¿Fretless Conversion?

[ElRay]

I have a Schecter Revenger-7 that has been setting fallow for many months -- Fallow enough that it was slated to go in the garage sale that we never had this summer. After reading this: Classical Prog Fusion thread, I'm this -> <- close to doing a fretless conversion on it.

Any tips, suggestions, warnings etc.? General discussion for anybody else ruminating on a similar idea?

The plans so far:

• Use a strip off a sheet of G-10 Phenolic (the green, glassy kind) that I have lying around
• Put a Sustainiac Stealth Pro in the neck
• Add a piezo bridge (just for output, not to drive the Sustainer)

Questions already in the queue:

• Is there another option besides the Sustainiac?
• Keep it as a 7-string, or go for a wide-neck 6-string?
  • This guitar has already spent most of it's life as Classical-spaced 6-string, it will be easy to go back.
  • I can see the wider spacing near the nut being useful for Classical-style vibrato
  • I'm really leaning towards a 5ths-based tuning and staying with 7-strings means the low string will be very think and/or floppy.
• Stick with the G-10 or go with another material?
• What to use as a bridge pick-up?
  • I currently have:
    • The original Factory Pick-ups
    • A 7-string CrunchLab/Liquifire Pair
    • An Entwistle Nemesis AFG 6-string set
    • A Cepheus 9-String Rail set
  • I'm thinking of:
    • Something 7-String EMG
    • One of the Dual Rail Fishman Fluence
      • the Moderns, right?
      • I think the fact they're rather compressed will help here, or will it actually hurt?
    • Bareknuckle Blackhawk 7-string
    • DiMarzio X2N-7
    • Any other 7-String Dual Rail Pick-ups?
• Where can I get single flat-wounds in larger sizes?

 

[CanserDYI]

Keep the first 5 frets and make the rest fretless, I think that would be really fun to play and would still allow easy chordings for rhythm looping, then solo/lead stuff over top with the fretless 6-24th fret.

I'd also put it back to 7 strings. Have no real input on the rest as its to your taste, but excited to see this project!

 

[ElRay]

Keep the first 5 frets and make the rest fretless, I think that would be really fun to play and would still allow easy chordings for rhythm looping, then solo/lead stuff over top with the fretless 6-24th fret. ...

I don't know why this never crossed my mind. I could even fill the fret slots with white/cream binding to flatten the learning curve a smidge.

I'll have to get some wood harder/epoxy for the upper fretboard, but definitely doable.

EDIT: I also have a 27" RGA neck I could use. That will make 7-string in 5ths a bit easier.

 

[odibrom]

Keep the first 5 frets and make the rest fretless, I think that would be really fun to play and would still allow easy chordings for rhythm looping, then solo/lead stuff over top with the fretless 6-24th fret.

I'd also put it back to 7 strings. Have no real input on the rest as its to your taste, but excited to see this project!

That idea of yours has a big problem, which is the guitar's setup. In order to have it in good playing order, one would have to raise the fingerboard's surface to the frets' crown level or the fretless part will sound dull and lifeless. The fretless setup is super picky in order to work.

If you look at Steve Vai's "new" Hydra guitar, the 12 string neck - half fretted, half fretless - has the fretless part half raised to the fret's crown level. Do to this kind of hack to a factory guitar takes a HUGE amount of work that in my opinion is not worth it. I'd keep the guitar full fretless.

...

@ElRay
Regarding the guitar's transformation:
1 - I'd use it as a 7 string. String spacing at the nut isn't a problem for "in line with the strings" vibratos
2 - That phenolic would go where, over the the actual wood and work as a finger board / surface or into the frets' grooves on the wood, so to fill in the blanks?
3 - Piezo bridge is a good idea: Graphtech, LR Baggs, Fishman... other brand... I have experience with the first 2 and I generically prefer the sound of LR Baggs to Graphtech's in fretted guitars. My fretless is equipped with Graphtech hardware.
4 - The sustainer in the neck position is a must for fretless guitars, it will open up a world of expression never ever experienced before. As far as commercially available 7 string sustainers go, I believe Sustainiac is the only one out there.
5 - Bridge pickup quest. When I first converted my RG7321 to fretless, I equipped it with a set of DiMarzio DA7s. They sounded OK-ish, but at the time what did I know about it? Also, the guitar was almost unplayable due to... eeerrr... nevermind... with the added Sustainiac sustainer, I used a DiMarzio D-Sonic7 pickup, with which I recorded all of my fretless videos so far. Recently (this last month), I've changed my guitar's circuit to a more functional one (got rid of push/pull pots) and changed the bridge pickup to a DiMarzio Air Norton 7. Sounds just as good, but I must say that the crircuitry has changed a lot, pot values included. I have no experience with active pickups, and less so on fretless guitars... Personally, I'd stick with passives because I like to coil-split them and depending on the sound one is after I don't think there's a need for very high output pickups like the DiMarzios X2N or DAs ...
6 - As for strings, at the moment I'm using D'Addario's Chromes 7 string pack, that goes from .011 up to... It's on the verge of not sounding like anything should. I'd say that for the high E string to use no smaller than .012 or if possible .013. The lower strings won't be a problem,for they have enough mass to ring out well, but the treble strings do need some mass. Don't worry about string tension, one doesn't bend on fretless guitars, so go up on that strings' mass.

After removing the frets, it is appropriate to fill in their voids. My experience tells me to avise anyone to stay away from using a material with a different density than wood. This because of material expansion and contraction along the year. One WILL hear and feel the bump whenever the fingerboard's wood has contracted more than the filler. I'd use a contrasting colored wood, so to see where the fret positions were and so it will be easier to play in tune... one fingers the strings over the frets' positions in order to get the correct note and not the spaces between the frets as on fretted guitars.

My RG7321 came originally with a rosewood fingerboard, which is strong enough to play fretless. At the moment, the guitar has an ebony one (the original can be seen hanged on the closet behind me on my most recent videos) and sounds fantastic. I didn't apply any resin nor other kind of protection on both woods. I must say I'm using flatwound strings, so not to scratch the fingerboard's surface. Different tone as well.

There's a whole lot to share on this matter, so keep questions coming... @ElRay we've had a conversation about this a some time ago (1 to 2 years already...?)...

 

[bostjan]

I have a Schecter Revenger-7 that has been setting fallow for many months -- Fallow enough that it was slated to go in the garage sale that we never had this summer. After reading this: Classical Prog Fusion thread, I'm this -> <- close to doing a fretless conversion on it.

Any tips, suggestions, warnings etc.? General discussion for anybody else ruminating on a similar idea?

The plans so far:

• Use a strip off a sheet of G-10 Phenolic (the green, glassy kind) that I have lying around
• Put a Sustainiac Stealth Pro in the neck
• Add a piezo bridge (just for output, not to drive the Sustainer)

Questions already in the queue:

• Is there another option besides the Sustainiac?
• Keep it as a 7-string, or go for a wide-neck 6-string?
  • This guitar has already spent most of it's life as Classical-spaced 6-string, it will be easy to go back.
  • I can see the wider spacing near the nut being useful for Classical-style vibrato
  • I'm really leaning towards a 5ths-based tuning and staying with 7-strings means the low string will be very think and/or floppy.
• Stick with the G-10 or go with another material?
• What to use as a bridge pick-up?
  • I currently have:
    • The original Factory Pick-ups
    • A 7-string CrunchLab/Liquifire Pair
    • An Entwistle Nemesis AFG 6-string set
    • A Cepheus 9-String Rail set
  • I'm thinking of:
    • Something 7-String EMG
    • One of the Dual Rail Fishman Fluence
      • the Moderns, right?
      • I think the fact they're rather compressed will help here, or will it actually hurt?
    • Bareknuckle Blackhawk 7-string
    • DiMarzio X2N-7
    • Any other 7-String Dual Rail Pick-ups?
• Where can I get single flat-wounds in larger sizes?

I've done similar before.

What are you doing with the G-10? How thick is the workpiece? G-10 is nasty stuff to work. It cuts pretty nicely for fiberglass (not as stringy as GPO-3 or whatever the generic yellow stuff is), but the dust is just as awful as any other fiberglass material. Random fact- G-10 can hold oil, kind of like wood. It's made partially of cotton, and the cotton fibers toward the surface absorb oil. I only know this because I work in the electrical industry with a lot of different fiberglass materials, and high voltage equipment is typically filled with mineral oil. G-10 is not super hard material, but I would think it is hard enough for a fretboard. Parkers used a fiberglass composite of some sort, and they fell great, but almost everyone else uses a phenolic material instead. Theoretically, fiberglass should be a much stronger material, though.

Every fretless conversion I've ever done has had a lot of tear-out if I've pulled the frets. Maybe that's why you have the G-10, though...

Why do you want an alternative to the sustainiac? There might be an alternative, but sustainiac is very likely the only option really worth bothering with.

If you go the sustainiac route, do the X2N-7 to keep everything nice and rail-y without having to mess with two different active systems, and then you can go either 6 or 7 strings without worrying about the spacing looking weird.

It's been a long time since I've done flatwounds, but I've bought them before from JustStrings dot com. I went with the D'Addario Chromes. I just checked and they still sell them as singles, but they are a little pricey; however, I think you will run into that with decent flatwounds.

 

[CanserDYI]

That idea of yours has a big problem, which is the guitar's setup. In order to have it in good playing order, one would have to raise the fingerboard's surface to the frets' crown level or the fretless part will sound dull and lifeless. The fretless setup is super picky in order to work.

If you look at Steve Vai's "new" Hydra guitar, the 12 string neck - half fretted, half fretless - has the fretless part half raised to the fret's crown level. Do to this kind of hack to a factory guitar takes a HUGE amount of work that in my opinion is not worth it. I'd keep the guitar full fretless.

...

@ElRay
Regarding the guitar's transformation:
1 - I'd use it as a 7 string. String spacing at the nut isn't a problem for "in line with the strings" vibratos
2 - That phenolic would go where, over the the actual wood and work as a finger board / surface or into the frets' grooves on the wood, so to fill in the blanks?
3 - Piezo bridge is a good idea: Graphtech, LR Baggs, Fishman... other brand... I have experience with the first 2 and I generically prefer the sound of LR Baggs to Graphtech's in fretted guitars. My fretless is equipped with Graphtech hardware.
4 - The sustainer in the neck position is a must for fretless guitars, it will open up a world of expression never ever experienced before. As far as commercially available 7 string sustainers go, I believe Sustainiac is the only one out there.
5 - Bridge pickup quest. When I first converted my RG7321 to fretless, I equipped it with a set of DiMarzio DA7s. They sounded OK-ish, but at the time what did I know about it? Also, the guitar was almost unplayable due to... eeerrr... nevermind... with the added Sustainiac sustainer, I used a DiMarzio D-Sonic7 pickup, with which I recorded all of my fretless videos so far. Recently (this last month), I've changed my guitar's circuit to a more functional one (got rid of push/pull pots) and changed the bridge pickup to a DiMarzio Air Norton 7. Sounds just as good, but I must say that the crircuitry has changed a lot, pot values included. I have no experience with active pickups, and less so on fretless guitars... Personally, I'd stick with passives because I like to coil-split them and depending on the sound one is after I don't think there's a need for very high output pickups like the DiMarzios X2N or DAs ...
6 - As for strings, at the moment I'm using D'Addario's Chromes 7 string pack, that goes from .011 up to... It's on the verge of not sounding like anything should. I'd say that for the high E string to use no smaller than .012 or if possible .013. The lower strings won't be a problem,for they have enough mass to ring out well, but the treble strings do need some mass. Don't worry about string tension, one doesn't bend on fretless guitars, so go up on that strings' mass.

After removing the frets, it is appropriate to fill in their voids. My experience tells me to avise anyone to stay away from using a material with a different density than wood. This because of material expansion and contraction along the year. One WILL hear and feel the bump whenever the fingerboard's wood has contracted more than the filler. I'd use a contrasting colored wood, so to see where the fret positions were and so it will be easier to play in tune... one fingers the strings over the frets' positions in order to get the correct note and not the spaces between the frets as on fretted guitars.

My RG7321 came originally with a rosewood fingerboard, which is strong enough to play fretless. At the moment, the guitar has an ebony one (the original can be seen hanged on the closet behind me on my most recent videos) and sounds fantastic. I didn't apply any resin nor other kind of protection on both woods. I must say I'm using flatwound strings, so not to scratch the fingerboard's surface. Different tone as well.

There's a whole lot to share on this matter, so keep questions coming... @ElRay we've had a conversation about this a some time ago (1 to 2 years already...?)...

Good point! One I didn't think about!

 

[bostjan]

That idea of yours has a big problem, which is the guitar's setup. In order to have it in good playing order, one would have to raise the fingerboard's surface to the frets' crown level or the fretless part will sound dull and lifeless. The fretless setup is super picky in order to work.

If you look at Steve Vai's "new" Hydra guitar, the 12 string neck - half fretted, half fretless - has the fretless part half raised to the fret's crown level. Do to this kind of hack to a factory guitar takes a HUGE amount of work that in my opinion is not worth it. I'd keep the guitar full fretless.

I agree, but maybe that's the purpose of the G-10 he had mentioned. If you laminated a thin layer of it over the fretless area, it'd do the trick. None of that was explicitly stated, though, which was why I asked.

2 - That phenolic would go where, over the the actual wood and work as a finger board / surface or into the frets' grooves on the wood, so to fill in the blanks?

Filling in the old slots with G-10 might look cool if done very well, but I would think it might end up looking goofy or feeling weird if it wasn't done quite painstakingly.

After removing the frets, it is appropriate to fill in their voids. My experience tells me to avise anyone to stay away from using a material with a different density than wood. This because of material expansion and contraction along the year. One WILL hear and feel the bump whenever the fingerboard's wood has contracted more than the filler. I'd use a contrasting colored wood, so to see where the fret positions were and so it will be easier to play in tune... one fingers the strings over the frets' positions in order to get the correct note and not the spaces between the frets as on fretted guitars.

Trouble here is that different woods have different densities and different expansion coefficients with temperature and humidity from each other. G-10 likely has a much smaller expansion due to humidity, but the thermal expansion won't be large as it would be with metal (I think the examples where I've seen problems have always been wood+metal), and is actually quite similar to a sort of average species of wood. IMO, the biggest issue is the nasty fiberglass dust you get from working the material. It stinks, after you cut it, you stink, and it irritates your skin, which is pretty much unaviodable, even with full body protection, since you eventually have to clean up your PPE and clothing...

 

[Gtan7]

I have a fretless strat, the slots were filled with some sheet maple the same thickness as fret tangs, 5 wound strings play pretty well. Can't see the filler, all my fretless instruments have no lines, cello, violins, bass, well, ok the pedal steel has lines...

Berklee prof Fiuczynski : https://web.archive.org/web/20120403113533/http://www.screamingheadlesstorsos.com/Website/gear.html

​

 

[Winspear]

Daddario Chromes go up to 80

 

[ElRay]

Wow! Much more response than I expected. Comments in roughly chronological order:

• I had totally forgotten about the fretless conversion idea. Raising Teens Life gets in the way. One is in college now, so I have a bit more free time than before.
• The G-10 came into the picture because I was thinking of the smoothest, flattest, abrasion resistant material I had. The intent way to pull the frets, sand away what radius remains, and then laminate the G-10over what remains of the fretboard. It's been I while since I've looked at that piece, so it might actually be fret-board-thick, in which case I'd remove the fretboard and replace it with the G-10 fingerboard. I've never seen a fretless in person, but a lot of the videos seem to have no/infinite radius fingerboards.I also have some "X" (black paper, aka Mircata) phenolic around, but it might not be long enough
• The issue with what ever slot-filler I use affecting the fell/being audible was a concern, that's part of the reason behind getting rid of the residual slots and laminating something harder, flatter, smoother on top. That said, the training wheels aspect of slots filled with light wood is appealing.
• If I stick with original fretboard, I would likely fill the frets lots with strips of hard maple. I also have some left-over walnut I could use.
• I have no bones about the Sustainiac, I just didn't know if there even were any options.
• I forgot the plain strings needed to be thicker than typical. That will likely change the tuning/scale-length ideas.I prefer to play with thicker strings, so that's actually a plus.

 

[Lemonbaby]

Wow! Much more response than I expected. Comments in roughly chronological order:

• The issue with what ever slot-filler I use affecting the fell/being audible was a concern, that's part of the reason behind getting rid of the residual slots and laminating something harder, flatter, smoother on top. That said, the training wheels aspect of slots filled with light wood is appealing.
• If I stick with original fretboard, I would likely fill the frets lots with strips of hard maple. I also have some left-over walnut I could use.

I've tested something similar with a red veneer in an ebony fretboard. The veneers usually come in 0.6mm thickness which was a perfect fit for the slot.

 

[odibrom]

(...)

Trouble here is that different woods have different densities and different expansion coefficients with temperature and humidity from each other.

(...)

Different woods will have different compression / expansion coeficients, but will be similar than some plastic to wood, hence me saying that. My fretless guitar have had several moments, the initial was my (wrong) doing, I removed the frets (didn't even have a radius block to sand the neck) and filled the blanks with.... PAINT!, yeat, paint. this was about 13+ years ago... it didn't feel right, and the neck's surface was super irregular. A few years later I contacted a local luthier and asked him to correct the fretboard, which he did. He cleaned the fret slots and asked me what to fill them with... I stupidly said "something metal since there were frets before in those grooves". The job done was average at best, the board really got to be even, but those metal inserts did stick out enough to be noticeable... so I got myself a radius block and did level those out a bit more. It worked, but with the weather changes it felt like it needed too much care for the use the guitar had. Fast forward to 2019, I contacted another luthier studio with whom I've already had a good experience with my acoustic guitar and asked them to remove those metal inserts and to fill the fret slots with color contrasting wood veneers (original fretboard was rosewood). They asked me if I wouldn't want to replace the fingerboard entirely, which they did because the price difference wasn't that significant. The guitar now has an ebony board. I asked for fret marks only at the edges of the fingerboard on top and bottom and like that the guitar has been since. Plays super smoothly now.

I have a fretless strat, the slots were filled with some sheet maple the same thickness as fret tangs, 5 wound strings play pretty well. Can't see the filler, all my fretless instruments have no lines, cello, violins, bass, well, ok the pedal steel has lines...

Berklee prof Fiuczynski : https://web.archive.org/web/20120403113533/http://www.screamingheadlesstorsos.com/Website/gear.html

​

Hey, don't you actually have link for an up to date website?

... fret lines are like the training wheels on a kid's bike... coming from classical education on cellos and violins you won't have any trouble with fingering a fretless guitar...

Daddario Chromes go up to 80

... and then some... bass strings!... yeah, also suitable to use if need.

Nevertheless, since one doesn't bend on fretless guitars, specially those with wood fingerboard, string tension is no longer a problem. I'd say the more the better, it will mean thicker strings with more mass. Again, on the wound strings there is no problem of mass, but on plain strings... one does need mass, so don't be afraid to go up. I've used .013 before swapping the fingerboard on the E4 string at 25.5" scale length and with Ibanez super thin necks... The MIK Ibanez RG7321 did have thin necks! It holds great it the obvious and accordingly truss rod adjustment. So this to say that a fretless guitar will need a different balance in tension from bass to treble strings than on fretted guitars.

Regarding on the "where to buy strings", I found that I can order individual strings at local shops. It may take more or less time depending on where one is in the planet, but this way I managed to order exactly what I wanted. For the moment I'm using a .011 7 string Chromes set from D'Addario, but I already have in stock with me about 5 sets of .013 6 string packs with an added 7th string single. The gauges I'll use when the installed set gets rotten are .013P .017P .026W .035W .045W .056W + .065W (P=plain, W=wound). The .013 set is the ECG26 and the added 7th string is the CG065... all tuned to standard pitch B1 to E4.

.............

@ElRay

I'm not that confident on removing fingerboards and replacing them with something else, personally, I'd avoid de-gluing the fingerboard by my own, but if you feel confident, go ahead...? I'm also not familiar with the G-10 stuff so I can not advise you about its pros and cons against wood as a fingerboard.

There are several possible approaches on the fretless board surface. I've seen metal (Vigier Surfreter and Aristides), GLASS / mirror, bare wood, wood with a layer of resin, fiberglass and some man made materials. Their tones will be all different with the metal surfaces to be the brighter ones. The surface material will also dictate the strings choice, in metal surfaces one can use regular roundwound strings, on bare wood ones, Ill advise against. This will also change substantially the feel and tone of the guitar, like night and day. My experience relies on the bare wood board with flatwound strings - D'Addario's Chromes.

...

Regarding the use of the Sustainiac and Piezos, it works well, but the piezos can't feed the sustainer, at least the way I have things wired. My onboard signal flow goes something like this: jack to Graphtech's Ghost preamp, which masters if the guitar is outputting mag/mix/piezo tones. When there's mag signal, then it travels into the Sustainiac realm. I can have infinite sustain in the mix mode (mags+piezos) and if I use an Y cable, I can then rout the piezos and mags to different processing and eventually isolate the mags and have the piezos sustaining indefinitely... which is something I never done... yet.

The Sustainiac has some internal trim pots that do need to be tweaked in order to level out unwanted noise and squeals, it's a compromise specially in the harmonic mode gain, but works and will work even better with thicker strings. Yeah, the more mass the strings have, the better the sustainer works.

.............

@Lemonbaby are there more pics and info of said experiment?

.............

A friend of mine has recently defretted a 30" baritone Schecter 6 string guitar, the luthier applied resin over the fingerboard, the guitar is tuned from E1 to E4 all with wound strings. We've jammed together about 2 weeks ago at his place with both our fretless, you know, for the comparison, the giggles and shit. Completely different beasts, either in tone, feel and play. Moving from the 30" to my 25.5" felt like moving to a toy... a functional and fun toy, that is. Obviously the electronics and string set/brand of these are totally different, but the scale length, tuning and string gauge were the obvious remarks.

 

[Lemonbaby]

@Lemonbaby are there more pics and info of said experiment?

Unfortunately not. I just did that little test on a fret that's anyway going to be cut off in a (fretted) bass build. Haven't yet had time to follow up on the fretless bass build I've been planning to do since last year. I just used a bigger piece of veneer, filled the slot with superglue and squeezed it in. Cut off the overhang the following day with a sharp knife and sanded it flat.

 

[bostjan]

Different woods will have different compression / expansion coeficients, but will be similar than some plastic to wood, hence me saying that. My fretless guitar have had several moments, the initial was my (wrong) doing, I removed the frets (didn't even have a radius block to sand the neck) and filled the blanks with.... PAINT!, yeat, paint. this was about 13+ years ago... it didn't feel right, and the neck's surface was super irregular. A few years later I contacted a local luthier and asked him to correct the fretboard, which he did. He cleaned the fret slots and asked me what to fill them with... I stupidly said "something metal since there were frets before in those grooves". The job done was average at best, the board really got to be even, but those metal inserts did stick out enough to be noticeable... so I got myself a radius block and did level those out a bit more. It worked, but with the weather changes it felt like it needed too much care for the use the guitar had. Fast forward to 2019, I contacted another luthier studio with whom I've already had a good experience with my acoustic guitar and asked them to remove those metal inserts and to fill the fret slots with color contrasting wood veneers (original fretboard was rosewood). They asked me if I wouldn't want to replace the fingerboard entirely, which they did because the price difference wasn't that significant. The guitar now has an ebony board. I asked for fret marks only at the edges of the fingerboard on top and bottom and like that the guitar has been since. Plays super smoothly now.

G-10 has a linear coefficient of thermal expansion of 9 ppm/°C, so it's sitting right in the range of most hardwoods (10 ± ~4). Compare with fretwire at over 18 ppm/°C or stainless at 12-13 ppm/°C. There are certainly some hardwoods that have more extreme differences in thermal expansion than between G-10 and, say maple. Hell, even the differences between different cuts from the same tree or slightly different grain orientations are greater than the 1 ppm difference between G-10 and hard maple along the grain. Some plastics, like ABS have super high expansion coefficients, but others have super low ones; it's really because "plastic" is such a big umbrella of materials. G-10 is technically electrical grade fiber reinforced plastic, but I think most lay people would call it "fiberglass," but even at that, it's maybe too interesting of a material to lump it in with structural FRP or whatever.

Based on it's thermal and hygroscopic properties, it's almost an ideal sort of wood substitute for a lot of applications. But, on a guitar, I guess no combination of any different materials is ever going to be idea in the long enough term. I haven't tried it out because I'm a little apprehensive about how it might wear over time, but I honestly considered it pretty seriously.

 

[ElRay]

I've tested something similar with a red veneer in an ebony fretboard. The veneers usually come in 0.6mm thickness which was a perfect fit for the slot.

That would actually be sharp, especially w/ black hardware and the dome knobs with a little red dot.

 

[ElRay]

... fret lines are like the training wheels on a kid's bike... coming from classical education on cellos and violins you won't have any trouble with fingering a fretless guitar...

Kids grew-up with Suzuki Lessons. We're used to seeing thin strips of pin-striping, smiley-face stickers, etc. on fingerboards.

 

[ElRay]

... Regarding the use of the Sustainiac and Piezos, it works well, but the piezos can't feed the sustainer, at least the way I have things wired. My onboard signal flow goes something like this: jack to Graphtech's Ghost preamp, which masters if the guitar is outputting mag/mix/piezo tones. When there's mag signal, then it travels into the Sustainiac realm. I can have infinite sustain in the mix mode (mags+piezos) and if I use an Y cable, I can then rout the piezos and mags to different processing and eventually isolate the mags and have the piezos sustaining indefinitely... which is something I never done... yet. ...

Tracking on the limitations on the piezo. The intent is purely sound-out and to have the option of mixing Mag & Piezo. My "rig" is already stereo-clean. I'm progressing to all my guitars being stereo-out - whether Mag/Piezo or Stereo-Mag. I'm really wanting to eventually get to separate bass/treble outputs.

 

[ElRay]

New question:

• What about intonation?
  • Looking at fretless set-up videos, there's a number that say to adjust intonation to make certain intervals playable. I understand changing the scale length to move the contact point towards/away from the nut so you can get your fingers in the correct spot, but is it a trial and error process?

 

[odibrom]

New question:

• What about intonation?
  • Looking at fretless set-up videos, there's a number that say to adjust intonation to make certain intervals playable. I understand changing the scale length to move the contact point towards/away from the nut so you can get your fingers in the correct spot, but is it a trial and error process?

I have my guitar's intonation so when I finger over the fret marks the note that comes out is about right. However, the fretless guitar is an instrument with which you can have a completely off intonation setup and still play in tune... because one tunes with the finger fingering the strings*. The fretless guitar doesn't even need intonation, it can work perfectly with one single saddle and uncompensated like many classical / nylon string guitars.

There is obviously a lot of trial and error in the learning curve here, there's the adaptation to the fingering over the fret marks versus the previous space between the frets, a higher string tension, eventually the string type / touch, the new tones and sounds.

In my experience, it's easier to play in tune in fast runs than with fretted guitars. Fast notes don't stick out much, so the "in the ball park" works pretty well, considering one is fingering within 90% to 100% accuracy over the fingerboard's scale / tonality map. With fretted guitars one either hit the correct note or doesn't, with fretless one can be about 90% there, and we'll still hear the note as ok-ish, as long as it's a fast run. Long notes do need fingering accuracy and more than on fretted instruments.

So, again, intonation on fretless is something that comes with the player's experience. The guitar itself is more of a SOLO instrument, it really shines with single note phrasing. Chords are possible, but one should make use of open strings if more than 4 notes (one per finger) are to be played. Chords are also quite demanding on fingering accuracy, more so on low fret positions where there's more "resolution" in the fingering** distance to cover between fingering positions. Playing at higher fret marks is quite demanding, 5mm could mean a completely wrong note, while at lower fret marks it will be "in the ball park".

It is therefore advised to keep the intonation stable (as not constantly changing something here and there) for the same string set, so our muscular memory gets to kick in and our ear gets used to it as well.

My advise would be to set up the fretless guitar as a regular fretted guitar regarding the intonation. Regarding action, it should be pretty damn low, specially at the nut and the neck should have almost no forward bow. lower pitch strings should rattle just just enough to get action low but not enough to loose pitch, sustain or tone. One has to start somewhere and then adjusts onto one's needs and feel.

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* which is also the reason not to use an Evertune bridge with fretless guitars
** the resolution concept relates to the finger movement along the string. A 2mm finger movement has bigger difference at higher fret positions than at lower fret positions. In other words, the travel between a 1/2 note is bigger in lower fret positions than on higher fret positions. This means it's a lot easier to play "in tune" single notes at lower fret positions, but more demanding in chording (unless arpegiated).