Wooden frets?

Unless you intend on doing a fret job every night or using wooden strings, I don't think it would work.

well there none tougher than ligium vitate, ironwood runs in a good second, don't think it will do it though,if you used it end grain up it might cut it, they did use it on steam ships as thrust blocks on the prop, and on clocks as cogs as it is self lubricating. might be fun trying.make sure you got some very sharp tools and a good waterstone to keep them that way, because as far as I've been told a piece of 4x4 ligium will blunt a new saw before it gets through it.

Dragonlord said:

You know, to get a fretless tone while keeping the frets... don't go too hard on me

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OK, I'll try to be nice.
I don't think the 'fretless sound' is so much from the absence of frets but more because of the closeness of the vibrating string to the fingerboard, which you would lose w/a fret of any material. But a very hard wooden fret combined w/a softer(nylon tape wound for instance)string might produce some very intersting results. I say try it.

bassteban said:

OK, I'll try to be nice.
I don't think the 'fretless sound' is so much from the absence of frets but more because of the closeness of the vibrating string to the fingerboard, which you would lose w/a fret of any material.

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Exactly. Without the string scrubbing/bouncing against the area of fingerboard just ahead of your finger, it won't sound fretless. Just like an actual fretless with the action too high. No mwah.

put gut strings on with a piezo or lightwave pu? dunno, most wood will give under pressure, like if press your thunbnail onto just about any wood youll leave a mark, strings will do the same

bassteban said:

OK, I'll try to be nice.
I don't think the 'fretless sound' is so much from the absence of frets but more because of the closeness of the vibrating string to the fingerboard, which you would lose w/a fret of any material. But a very hard wooden fret combined w/a softer(nylon tape wound for instance)string might produce some very intersting results. I say try it.

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bingo, the fretless sound comes from the string vibrating against the fingerboard.

I agree that it's something worth a try, just don't do it expecting a fretless or double bass sound. woody != fretless.

If you want a fretless tone with frets, consider having your frets filed down very low. This is how Jeff Berlin's bass is set up. He has regular wide frets, but has them leveled really low. I mean really low.

This has the effect of allowing the lowest action I ever felt on a bass, and you get that nice fretless growl because the strings buzz on the frets, as they would on the fingerboard. I was so impressed with the action on his bass that I went home that day and leveled my frets a lot lower. Not as low as his, but pretty low. I wont play high frets anymore.

Me'shell Ndegéocello also plays a Jazz Bass with the frets ground down, and on the recordings she used it on, it sounds like a fretless.

The height of the fret has no effect on the action since that is the distance between the string and the fret top. Any bass with low action can give you fret buzz regardless of the fret height. And Jeff's tone is not fret buzzing.

A finger board the strings don't touch doesn't add fretless tone no matter how close you get without touching it, if you don't touch it it doesn't do nothing. Simple science.

Thank you, Penguin.

The action of a fretted bass is a function of the collective distances from the string to the fret crowns, at the various points along the string. The distance from the fret crowns on down to the fingerboard surface is not part of that. Heck, a sitar doesn't even have a fingerboard immediately below the frets; they hang in space. Not to mention the Gittler guitar and bass.

It can be argued that the height of the fret affects the distance of metal any vibrations go through before they get to the fingerboard wood, and that this affects the tone. But any effect here would be minor, nothing like "makes it sound fretless." The operation of a string on a fretless is too different from the action of a string on a fretted for that. Heck, the absence/presence of glue to hold the fret, and the type used, could have at least as much effect as the height of the fret in this regard.

And while on that subject, how does a sitar get its buzzy tone, which is basically the same as the mwah of a low-action fretless bass? It's not due to the frets, it is due to the bridge-- which, rather than having a sharp saddle, has a surface just ahead of the witness point, which the string rubs against/reflects off of while vibrating. Just like the area just ahead of your finger on a fretless, and just like the surface introduced on the Neuser-ABM convertible "fretless sound" bridge.

I would think that commissioning a machine shop to machine out a lignum vitae fingerboard, leaving wood where the frets should be seems much easier. I think it could work. Milling out that material and leaving a good finish (as well as not ruining the frets) should be easy for an experienced machinist, and probably not take very long.

The Penguin said:

The height of the fret has no effect on the action since that is the distance between the string and the fret top. Any bass with low action can give you fret buzz regardless of the fret height. And Jeff's tone is not fret buzzing.

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Yeah, I said the same thing. But seeing and playing is believing. Everyone who picked up Jeff's bass said "wow!" It was so freaking low! I talked to jeff about it, and he says he likes low wide frets. So as I said, I went home and leveled my frets lower. Not as low as his.. they are barely bumps. This is on a bass I built, so I know it was set up well. I was able to get my action lower than with the frets higher. I think the other thing is it feels better because you aren't running into the fret crows as well. Also you need a dead straight neck... no relief at all.

The Penguin said:

A finger board the strings don't touch doesn't add fretless tone no matter how close you get without touching it, if you don't touch it it doesn't do nothing. Simple science.

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Listen to Jeff Berlin. Sounds like a fretless doesn't it? It's not just the tone and chorus pedal... I heard the bass in person. When you pluck a note it swells. If the string buzzes on a series on frets ahead of where it was fretted, it will have a very similar sound as a fretless. Not exactly the same, but close enough. Listen to Meshell too. She talked about how her bass sounds like a fretless because someone ground the frets low in a BP interview. Very wide flat frets buzz.

One reason why low frets would do this is the break angle over the fret is lower... there's not a big drop between the crown and the fretboard. If they are low enough you will get some contact on the wider fret spaces.



I would have sweared up and down that it didn't matter. Then I tried it for myself on a bass I know well. Just give it a try.

Well, if you are filing the frets down, and not re-crowning them, but rather are leaving a flat surface, then you are leaving some "scrub surface" just ahead of the witness point (which will be located on the finger-side edge of the fret). So, you actually could get some fretless sound that way.

But that is not the same thing as "low frets sound somewhat fretless." What it really is, is "flat frets, regardless of height, sound somewhat fretless." And in order to get the desired wide flat area, one has to chew through most of the height of most frets to get to the wide bottom, to get that width to work with.

BTW, David, I'm not questioning your experiences in any way; just trying to reason out the actual mechanism behind the outcome.

Also, minor point, the "bridge" on a sitar is not actually flat, it's a fairly wide-radius curve, sort of like stretching a string over a barrel. So it may be possible to get the buzz effect with wide frets that are not quite flat, but rather slightly crowned (and I imagine you can't get much crown if your frets are filed down extremely close to the fretboard).

DavidRavenMoon said:

Listen to Jeff Berlin. Sounds like a fretless doesn't it? It's not just the tone and chorus pedal... I heard the bass in person. When you pluck a note it swells. If the string buzzes on a series on frets ahead of where it was fretted, it will have a very similar sound as a fretless. Not exactly the same, but close enough. Listen to Meshell too. She talked about how her bass sounds like a fretless because someone ground the frets low in a BP interview. Very wide flat frets buzz.

One reason why low frets would do this is the break angle over the fret is lower... there's not a big drop between the crown and the fretboard. If they are low enough you will get some contact on the wider fret spaces.



I would have sweared up and down that it didn't matter. Then I tried it for myself on a bass I know well. Just give it a try.

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I've played Jeff's p bass with the Fender neck and the Tobias neck, he's played my bass, we've talked a bunch about his "fretless" tone over the more than 20 years I've known him. I still don't hear any buzzing in his playing and this stuff about low frets let you set up your neck with no relief and with lower action is just nonsense. Lower frets don't mean your strings stop vibrating in a curve. If a string buzzes on the next fret that doesn't sound anything like buzzing in the fraction of an inch just in front of your finger on a fretless.

Jeff plays with a narrow focused tone and a rubbery style, that can be confused for fretless tone. But fret buzz doesn't sound like fretless it sounds like fret buzz.

The Penguin said:

I've played Jeff's p bass with the Fender neck and the Tobias neck, he's played my bass, we've talked a bunch about his "fretless" tone over the more than 20 years I've known him.

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I was talking about his Dean bass... the one he currently plays. He doesn't even have the the Blond anymore... it was stolen.

Mike: Can you talk about the new Dean "Jeff Berlin Bass?"

Jeff: There is nothing innovative about it, except that it plays great. Low action, custom built Bartolini Pick-Ups that you cannot find on any other instrument in the world, Badass Bass Bridge. All of these elements are on every Standard and Exotic wood bass produced by Dean with my name on it. They are the best playing basses I ever played. I always alter any bass I own just a little to make them more the way that I like to play. I always lower the frets a little and raise the pick-ups as well. That's about it. Anyone who buys a Jeff Berlin Model Standard or Exotic Wood instrument will have exactly what I own. I only play stock instruments, because it wouldn't be honest to own my own fixed up guitar while I hawked an instrument that I didn't play.

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lee sklar does the same thing, he has his basses setup with mandolin fretwire, and then has the frets filed down really low, and that gives him a real woodsy sound, but keeps more definition than a fretless.

DavidRavenMoon said:

I was talking about his Dean bass... the one he currently plays. He doesn't even have the the Blond anymore... it was stolen.

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Your quote clearly says he lowers the frets a little, not so low it seems fretless. Big difference, some of the same words.

The Penguin said:

Your quote clearly says he lowers the frets a little, not so low it seems fretless. Big difference, some of the same words.

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He said "a little" in that interview, but I played his Dean bass, and they were very low, like an old Les Paul Custom. I have standard jumbo frets on my bass, and his were at least half as high as mine. He said to me "I like them low and wide".

His Dean had the lowest action on any bass I have ever played. He had pretty light gauge strings too... seemed lighter than 40-60-80-100, but they probably were those gauges. Just about every note on the bass had the same amount of fret buzz. It has a thin and narrow neck too.

Just an idea, not sure if it would work.


What would happen if you mixed sawdust of same type as the wood being used with an expoxy of some sort and poured it into a fret template?

Surely the epoxy would at least add some strength and the sawdust the colour.

Obviously it would be a lot more prone to wear, but its just an idea.