Monday 26 March 2012

DIY Fret crowning tool


I was checking online on how much it would actually cost to get a fret crowning file and it actually cost quite a fair bit to get a file that I will probably use once in a very long time. I read somewhere online that I can actually do it with scrap pieces of wood and some sand paper. The whole idea of crowning is to get the fret to return to round shape after a fret leveling. So I decided that it is probably cheaper to get sand paper and some wooden blocks to do this.


I actually get most of my stuff from Daiso, the $2 shop. It actually has a lot of DIY tools that are really cheap. You can see that I gotten myself many different types of needle files with diff filing texture. Needle files are very useful for fretwork and they don't cost a lot. Sometimes, if it's just one or 2 frets buzzing, just a quick file and crowning on the fret can actually solve the problem instead of full neck fret leveling. Well in this case, I just want to do a Fret crowning block.


First, I create a groove on one of the blocks. This is a guide to the center point where I will begin filing with a needle round file. Beginning filing until an obvious groove appears. Look at the top pic for example. That's it. My very own fret crowning block. Now, how do I crown frets with this?


It's actually very easy. After the frets are leveled and probably flat, after taking off quite a fair bit of metal, hold the block with the groove below and stick a piece of sand paper on the block. Angle the block making sure the groove touches the fret and begin filing. I use 180 grit sand paper for this operation. Make sure that you do not over sand it as the sand paper takes away the metal pretty fast. All you want to achieve here is for the frets to become round. Not further flatten the frets.


I've tested my fret crowning blocks on one of my guitars and I must say that this works perfect. Not to mention, it is so much cheaper to make one of these instead of buying one of those fret crowning tool. Notice the first 2 fret being more shiny than the other frets? Those are the frets I've tried on.

On a side note, someone actually taught me to use a pair of disposable chopsticks for this. Get one of those disposable chopsticks that are joined, and use the end (the part that hold both sticks together) and a piece of sand paper for the same application. However, what I realized is that the wood for disposable chopsticks are too soft and warps out of shape too easily.

2 comments:

  1. BRAVO! i 'm semi pro player who spent a lot of $ on guitar repairs so i think hey i must do something alone, so i got idea like yours and during search on net i found that of course somebody had that idea before so thank you so very very much due to this encourage me to do my own fret leveling, wish you all the best, cheers . PS honestly some rapier tools are extremely pricey out of any logic, i saw some files costing 30-40$ and same kind of files in usual tool shop with a different ''brand'' name cost like max 5-7$

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