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Permalink Reply by Moritz Voegeli on April 4, 2017 at 5:57am

Fretwork with power tools: you will have the problem to get the correct saw blades. For an optimal clean slot you need a saw where the thickness of the blade equals the kerf equals 0.020" to 0.023". For table saws StewMac sells a special blade for hundred bucks, whether you will find a correct blade for a scroll saw, I have my doubts. If you think about building a dozen of cigar box guitar in the next few years, the real power tool for you is Chickenbone John's set with mitre box, ruler, and fret saw for sixtysix bucks. For your first cigar box guitar cbgitty's fret slotting saw is a good investment, with blade thickness equals kerf equals 0.020".

Why a saw blade with thickness equals kerf? With this type of saw blade the sides of the slot are like polished, and the bigger the value of (kerf - blade thickness) the rougher the sides of the slot. For general purposes a value of (kerf - blade thickness) of 0.004" to 0.006" works best, with smaller values the blade tends to stick, with bigger values you may risk a slanted cut, but too you have a chance to correct a deviation from the wanted direction.

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Permalink Reply by darryl kernaghan on April 4, 2017 at 6:27am

Scroll saws work very well for fretting, i've used them often, but i prefer using a handsaw, as i find it not much slower and a lot less likely to miss my mark

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Permalink Reply by John Dill on April 5, 2017 at 11:01am

I use a 4 1/2" jewelers saw blade .223 on an old skill saw. I made a jig that that holds a MASTER fret board upside down and sticky tapes a New blank on top. on the bottom of the fret slot in my jig is a razor blade set just to fret slot depth so I slide my MASTER fret board over the Razor blade and the fret slot falls over blade, slide saw across fret board the repeat again and again. I made my jig to have an adjustable height that I can adjust according to different thickness and widths of Fret Board blanks. My Fret Board MASTERS are all cut by hand though. I have used this jewelers blade for maybe 50 fret jobs before I change it out. I bought the blades on EBAY. These are good for Med Frets. 

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Permalink Reply by Jerry Jordan on April 7, 2017 at 8:11am

Home Depot has Oak "hobby" boards many folks use for fingerboards. 1 1/2" wide and 1/4" thick. I used 70 or 80 and they work fine. When I first started fretting I used whatever saw I could find, but a fret saw is a good investment. The CB Gitty one is about half the cost of the stew-mac one I use. And a simple miter box that you can make from wood scraps. I use a fretting template and a carpenters square to mark the fret lines. There is lots of good advice in this thread, but I go for cheap and simple and what works. And practice is a good thing. 

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Permalink Reply by Kigar on April 7, 2017 at 2:01pm

The cheapest and simplest fret board (besides fretless) is to fret directly on the neck.  I wouldn't do it beyond a 3 stringer or a uke as you wouldn't have the extra thickness for strength.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Griggs on April 11, 2017 at 10:40am

You didn't ask, bubba, but I'm gonna suggest that you order a CB Gitty fret spacing template, too. Takes all the guesswork out of marking your fretboard spacing.

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Permalink Reply by Tim Powell on April 13, 2017 at 7:46am

I use my coping saw ($15.00 from Lowes) with a fine blade to cut frets-perfect size, plus I can use the coping saw for other uses.

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