Defretting a cheap Squier guitar.

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Zarathustra

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This is not a "should I" thread, I've actually got the frets off and am going to work on filling in the fret spaces soon (I'm doing this all in little bits at school). I'm interested if anyone else here has defretted a guitar (bass is alittle too ordinary, but still cool), and if they've got any tips. This is just a cheap Squier Affinity (it is a 20th anniversary edition, but they can bite me). I bought a set of roundwind 11's to restring because I heard you need a heavier gauge, the guy at the store suggested flat-wounds, but he didn't stock them.

Will it sound like crap with roundwounds, how should I measure fretboard level, and what's the proper gauge for a fretless guitar? I know, I'm a rebel messing with the norms with this crazy fretless guitar tom-foolery, but I've heard some awesome stuff from fretless guitars.

I also have a crazy idea of someday taking the gloss finish off the guitar and digging in F-holes like Rickenbacker used to do... do I have a mental illness?

I'll post pictures if I can.
 
Fill the slots with some contrasting color veineer.

I did make myself a fretless acoustic once, but I never quite got around to finishing it. One of these days. It's one of those cobbler's children things.


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It's been done and tried a few times. I know you were not after "why not" not answers but heres a few things you may find troublesome. The thing will have lots of buzzing and at different amounts on the fret board. You will struggle to get good accurate intonation while paying, it's even harder than say a fiddle or cello. That said it can sound interesting. Almost sitar like.

If you haven't got got veneer handy to fill the slots. You can use a clear expoxy. Use one that has a long open time and overnight set. That way you'll be able to clean it up and get most of it off the fingerboard before it goes off. Use denatured alcohol to clean it. You can colour the epoxy any colour you like with aniline dyes.

Flat wound would be the best option. The best sounding example of a fretless I've ever heard used nylon strings. You may need to get the action up quite high to even make it playable.
 
You should also decide if you need to change the 0th fret, as the action on the first part of the neck may be too high.
 
Sounds like a fun project. I de-fretted a ditch-recovery guitar a few years ago and have gotten some interesting sounds out of it. Mine's only got four strings on it, because part of the headstock was broken off when I found it. I have a page for it ( http://whatstudios.net/Dan/geetar.html ) if you want to take a look. The tricky part is that if the action is too low, it buzzes everywhere (mine right now still has some buzzing issues at the top end), and if you get it too high, it's damn near unplayable and hard to get any sustain. I filled my fret slots partially and sanded the whole fretboard way down, but I wouldn't recommend doing that. It's too hard to get a consistent shape. I'm thinking of making a new solid-wood fretboard for mine to try and get a more consistent sound.
 
I know the idea's not crazy, but there are always those people who've never heard of anything besides a Fender or a Gibson.

Alright, I'm going to keep hold of those heavier gauge strings, maybe put them on a friend's electric... but anyways...

I might sound like a dumbass here, but how do you raise the action?
 
Try raising the bridge. If it's a strat-type guitar you can usually raise each saddle at a time with the little set screws on either side of each string.
 
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