Best tool for removing frets?

[JLS]

Wow..never thought about that. Did you knock the frets loose first?

That's been my fret removal tool for several decades, a large toenail clipper, slightly reground. I have a cheap 1/4" chisel, reground to a round edge, that I tap under each fret end on the bass side, to lift it just a hair, then walk across with the tool, after hitting the fret with a soldering iron.

I've never found any tool that works better than this.

 

[walterw]

I have a cheap 1/4" chisel, reground to a round edge, that I tap under each fret end on the bass side, to lift it just a hair...

call the cops, 'cause i'm stealing that idea!

as for the end nippers themselves, i have a couple that are really no larger than large toenail clippers anyway, and that's what i use.

big +1 on heating the frets first.

 

[JLS]

call the cops, 'cause i'm stealing that idea!

as for the end nippers themselves, i have a couple that are really no larger than large toenail clippers anyway, and that's what i use.

big +1 on heating the frets first.

Thank Paul Dwyer, who came up with that idea when we were working at ST. Louis Music Supply, in 1976!