Official Luthiers Forum!

https://youtu.be/5Y2hiE2Nkvc?si=hKBshgtFYUtjcf0t

That’s so crazy it just might work.

Sigh... Spot leveling is a poor approach to fret work. As I have said many times before the fret plane needs to be addressed as a whole as the strings, natural straight edges see the fret plane.

High frets don't just happen and there are rarely only one when there are high frets. Something like in the example in the video is a high, secure fret (its therapist would be proud...) but that's pretty unusual without a cause.

So the vast majority of the high frets that we see are loose and that is why they are high. The ends are particularly susceptible to this when a guitar is permitted to dry out. It could be that the fret had too much radius to be loose and it lifted.

With this said the proper approach is to clamp and glue the fret AND check every single other fret since we know that this guitar had it happen at least in one place.

Once the frets are all sure to be glued in place a proper fret dress precision level and recrown using precision leveled beams that span at the very least between the 1st and 12th.

For us if this guitar was presented to us with a high, secured fret we would recommend a fret dress. If it presented with a high, loose fret we would also recommend a full fret dress (we check and glue if necessary every fret as part of a fret dress, always). If the client only wanted one fret addressed in isolation we would decline the business because again the fret plane should always be addressed as a whole when it comes to the level set.

The approach is not new, it's the kind of thing that might have value to a tech on the road where a show must go on but again a poor practice to spot level when you don't absolutely have to.

Lastly that fret still has to be polished out or it becomes a file on the string and can lead to string breakage.... Bet you didn't know that that gritty frets break strings more often. So again a full fret polish is part of that fret dress I'm suggesting.

We see countless tools these days that will come and go for operations that are said to be luthier activities. This is one is off the mark because again as has been said on the OLF dozens of times spot leveling is a half ass approach to fret work.

All this is true and spot on what I expected you to say. Your shop thrives on upselling jobs for max profit which is a fine business plan.

And yet, sometimes a spot level is perfectly fine and I’m happy to offer the 20$, or the 120$ job.

Ed... I'm sure you didn't mean it that way, but your post makes it sound like you are okay with half-assed solutions.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

I don’t consider the occasional spot level to be a half baked solution.

Thought we were talking about the tool?

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Ah, well I haven’t tried the tool so I can’t really say but it looks pretty slick to me, similar to what I already do but slicker with the crowning effect. Though 240 seems pretty aggressive as a grit but that’d likely wear down pretty fast. When I use the 300 grit Stew-Mac fret file, a square inch of 800 grit pinched around the groove removes the 300 grit scratches in just a few strokes, followed by 1500 which buffs it nicely in efficient time.

A high or loose fret is a tell tale of other fret plane issues and should be further investigated for others that are high or loose. Good work has a cost it's not upselling and we don't upsell we simply suggest and explain what something needs and why.

Had we been asked to "spot level" one high fret we would decline and not take the job on it's a poor practice and we guarantee our work and always have.

It's not about the cost or selling up it's about something else.... something called doing good work.....

Even on new guitars at least two respected makers will put a new instrument through a $140,000.00 PLEK machine and a fret dress and then follow-up with hand work to further dial in the fret plane. No spot leveling there.

Spot leveling may be... addressing a symptom and not the complete problem and that is why it's a poor practice. I do see a place in an emergency for spot leveling but short of an emergency it's a poor practice.

OK then let’s call this an Emergency Spot Level Device. For when ya really gotta.