosewood, you can drill and fill the old dots on the side of the neck and fill them with rosewood sawdust and glue from the new markers you drill. Then use the same epoxy or something lighter for the new dots.