Fretted vs Fretless Setup

Most fretless basses come "out of the box" with the nut action WAY too high. If you have appropriate files you will be much happier with your instrument if you file the nut slots down (or have the store do it) so that the strings are no more than 0.025 inches from the fingerboard. I like it lower than that.

Strings? If you can afford them you should try TI Jazz Flats. A bit pricy but they last a long time.

 

The clearance is zero when you're fingering a note, why should it be any different at the nut? Theoretically you should be able to take it down to nothing. I use a business card which is actually about 0.015.

 

I can only imagine what it would be like playing a bass with a quarter of an inch action at the nut

 

If you have a set of needle files you might be able to do it. Or you can buy nut slotting files. Stewmac has them.

 

The really great thing about fretless is that there is no buzzing (as there are no frets). For this reason I have mine setup really low.

I have the intonation set-up so that when my finger is right on the fretline marker, I am in pitch.

If you use rounds, there will be fretboard wear.

I was going to do the epoxy thingy. Crazy glue seems like the resin of choice these days. (There are many posts on this topic in TalkBass.)

My fretless came with flatwounds and I wanted to use them (to get my money's worth out of them). I switched to roundwounds but went back to flats as I prefered the sound of them, particulary in the upper register. Also, I have roundwounds on my fretted bass so I wanted to go with a countrasting sound.

 

The amplitude of vibration at the nut is, well, zero. The amplitude of vibration at, say, where the first fret would be is almost zero. So you hardly need any clearance at all.

 

At the point where the string is touching the fingerboard it isn't really moving. The further the string is from your finger, the more it vibrates, but it's also further from the fingerboard. You actually get more of a damping effect from your finger than from the fingerboard.

(oh, looks like AG beat me to it...)

 

BTW, as to why they come with nuts that arent filed low enough, is I believe most manufacturer's pre-make all their nuts, then attach them during final assembly. Rather than have a pile of fretless nuts and fretted ones, they use the same on them all, which makes the fretless ones too high. Id get the set of nut files from Stew Mac and trim them down as well. I did so on my Ibanez when I de-fretted it. Played and sounded bad before I did it, played great and had lots more mwah afterwords, which I think is what most people look for in a fretless.

As for rounds, Id say it would depend on your board. If the board is ebony, it will wear less than say rosewood. Also, check the thickness of the board. If its very thin, you may want to stick to flats. If its thick, Id use rounds, and get a resurface done every few years or so depending on how hard you play. And just keep in mind what wears the board out and use a light touch as much as possible like the above poster said.