Exciting..... and frustrating!!!!

[Les Paul Lover]

So i bought and G&L ASAT Special Tribute at a great price.... but with a much less than perfect fret work (pretty rubbish even). Let's give them credit where it's due..... they were nicely polished, and no sharp fret ends.
A shame they didn't bother pushing them in all the way......

I decided to keep it anyway, hammered the frets in but it still needs a fret levelling.

I've got an old MIJ Aria Pro II RS X80 that I thought needed a refret, but a levelling should do.

I like tinkering.......


And so I bought these:



Diamond fret levelling file, fret crowning file, fret protectors and lota a sandpaper and some micro mesh for the final polish.

I really like the crowning file it looks very well designed.



You can see it better there.
http://www.chrisalsopguitar.co.uk/shop/ ... file-TF080


Got the goods yesterday, and as I came back from the open Mic night at my local pub, I tried the file.... on one of my nail...... and then polished it with all the sandpaper grades then micro mesh. Well.... it's very smooth and shiny now.


And now the frustrating part..... I'm super busy for the next few weeks. It's gonna be hard to find the time to actually level, recrown and polish the frets of both guitars........

[Boy_Narf]

Cool!

I had a G&L ASAT at one time, honestly the only guitar I regret selling off, young and dumb... Anyway, the fretwork was flawless, sorry to hear about yours. At least you got some new toys

[Les Paul Lover]

Cool!

I had a G&L ASAT at one time, honestly the only guitar I regret selling off, young and dumb... Anyway, the fretwork was flawless, sorry to hear about yours. At least you got some new toys

I believe USA made G&L very rarely give these issues.
Mine is a tribute series, and if I didn't buy it as B stock for a price they're hard to get 2nd hand, and didn't sound so freaking good, I would have sent it back.

I'm not sure how true it is, but I've read a number of people having similar issues with tributes G&L. In fairness, I've encountered the same issues with squiers and Washburn guitars I bought cheap and sold on for profit - I believe the issue is inherent to budget off shored production guitars. Some are perfect, but not all of them are. None of the guitars I've had before were as bad as that G&L ASAT Special Tribute though!!! All the other guitars i got, i was able to give a pretty good set up to (not what i consider ideal though).

The plus side.... I made the ASAT a lot better by hammering the not fully pressed frets in.... and I feel a lot better buy these tools when it's for 2 guitars. It means that for less than one fret level would cost, I'm buying all the gear to do multiple guitars.

Now..... Let's see if I can pull it off!!!!!!

[PBA]

Interesting tools! I've not heard of Chris Alsop before but will look again if I need any more tools. UK made and different to those I have now.

I bought a Chinese made Hofner about a year ago with fret problems. With the Hofner, the fret slots were too wide meaning the frets were very slightly loose. It could be worth checking to make sure you don't have the same problem with the G&L. Try lifting one of the frets you fully seated. If it's easyish to lift, you have a problem.

I used a home made shaped clamp to superglue the frets two at a time before levelling. It worked well but was a lot of effort.

Also - I don't see a straight edge or notched straight edge. I guess you already have one? I'd say the notched straight edge is the most vital tool for fret dressing work...

Good Luck!

[Mystic38]

have had a couple of Tribute G&L.. an SB-2 bass and an Asat Classic... both were really great.. certainly no issues with the setup but the pickguard in both cases were a little off, and clearly hand made, but i have yet to be bothered to make new ones..

the Asat Classic with the MFD is just great..just does not get enough attention.

[Les Paul Lover]

Interesting tools! I've not heard of Chris Alsop before but will look again if I need any more tools. UK made and different to those I have now.

I bought a Chinese made Hofner about a year ago with fret problems. With the Hofner, the fret slots were too wide meaning the frets were very slightly loose. It could be worth checking to make sure you don't have the same problem with the G&L. Try lifting one of the frets you fully seated. If it's easyish to lift, you have a problem.

I used a home made shaped clamp to superglue the frets two at a time before levelling. It worked well but was a lot of effort.

Also - I don't see a straight edge or notched straight edge. I guess you already have one? I'd say the notched straight edge is the most vital tool for fret dressing work...

Good Luck!

Thanks for the tip re fret slot width.
I will check and see if some of those frets come back out again.

I'm using a spirit level I have as a straight edge. I had 15mns free this weekend, and managed to just removed the strings from my Aria Pro II RS X80 and try to set the neck as flat as possible.

My straight edge (spirit level) revealed an area of concern - the neck seems to be back bowing slightly between the nut and the 2 fret. That means that the 1st fret doesn't make contact with the spirit level, or to make it do so, I have to set much too much relief.

I will set it as flat as I can, and then the levelling should solve that issue, it will just mean a little (or quite a lot.....) extra filing. Another option would be to swap that fret only for a taller fret, but I would probably need to then change to original brass nut as the nut slots would be too deep. I'm quite keen to keep that nut on.

[PBA]

This is what I would do. Note however that I do not claim any particular expertise. I’ve built seven guitars over thirty years of dabbling with guitars but none have been of the quality of a factory guitar!
Check the straightness of your spirit level. If you don’t have a flat reference surface the best choices would be a large mirror or a decent quality kitchen work top. If you’ve got the balls, go to Wilkes and see how flat their granite counter tops are!
Once you know it’s flat, find some hard blocks to elevate it off the fretboard. These will need to fit between the nut and first fret and between frets at the dusty end. They need to be stiff and incompressible. Wood or hard plastic would be fine. Then you need to measure between the wood of the fret board and the underside. Another hard block and feeler gauges are your best bet. A notched straight edge is ideal but you can do it without.
You COULD just rest it on the frets and estimate neck straightness but I’ve found that hard to do. Any work already done to the frets can throw your estimate way off.
Now, guitar necks are all likely to have some slight twist so that the straightness on the treble side differs from that on the bass side. Do your measurements at the middle of the fretboard. You are likely to be able to see any significant twist.
If you really do have a back bow, be careful with the file and keep an eye on the second and third frets. It might be that the second fret is high rather than the first is low. This is why it’s good to check relief from the fretboard not the frets.
Fret levelling files can be hard to get used to. If you don’t find it easy, try sticking sandpaper to your spirit level and using that instead. Whichever method you use, don’t press down. Just let the tool’s own weight do the work and use your effort to keep it straight and flat onto the fret so that it cuts at the middle only. The neck radius means the edges shouldn’t touch…
I tend to start at the body end and work up towards the nut. I just dress the frets so that the normal frets have a bright line of sanding. I don’t deal with the low frets but I will grind a bit more on the high ones. Once I’ve made it to the nut, I go back and start again, slowly improving the levelness until I have touched every fret. Use a marker pen to colour the frets before you begin so that you are confident you have touched all on them. It might just be me, but I really struggle with black markers as the ones I’ve tried only colour the frets grey and that’s too close to silver for me! Blue is ok and red was best. Your eyes may be different.
The crowning file looks good to me. I’ve only tried toothed steel files used for laminates and gave up on those pretty quickly as I was gouging into the fretboard. Yours looks to have “safe” edges. You just need to be sure not to actually file on the crown of the fret - you are just removing the shoulders caused by the levelling process.
Most importantly, I found it to be good fun – I hope you enjoy it.

[Les Paul Lover]

Thanks for the tips!!!!

My son's Lego collection is finally gonna come to good use!!!!!

[Les Paul Lover]

Cloud and silver linings.....
Both my kids have chicken pox, so I stayed home..... and when the youngest had her nap and my poor older boy was comatosed watching cartoons, I started doing some fret work.


I lined the neck with Lego blocks and had the same conclusion - with a very slight relief, I've got some back bow too starting around the 4th or 3rd fret.

Since I can't get the neck straight, I compromised and went to town with it.

All taped and prepped up.


I protected the nut with some masking tape too..... and then promptly knocked it off with one of the 1st stroke of the file making contact......



By the way, it's now become clear that it's not only the worn out frets that gave that guitar a poor set up, but the back bow too.

[Les Paul Lover]

Here you can see reasonably well the wear on the 1st few frets.



The fret levelling went pretty fast actually. May be 20 mns or so.
Because of the back bow, I decided not to totally eliminate the wear grooves on the 1st fret, as that would have meant taking too much material off the frets 3 to 7.


I can always revisit thay later, I have the tools now.

And so I set off to crown the frets.



That took a lot longer. I have filed some frets pretty low trying to even out the fret height along the back bowing neck, and those heavily filed frets took quite a while to recrown.

But I got there.



Took quite a long time recrowning them all though, perhaps 1h.
That file is very good though. Really well designed tool.

[Les Paul Lover]

And next i sandes them all, from 800 grit to 2500, and then micro meshed them.



I was worried that I could still see some slight marks on the crowns, but I couldn't feel them, it all feels very smooth.

So I cleaned everything, glued the nut back in place and stringed it.

The action is SOOOOOO MUCH better.
However, the slight tooling marks I could just about make out but not feel under my finger..... are like grit under the strings.

I'm gonna have to redo the polishing, perhaps starting with 400 grit this time.

Not a big deal, I'm happy with the levelling and the crowing, so that's 2 out of 3 good from the start.

[Jondog]

Awesome! I need to get some files and leveling beam. Recently bought a rosewood All Parts neck for my strat that needs some dressing. Frets are all pretty level. Have a Warmoth Tele neck that came with awful frets. Most of them uneven, and its back bowed. Barely flat with the tension loose. Quite disappointing considering the Warmoth was twice as much $$ as the All Parts. Currently have a Maple All Parts neck on my strat that came pretty well perfect other than needed dressing, which I did with sand paper. Neck has been good to me, just decided I want to try rosewood Its always kind of been a project guitar.

[Les Paul Lover]

Awesome! I need to get some files and leveling beam. Recently bought a rosewood All Parts neck for my strat that needs some dressing. Frets are all pretty level. Have a Warmoth Tele neck that came with awful frets. Most of them uneven, and its back bowed. Barely flat with the tension loose. Quite disappointing considering the Warmoth was twice as much $$ as the All Parts. Currently have a Maple All Parts neck on my strat that came pretty well perfect other than needed dressing, which I did with sand paper. Neck has been good to me, just decided I want to try rosewood Its always kind of been a project guitar.

I was surprised too, with the price they charge, to read the a warmoth neck might need levelling. It isn't what you'd expect at that price.

I'm not sure what you mean be back bow jondog, but I think what you mean is that with the rise rod loosened, you still have some relief?

With my guitar, what i described as back bow is different - I get both relief and then from the 4th or 3rd fret some twisting away backward. I'm pretty confident the levelling will make it a great player again, but I'm I'll do a final full set up later, when I'll have repolished the fret correctly.

[Les Paul Lover]

have had a couple of Tribute G&L.. an SB-2 bass and an Asat Classic... both were really great.. certainly no issues with the setup but the pickguard in both cases were a little off, and clearly hand made, but i have yet to be bothered to make new ones..

the Asat Classic with the MFD is just great..just does not get enough attention.

I absolutely love the tone coming out of the ASAT Special Tribute. The jumbo MFD pick up are really really great, and the bridge is a great unit, very comfy to play.

It might become a major player in my collection once the frets are sorted.

But the fret work on mine was pretty shocking really. No sharp fret ends, all nicely polished, but to have 8 or 9 raised frets, some so much that I had to raised the action like crazy to stop not only fret buzzing, but on some frets the fret next tonit totally killing the note played!!!
Really really poor.

But the axe is worth keeping.

[Hubaxe]

Your skills are good! The first fret are really worned, I think I would have refretted instead of leveling.