I have found that if you don't stretch the wire, it will stretch later on its own and then you end up with floppy frets.
I stretched the wire by wrapping the end around a pole and giving it a good tug. The beginning was epoxied into a tight hole near the nut. You can do the same with the end. I also devised a crude but effective tightener using screw and a washer. I also used this method as a tuner on my diddley bow.
I like the level piece and just so happens have a junk one in my collection of guitar stuff, I also have a 120 watt Peavy with an Acoustic head, seems like the piezo is noisy and sounds like crap in the one guitar that has the pickup incased in hot glue. Maybe just a bad piezo....Hope to get back to building soon, weather been really crappy in Michigan.
hi keith, Hollowbelly, David, Hamhock, everyone I missed,
Sorry for the extremely late reply. Somehow I did'nt see most of these posts until now. The bridge was a piece of "T" from a broken aluminum level. David, the wire fret idea came from a creative guy in australia who designs and builds affordable instruments for underpriveledged areas. Bob Brozman, an incredible slide guitarist, is also involved in this project. They have a great site called cyberferal.com.
Some people groove the back of the neck, but I did'nt. The trick is to prestretch the wire before wrapping. I just notched the edges of the fretboard and wrappped. I believe this method is also more effective if you have a slight radius on the fretboard to allow the wire to lay perfectly flat. This was just an ordinary piezo pickup, but I am playing out of a big 100 watt Peavy tube amp, thus the big sound. Hope this helps. I'll try to reply sooner next time.
Comments
Cool, thanks! The worst that can happen is I mess it up, take it off and keep on slidin'!
Hi John,
I have found that if you don't stretch the wire, it will stretch later on its own and then you end up with floppy frets.
I stretched the wire by wrapping the end around a pole and giving it a good tug. The beginning was epoxied into a tight hole near the nut. You can do the same with the end. I also devised a crude but effective tightener using screw and a washer. I also used this method as a tuner on my diddley bow.
Thanks for the comment
Wade
Oh, and what did you do with the ends??
I want to use wire for frets and I saw your comment about pre stretching?? How in the world do you do that and do I need to?
hi keith, Hollowbelly, David, Hamhock, everyone I missed,
Sorry for the extremely late reply. Somehow I did'nt see most of these posts until now. The bridge was a piece of "T" from a broken aluminum level. David, the wire fret idea came from a creative guy in australia who designs and builds affordable instruments for underpriveledged areas. Bob Brozman, an incredible slide guitarist, is also involved in this project. They have a great site called cyberferal.com.
Some people groove the back of the neck, but I did'nt. The trick is to prestretch the wire before wrapping. I just notched the edges of the fretboard and wrappped. I believe this method is also more effective if you have a slight radius on the fretboard to allow the wire to lay perfectly flat. This was just an ordinary piezo pickup, but I am playing out of a big 100 watt Peavy tube amp, thus the big sound. Hope this helps. I'll try to reply sooner next time.
Wade
-
1
-
2
of 2 Next