Jagged fret ends.

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thiswaythatway

thiswaythatway

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What to do with jagged fret ends. I have a guitar that was fine until about a month ago. It's been 20 degrees since Christmas and dry as the Sahara since. Now I've felt the fret ends sticking out past the edge of neck and I hate that, it feels like I'm going to slice my hand open. Is it due to the neck shrinking and will it fix itself if I get more humidifiers in my house or should I have a tech file down the fret ends?
 
danyeo":36zybts9 said:
What to do with jagged fret ends. I have a guitar that was fine until about a month ago. It's been 20 degrees since Christmas and dry as the Sahara since. Now I've felt the fret ends sticking out past the edge of neck and I hate that, it feels like I'm going to slice my hand open. Is it due to the neck shrinking and will it fix itself if I get more humidifiers in my house or should I have a tech file down the fret ends?
Click to expand...

Yes, it's the wood shrinking from the lack of humidity. Yes it will reverse course - may or may not completely reverse - once you reintroduce the humiditiy.

Getting them filed down is not a bad idea. Might help prevent it from being a problem in the future.

Maple board or rosewood?
 
The N4 I just got was sitting in a basement for 22 years. The frets were sprouting bigtime. I oiled the neck and let it sit for a few days. Slowly, over about a week the fretboard (ebony) swelled back to normal and the fret sprout disapeared.

Thanks to 0000 steel wool everything is super smooth. The guitar plays and sounds great!!!

BTW, my house is humidified and is kept between 35-50%
 
ratter":wq7p40np said:
danyeo":wq7p40np said:
What to do with jagged fret ends. I have a guitar that was fine until about a month ago. It's been 20 degrees since Christmas and dry as the Sahara since. Now I've felt the fret ends sticking out past the edge of neck and I hate that, it feels like I'm going to slice my hand open. Is it due to the neck shrinking and will it fix itself if I get more humidifiers in my house or should I have a tech file down the fret ends?
Click to expand...

Yes, it's the wood shrinking from the lack of humidity. Yes it will reverse course - may or may not completely reverse - once you reintroduce the humiditiy.

Getting them filed down is not a bad idea. Might help prevent it from being a problem in the future.

Maple board or rosewood?
Click to expand...

Maple. Funny thing is that I was in Guitar Center the other day and every other guitar I played had the same thing going, some worse than others.
 
I get this happening a lot because of our weird weather in the UK.

You know those 4 sided nail buffing blocks? They have 4 fine grits that go from course to smooth. I use one of those to take care of sharp fret ends. Starting with the course grit, i run it along the side of the fretboard, all the way from the body end of the neck towards the nut end. Then i do the same thing several times going from course grit through to the finest grit to finish the job.
 
Your house is too dry. Get a gauge that reads humidity and see what it is. Probably below 20% Head to Lowes/ Home Depot and get one of those big room humidifiers and put it in the room where your guitar is kept. After a few days it should go back to where it was. This year has been a bad one for drying out guitars.

I've had quite a few acoustic guitars come in the past month where the bodies had shrunk from it. A couple weeks hanging in the shop and they come back to normal.
 
Damned shrinkage.

I have the same problem too due to the cold and dry weather here in eastern Ontario. My house doesn't have a humidifier and I have not been storing my maple board guitars in cases. My bound ebony fretboard guitar doesn't seem to have any sharp frets. I've only recently noticed this so I stuck my guitars back in cases with a moist sponge and I'll see if that helps.
 
I probably would not do anything, check the humidity level and correct, wait another month and see if it comes back to normal. I was in GC the other day and noticed the same thing as you guys.
 
It's no big deal to sand down the fret edges. I think some guitars have fretboards that were seasoned/dried better or something, I have some guitars that it never happens to, and a few that it does. I have two acoustics - one is a USA Guild, other is a Taylor 510, both are from '96. The Guild could probably be played in a desert with no issues, the Taylor gets too dry if I look at it sideways.
 
I've noticed the same thing happened to my two TA Drop Tops. I never remember them having such sharp fret ends.
 
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