don't waste $ on a defret

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j dubb

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first of all, i'm no gear snob. i've got a humble $300 aria pro II fretless--it sounds clean, stays in tune, and i have chops. when i see some dork with a $1000 6-string bass onstage, i'm generally reminded of a "$10 haircut on a $2 head."

i still have my first fretless. somebody'd yanked the frets out of a short-scale neck and attached it to a homemade plywood body. i loved it--worth every penny of the $60 i paid the pawn shop.

but i worry when i keep hearing that somebuddy spent good $ on a defretted neck. the putty or epoxy or whatever they replaced the frets with is just not the same as solid wood. it'll shrink, bulge, warp, or crack in a closet or during a tuning.

don't waste your dough on wood-dough. save your bread and get the real thing.
 
Well, when we, or any other reputable shop, convert a fretted to a fretless (which is uncommon, as it actually costs less to get a new neck from Moses or from Warmoth), we fill the slots with wood. On an ebony or rosewood fingerboard, we use maple, and of course it would be a really bad idea to try and make a maple fingerboard fretless, as it needs finish. If it is done right, it is not a problem. Besides, some people need the lines to play in tune. Don't knock it until you've seen it done right, and some guy pulling frets with an awl and filling with some wood putty is not doing it right.


Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi
 
gotcha...

guess the only defret jobs i've seen have been done by some careless people. if the stuff i've seen was filled with wooden shims, it musta been balsa.

one of my friends had a defretted vintage neck mail-ordered to the downtown pro studio where he engineers (and where i hang out to learn). i felt sorry for him when he opened the box--i think he spent about $100 on what was obviously a turd.

almost as irritating as walking up to a sweetass fretless in a guitar shop, only to find that the fingerboard looks like corduroy because the "professionals" who run the place put roundwound strings on it instead of flatwound. i could weep...

if somebody does it right, that's great news to me.
 
Re: gotcha...

j dubb said:
almost as irritating as walking up to a sweetass fretless in a guitar shop, only to find that the fingerboard looks like corduroy because the "professionals" who run the place put roundwound strings on it instead of flatwound. i could weep...
Click to expand...


That is the sound some people are after. It does rip up the fingerboard, but we can (and frequently do) resurface the fingerboard. For most players, they can last years using roundwounds on a fretless. It is mostly a matter of the sound you are after.


Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi
 
Actually,I pulled the frets out of my Ibanez bass and filled it w/wood putty and played it happily for 5 years.It seemed fine to me.Then,on a whim,I decided I wanted it fretted again,so I scraped out the putty and my brother helped me put the fret wire in and dress them.We're not pro's,but it seems fine to me.Then again,I drink too much!
I certainly wouldn't recommend doing these things to your $2000 Alembic!:D
 
I use roundwounds on my custom Manson fretless, because as Light says that's the sound I want. The most damage is caused by bending or using a side to side motion to vibrato. If you vibrato by swivelling your entire hand up and down the neck, like a double bass player, it cuts down the damage significantly.
 
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