Non-standard temperament conundrum

[Rob Taylor]

I’m building a six string "classical" guitar with a variable temperament neck.  No frets will be continuous.

 

How do I cut the frets?

[Tim Mace]

It was obvious from the gitgo this was more curiosity than actually answering the question.Seems almost like you'd have to finish the fret before you installed it.I for one would not want to cut several pcs. to = 1 fret position.Are you doing this in order to have a perfectly alligned saddle? Howard answered most of your question but looks like we got more questions than you do! Show us wtf you're doin' to that instermint!!

[Rob Taylor]

No.  That's exactly the question.  Many of the frets will be the width of a single string.  How do I cut a fret slot in the middle of the finger board?  The solutions I've come up with include building a Dremel jig or talk to a friend with a CNC machine.

[Scot Tremblay]

Hey Rod, here is an article that you might find interesting...http://www.microstick.net/schneider.html

It doesn't really answer you question but might give you some leads to people that might be able to.

 

One solution that I've seen that seemed to work quite well, was to have the frets slide in slots under each string the length of the fingerboard. The frets were tiny + shaped pieces that were held in place by fiction.With this method one moves the fret rather than have removeable fingerboards as shown in the article. I certainly wouldn't say it was a perfect solution but it did work for the guy that owned the instrument.

 

As there are a bunch of temperments you can use and experiment with it seems logical to do it this way albeit a serious undertaking. here's a link to the LSA fret placement download which gives one the different temperment measurements http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~lsa/download/index.html

It's part way down the page under "Fret Placement Spreadsheet". Please forgive me if you are aware of this info but I thought I'd put it out there for others that might not.

 

Good luck, I look forward to seeing your solution when finished.

 

 

 

[Rob Taylor]

Thanks Scott for excellent information and resources.

We've already done the math on this "art" project.

I'll send you the results when we're finished.  Meanwhile, I'll be cutting little tiny fret slots with my Dremel.

rt

[Rob Taylor]

[charley erck]

Rob, could you explain how this guitar can play in tune?

[Pierre-Antoine Roiron]

Nice neck! How did you do eventually?

[Paul Hostetter]

Another possibility:

 

These frets are case, the slots routed.

[Paul Hostetter]

I meant: the frets are cast. Sorry!

[Ned Knepp]

Paul,  

How did you determine their shape and what metal did you use for the casting?

[Mike Kolb]

The wall-hanging artwork above the stairs looks suspiciously similar to the pattern of the frets:)  

Seriously, were the frets designed as string compensation (like something akin to a Feiten system) or were you going for an alternate tuning?  In any case, it looks like a lot of work and it turned-out nicely.