Day 1 of Fretting Day...

Stars must have aligned today. Some replacement parts for the CNC that were due today didn't make it so we all bailed out of the shop early. Right around the time we were calling it a day I get an email from Dave - "Have 3 hours to kill today after work, you working on guitars?"... well I guess we'll have too now! So I cranked out an extra rack to keep at Steve's and headed over to get a jump start on fretting.

Dave in fancy work clothes... knocking down the sanding sealer I shot last week.
Rolling out some fretwire in Steve's home built radius jig.
Cut and ready to press in!
We've been using Steve's drill press with the StewMac caul to press the frets in.
One down...
Three down.......

We did end up using CA glue on these to make sure they stay seated.
Working our way down. One unexpected upside to the drill press is we could lock the quill while the glue set.
hammering the ends a bit over radius.
Snipping the ends of the wire off at the board.
I don't know why but I thought I was making a funny face here...

After showing Dave what to shoot for he took over.
Before Dave got there Steve and I did my bound 'bird. Steve's using his homemade fret nipper.
pressed and edges filed.
Leveling the frets
And recrowned.

I PROMISE on Sunday we'll get some better shots of the various steps. Dave has really taken over as official documentarian!