home-made end nipper and hammer tool question.

[Leonardo Silva]

I present you the poor people choice for an end nipper:










this is how I clip the tang on the each end, first a diagonal cut







and this is how I hold the fret while and I file the tang down with pullstrokes while the hand is holding the fret with opposite force, does it make any sense?, I hope so



and yes, that's a block of red oak that holds the frets, better pic in here.



this is how the end nipper cuts, not that good anyway but better than filling down 2cm of unnecesary fretwire.


(by the way, the fret is kinda lifted in the end because the radius of the fretboard was wrong, I had to check it and should work nicer now)


so, just as a reminder, this tool WON'T replace a good quality fret end nipper, as you see is already chipped and I suspect it won't take that much abuse (maybe 2 fretting jobs more), I did this meanwhile I ordered a good quality end nipper, the end nipper arrived but it was defective and couldn't even cut normal fretwire, dull as a bowling ball, so I'll work with these ones before buying another good set of nippers.


and finally, there is no picture of the last process, I grounded the point so I can clip the last frets without damaging the neck joint are (refreting a set-in guitar), so it's like a centimeter shorter, I wouldn't use that part of the edge anyway.

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hammer time.

I know it's a completely different topic, but what's the purpose of having a round surface hammer for fretting job? (like the one stewmac sells)



I think I will have to use an steel hammer for the fretting for now, maybe the next fret job I'll buy a brass hammer, or I have an idea of building a brass tip for an existing hammer, if I do so, I want to know if there is any advantage by making the surface round like the picture.

that's it for now!, I'll keep working on my poor man options before buying the real deal when I have the proper money.

[Barry Daniels]

Get an arbor press and press them frets. It is a big improvement over a hammer.

[Randy Roberts]

It may be possible that in grinding the face square, you may have heated up the steel of the nipper to hot and lost the temper in the metal. If you make another the same way, grind in short increments and cool it off frequently and you may find it lasting longer.

I'd agree with Barry about pressing the frets in. If you have access to a drill press, you don't need the arbor just the radiused cauls chucked into the drill press.

While I have a fret hammer I have never used it. What might be easier than making a brass cap for your steel hammer would be making a cap out of polyethylene plastic (white cutting board material).

[Clay Schaeffer]

You can also drive frets with the "rubber" face of a dead blow hammer. Almost any hammer will work if the slot is properly cut , the fret is radiused, and you don't hit it too hard.

[David King]

Just as important as the hammer is what you rest the neck on catch the blow and keep the fret from bouncing back out. A leather bag of lead or steel shot is excellent for this purpose. The factories use a fretting bench with a heavy steel H beam work surface that's pillared into the concrete floor. They'll lay the leather shot bag on top of that.

Real end nippers aren't much more expensive than diagonal cutters aka "dykes" that you've used here. They'll save you the trouble of filing the tang off since they can cut flush with the bottom of the fret.

For stainless frets then a Dremel rotary tool with the abrasive disc is the fastest way to go. I can cut 30-40 jumbo frets with a single disc. It takes 2-3 seconds per cut. Wear goggles and a dustmask if you go this route.

[Todd Stock]

My favorite fretting hammer is the 5 ounce Stanley dead-blow, which Stewmac used as a basis for their new hammer, but screwed up and used a radiused face on the brass insert. The new SM hammer is a good tool for reducing the radius of a fret after insertion, but that is seldom what we want to do with a fret...mine got reground to flat, and does duty on the student bench...hope that they offer a choice of flat or radiused face. Stick with the Stanley original, which is on sale at Enco this month for about half of what everyone else is running (see my post), or the standard brass/hard plastic wooden-handled LMII tool, which works pretty well.

A press make lot of sense if a) you fret the board before it goes on the neck, or b) you build Fender-style necks without heels - either makes best use of what a press can do without forcing you to resort to a bunch of special tools (e.g., the 'Jaws I, II, III series from SM) or work-arounds to address the lack of backing in the body for press work on an acoustic. Boards that are fretted off the neck will show minimal need for further leveling (but will still need all the usual cleanup on ends, etc.), and assuming the board goes on dead level, will reduce the time spent on level/crown/polish/end treatment. Most repair shops will use a press where it saves time, and hammer work where presses are inefficient or just a pain to set up or use.

Hammer work is a core skill for anyone thinking about repairing, and lets you do as consistent a job as your skills will allow. Low skill level means lots of variation...start with a higher fret (the .080 x .050 wire from SM works) and handle issues in leveling. Higher skill means more consistent results, with less dressing. Anyone that makes a chunk of his or her living doing refrets needs good hammer skills, so worth developing if thinking about repair work as a staple in the shop. Total tool outlay is $15-$25 for a hammer and whatever 3 lbs of bird shot runs in your neck of the woods.

As mentioned, US-made end cutters cost close to a cost of the purpose-made tool from Stewmac or LMII...Other than having a set of Channelocks sitting around doing nothing, there's not much sense in spending the time regrinding. Also an issue to get correct angle on cutting edge - the notched edge on your shop-made side cutters is a pretty good indicator that a) the metal got too hot during regrinding and was softened in that area, or b) the angle is insufficient to support the edge. One fix is to rework the angle on the non-flush side of the jaws - easier on an end cutter than side cutters - with a diamond file.