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Comment by the anonymous pick on March 11, 2012 at 1:34pm

bob ..  did you get my email about   barn  board ?

-----ever  try the  vinegar  and steel wool  treatment ?  it  make a nice   barn board look    out of  most  light    colored woods  .  just soak  some #0000 steel wool   in  cider vingar  for about 3 hrs  ..  and  paint it on .  you can watch the colour change before   your eyes  .. its very  cool

Comment by Bob Lumpkin on March 11, 2012 at 12:50pm

I'm gonna try this. I HATE doing fret work, most time consuming & nerve wracking part of the whole build (& I have all the tools). Thanks, I'll let you know how it turns out.

PS: I just tried out my new planer/joiner on some rosewood seconds I bought & they are turning out to be some very nice fretboards. Should have bought one sooner, have more uses for it if they work out.

Comment by the anonymous pick on March 11, 2012 at 10:42am

video  is up  with  my new  guitar  build-   with  this fret board on it 

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/bobby-s-yer-aunt

Comment by the anonymous pick on March 11, 2012 at 5:08am

rand - as you  can see in the  video ,  the   bobby pins  i used are quite larger (almost 3 inches long )  ..  and  wider .. they are just as wide as regular frets  .  sometimes  these are also   called "roller pins " -  you can also see the brand  name in  the video , that my  help   you when searching .   i  got them at zellers (here in  canada ) 2 bucks  for a  pack of 18  , so ya may need 2 packs . .  i'm sure   you could find them online .  heck .  they are made in  china  ;-) 

if not ,  talk to me  if you want me to send   you some . ;-)

 

 

 

 

Comment by Mark Bliss on March 11, 2012 at 1:48am

Rand:

The w/wiper strips may work, but they are hard, springy stainless steel and trimming, fitting and leveling them is likely to take a lot of work. I suspect case hardened cut nails would be the devil as well. I think while either could be done with satisfactory results, most people would run out of patience long before getting there!

I just have trouble comprehending that it would be that difficult to aquire readily available materials, surely you can recieve mail and have someone who could send you a small package, eventually right?

 

Oily;

No additional projects for me right now. The 42 1/2 I have going is killing me. But thanks to you guys I have the line "Dreamed I was an Eskimo, doo-doo dododoo-doo-doo-doo-doo" stuck in my head for about the last 48 hours............

Comment by Ron "Oily" Sprague on March 11, 2012 at 12:17am

Mark,

 

You wanna host an FZ Commemorative CBG Songwriting contest, I'm in. Let's take it over to the Songwriter's Group, see how it plays out.

 

Ahem. Gonna have to see how difficult it would be to play parts of Peaches En Regalia on a 4 stringer...

Comment by Rand Moore on March 10, 2012 at 11:26pm

Well I just got back from Walmart (in Shekou District, Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, China) and the only bobby pins they have look way too small to be used as frets. They measure 43mm in length, 1mm in width and maybe 0.5mm thick. The thickness I couldn't measure w/o opening the package but it appears thinner than the width. So, are we talking the same thing? Or do they come in different sizes? What are the dimensions of the bobby pins you guys are using? I ended up not buying because a 0.5 to 1mm fret height is ultra-low action in my book.

These bobby pins might be usable if you glue them to tooth picks (or bamboo skewers) and then glue that combination to the fretboard, and with the metal top layer, this type of fret should wear less than either toothpicks or skewers alone.

Maybe I'll try used windshield-wiper blades next. I've read they have a long, thin strip of metal that can be salvaged and used for frets. Just need to locate a local source for used windshield-wiper blades.

I've been out of fret wire for 3 months now, and while I've located several sources on taobao.com, they don't have PayPal and what the do have has no English UI (same for taobao.com). So, it's a bit frustrating and I'm looking for better alternatives. I've used nylon tie-wraps, bailing wire, cut nails, and bamboo skewers with mixed results, and all falling short of the ease of installing real fret wire with the good sound that produces. So far, the runner up is cut nails glued in with 2-part epoxy glue... but that was a lot of work, messy and I'd have to re-glue maybe 30% of the frets that would fall ff when I went to clean up the glue mess, and again when I'd file down the ends of the cut ail fret. With all that work, I'm not ready to go back to cut nails.

-Rand.

Comment by Rand Moore on March 10, 2012 at 7:56pm

Great idea. Will have to give it a try, even though my normal inclination would be to slot the the fretboard and mount the bobby pins in perpendicularly. Glued directly to the fretboard (or neck) just seems too low action, but I'll have to give it a try to find out for real. The thing I fear is gluing my fingers together yet again. Well, as long as I have to go shopping for bobby pins, I guess I can pick up a bottle of nail polish remover as well. That what my wife uses to get me out of these sticky situations. Works pretty well.

-Rand.

Comment by the anonymous pick on March 10, 2012 at 3:55am

thanx again guys . ;-)

Comment by Mark Bliss on March 10, 2012 at 3:30am

Oh and I am sure FZ would have spontaniously written a wacky song if handed a CBG Oily.

Hey, I know! Maybe we need to have a CBN Frank Zappa commemorative song writing contest! LOL!

Ok, ok, "shutup and play yer CBG!"

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