Re-fretting Tutorial | A very well Loved 1972 Gibson SG

[@rauschguitars]

By now we've all learnt from Ben, but it's super valuable to have Josh explain his process. Even though it's basically the same, he explains it differently which makes some parts clearer. Well done Team Crimson!

[@realcdnthreetles]

Something I’ve learned as a teacher is to try and understand how people learn differently. Being able to articulate different perspectives of the same concept is invaluable, since not everyone thinks like me. Love this tutorial!

[@wayneclemons1289]

What I love about Crimson videos is not only are they fun to watch, but they are so educational. I've learned so much from you guys. Everyone is so talented.

[@crystaloffrost]

This is the best explaining refret video I watched so far.

[@adamdutton9922]

I basically watch this channel in the same way I watch The Repair Shop. Maybe bring the owners in to cry when you’ve finished and it would hit all the buttons for me,

[@CrimsonCustomGuitars]

This customer genuinely loved the work Josh did so much that he phoned a few days later to tell us, again! Really good when that happens

[@martinclayton7260]

I've had two of my guitars refretted at Crimson, they did an excellent job. I had stainless steel frets fitted on both my Strat, and Tele.

[@philmazzie3674]

This guy is awesome. More videos with him

[@joshuastopford]

☺

[@gerrykavanagh]

Thanks Josh... lots of helpful little details others leave out.

[@AnimalJohn85]

So glad you went through the fret ends again, even after you explained it in detail n showed me in brum this fool here still forgot. Awesome and most instructional as ever!

[@stu-j]

I've been putting off re fretting my Gibson SG junior p90 for about a year and this video has given me the kick up the arse to actually do the job! ( my stuff always gets left till last ) I'm considering using Hosco stainless steel medium jumbo just so I never have to do the job again ( I re fretted it 10 years ago with jescar wire )

[@joshuastopford]

Thats great to hear! Good luck

[@stu-j]

@josh stopford great video and definitely easier without the fret nibs as most Gibson people want to keep the nibs and it just takes ages to remove the binding without massive damage to the finish then it takes 4x as long doing nibs and the finish work to hide the scaring.

[@MrSongwriter2]

@@stu-j you should see the level of work people do when they leave nibs intact and refret and cut the frets to fit exactly inside the old binding. It’s insane like 10’000 of an inch off is exactly perfect for your top E to get stuck between the binding and fret. My Dad was an old school carpenter and they were taught to have a 10’000 of an inch tolerance but this requires even tighter tolerances.

[@aipsong]

Don't fret!!! You have earned the coveted WWW award - Well explained, Well filmed, and Well done!!! Thanks for the video!!!

[@joshuastopford]

You're too kind! Thank you and really glad you found it useful

[@aipsong]

@@joshuastopford I built my guitar at Crimson about 5 years ago in a 6 day course. I play it every day, and continue to learn about guitars through the Crimson videos. As simple as they seem to be, guitars are the 8th Wonder of the World!!!

[@bullasbullas]

Great tutorial!

[@robertiboy7315]

Great video, I agree with some others that the audio was too low. And that story about the singer and the spit was hilarious 😂.

[@sporadicamnesic]

13:58 that is a really nice fretboard! Really like the pattern that came through once it had some cleaner put on it. ANd you should have turned the camera to show Sophia's reaction when you told the microphone story! 🤣

[@worldwyn]

Great fun watching this refret. You mentioned early on that this SG has a non-original Bigsby. Curious if you can see that from the way it is situated. Not commonly known, SG’s produced around ‘71, ‘72 were some of the only that came from the factory with Bigsby’s. I bought one new in Denver, Colorado in ‘72 or ‘73 with the Bigsby tailpiece which I played in my band until I sold it in 1975. Funny that I had always thought Bigsby’s were common on SG’s as I knew this guitar inside and out but it was the only one I was exposed to. I only researched the history of early ’70’s SG’s a year ago and was surprised to find how short a time they were available with the Bigsby. Your customer’s SG may very well be a rare bird! Fantastic guitar for me and a magical time for rock music!

[@individualmember]

I have a 1970s Les Paul that desperately needs that doing. Plus a body repair and refinish. I’d love to bring it down to you to discuss it sometime.

[@jakegarber2758]

You guys always seem to post a video relevant to the exact thing i'm doing at the time.

[@beerandasongguy]

Very entertaining and relaxing. Nice production. You did a great job again!

[@jasoncockwell8077]

Great Video Josh and great work, Nice Guitar for a 72, I was born in 72 and the guitar is like me, it has some issues but it's still sounds great any it plays well!. Visiting next week ,really looking forward to seeing and playing a few nice guitars and hopefully meeting a couple of the staff..

[@joshuastopford]

Well I look forward to meeting you man!

[@JoeThornhill]

27:00 "My name is Josh, and I am the *FASTEST* man alive... I am, THE SANDER!

[@markchristopher4165]

So great, thank you!

[@JohnVieto]

Class video Josh. What are those things elevating the body? Never seen that before.

[@VAXHeadroom]

Great job, and great video, but the audio levels were kind of low - the ads are MUCH louder, audio could have used a bit of a final polish too :)

[@adampatterson9650]

70s sg guitars are so different with their volutes and pickguards, I would love to see a teardown of the electronics and an inspection of that previous repair that would be interesting. Great job on the refret josh I like your attention to detail. Do you ever get fed up doing level, crown and polishes?

[@joshuastopford]

Thank man. No I don't to be honest. I love knowing that the guitar's going to play better. That gets me through!

[@elecengineer46]

Is there a reason that Josh used a leveling beam to sand the fingerboard and not a radius block?

[@martonvalcz5492]

Great video! What are those little body supports?

[@andsoistopped]

Hey Josh.

[@revivalmusic8063]

Does your left pinky finger hurt?😅 But seriously, this is the best video I have seen for a whole refret or even just a level, recrown, and polish.

[@ChrisHopkinsBass]

Am I the only person who wishes that those specialized nippers were called the "Fret Tang-Go"

[@TomLeg]

If you have a long sanding block, it is always sanding the middle section of the neck, but only 50% of the time is it sanding the head end, and 50% of the time the pickup end. So the extreme frets will be sanded less than the mid-neck ones. If you used a very short block, it would be sanding all regions much more equally. But the long block eliminates differences better than short one does. Something in between, perhaps?

[@MrDblStop]

Also I would tend to put some 'fall away' in the upper frets, particularly on 7.25" radius boards, which would counter that tendency to take more from the middle. It keeps upper fret string bends cleaner on tighter radiuses.

[@aaax9410]

Please consider the audio level before upload -18 db it's so quiet , thanx for the vid tho :)

[@vmann-jd5yw]

Anyone remember when this channel was all about a cool dude who built unusual guitars? #losttheplot

[@holdenm9361]

What kind of frets did you use? I need to re-fret my epiphone sg and I’m unsure of what frets to use. Their website says the guitar uses medium jumbo frets. I see online that fender sells medium jumbos but Gibson doesn’t appear to. Can I use any style of medium jumbo frets to re-fret an epiphone sg?

[@MrSongwriter2]

Is there a reason not to do bullet end or barrel frets as you called them on a sg or les paul? They feel great on strats and really make the neck lovely to play

[@StevieScotty19]

Bloody hell josh,Sitting here drinking a McDonald’s strawberry milkshake and You’ve just put me right aff it wi that microphone spit dust story😂😂

[@stuahlers1528]

Great job, very detailed explanations why you do the sequential process in layman’s terms. Like the small sander at end! Are the available? Cheers!

[@joshuastopford]

Thanks man! Yes they are. If they're not on the site then email because we do have them

[@Lisa-rg4fp]

What's in the spray ottle please. The new tool looks awfully like it;s being used like a Z file. Maybe try one of those but they;re a bit expensive. Quite a few peole here use them.

[@macgibbon]

Were the fret nibs already removed from a previous refretting?

[@CrimsonCustomGuitars]

Yes.. they were

[@addryan]

Maybe some heating tool for the frets (i mean "tip" of the soldering gun)?..

[@MrDblStop]

You can grind a shallow groove in a 'bevel' or 'chisel' type soldering iron tip which helps stop it slipping off the fret.

[@lesbutler5458]

Surely there must be a case for a custom soldering iron tip to heat up frets?

[@MrDblStop]

You can grind a shallow groove in a 'bevel' or 'chisel' type soldering iron tip which helps stop it slipping off the fret.

[@kimballowen-brown4771]

Josh are you going to remove the screws and fix the neck properly ???

[@HandlebarWorkshops]

That's what I was hoping to see. Maybe another video?

[@joshuastopford]

@@HandlebarWorkshops I'm afraid the customer had probably spent all he wanted to spend that particular day!

[@scottishgentlemen6038]

I'm with Sophia on that microphone story. After having nearly vomited from the smell of a few rehearsal room mics over the years, I now bring my own. Mics are gross.

[@garagemasterguitars]

Fret slot cleaning saws have been out of stock everywhere for months. Anybody know otherwise please let us know.

[@mbontekoe3358]

What no nibs?

[@trent69marc]

Did it have these Fretnips which i love on Gibson guitars? if not it hase been already refrettet. One question: Is it possible to keep fretnips on a Gibson and refret it without losing them? very interesting video, thx & greetings

[@joshuastopford]

I think you're spot on. It has been refretted no doubt. You can keep them but it's just as tricky as you might think!

[@trent69marc]

@@joshuastopford ohyeah i can imagine that! ;) it would be hard to make every nip perfect and it´s very time consuming. But i´m sure it plays very nice without these nips. As far as i know Gibson makes the Binding kinda liquid with a certain glue, so they can arrange this nips, but i´m not quite sure about that, i really enjoined the video, so thx dude!!

[@eddiejr540]

This is gonna sound crazy…but I’m listening to Josh and I’m like, jeez his voice reminds me of someone…then it hit me…he sounds identical to a guitar YT’er named Sped Spedding…they sound like brothers…or maybe every British guy sounds the same to us silly americans😳

[@joshuastopford]

Ha! Quite possibly old bean!

[@Chris-Ian]

What do you mean it won't ever be an ASMR? It already is.

[@vgmoulin]

Question: If you leveled the fretboard before putting the frets and the frets are all the same height, all glued to the tang, why do you need to level the frets ? I never understood that.

[@HandlebarWorkshops]

Fret wire is not necessarily uniform along it's length. There will be rises and dips along the way.

[@vgmoulin]

@@HandlebarWorkshops thank you!

[@MrSongwriter2]

Don’t forget it’s the human element involved in pressing or hammering frets. There can also be an inconsistency between how the fret is seated. The idea of levelling the board is you save fret metal and create the perfect environment. The exception is maple fret boards if you’re not wanting to have to respray the board. ​@@vgmoulin

[@vgmoulin]

@@MrSongwriter2 Thank you

[@MrSongwriter2]

@@vgmoulin you’re most welcome

[@LordSneferu]

How did you get the frets "just shy" of the binding?

[@MrSongwriter2]

I wondered what he meant, as I was watching on phone, but I think what he was meaning the bevel inwards stops just shy of the binding. I use a fret bevel file which is set to 35 degrees and that is usually perfect. (The kind where the file is slotted into the wood at the correct angle like stew mac or Chris Alsop sell)

[@LordSneferu]

​@@MrSongwriter2 Hi. At the 25 minute mark you can see the fret end is trimmed back so that it touches the edge of the binding, not the edge of the fingerboard. How that was done isn't explained in the video.

[@MrSongwriter2]

@@LordSneferu yes I see what you’re saying now. I agree that was not explained. I’m as curious as you. That’s a whole lot of skill to cut the frets 0.2mm short of the binding on ALL the frets. I’m wondering if it was filled at 90 degrees running the file on the safe edge all down the fretboard. I’d love an explanation so we can all learn @joshuastopford

[@MrSongwriter2]

@@LordSneferu as I didn’t get a response here I asked on Reddit. Turns out I think we both overthought it. He just bevelled the binding aver so slightly or it was already bevelled slightly on the binding. I’d love Josh to reply to confirm or correct this. I tend to do this as it creates a nice roundover on a strat neck and it feels so much nicer. The les paul I did the binding was already bevelled slightly so I just followed that when moving to the diamond stone to smooth the edges after the bevel file

[@garagemasterguitars]

I hits dem wid the hammer 🤣 No, I do.

[@danielwotton5961]

THE PERSON WHO HAS TO DO THE NEXT REFRET ALREADY WANTS TO PUNCH YOU IN THE FACE.Superglue? Really? And the fact that you forgot to straighten the neck after the fretting , the meat taken from the middle frets means it wont be too far away.

[@MrSongwriter2]

Superglue is standard or titebond. Only a muppet pulls frets without heating with a soldering iron. That deals with superglue or titebond wood glue. I do draw the line with Ben when he used to use no more nails in fret slots. That sets like concrete. It’s great for bodging loose plasterboard fixings in modern houses though.

[@MrSongwriter2]

On the straightening the neck yes I agree it’s worth double checking, it shouldn’t really move unless you’ve used the wrong size wire with too wide a tang. I had more of an issue with using a notched straight edge to straighten the board whilst not aligning the slots so that the raised chips or gunge under the frets was avoided to get a true straight not resting on the gunge/chips Greater scheme of things he did the job well and the customer got a refretted guitar without buzz and no damage to the board

[@danielwotton5961]

@@MrSongwriter2 you have obviously never had to remove frets glued in with superglue. Titebond and superglue are two very different materials. Trying to heat superglue to a temperature that works would burn a board beyond recognition. I have not ever had a refret after superglue go well.

[@MrSongwriter2]

@@danielwotton5961 I’ve done refrets on guitars with superglue you can see/smell the fumes when you heat the frets. It’s just you spend longer on cleaning the slots out. As long as the board is cleaned up and the slots cleaned out it’s fine.

[@chriss2452]

This guy has absolutely no clue. You know they charge you £60 for that little piece of wood

[@raoulduke8720]

I don't know he's a little creepy

[@holdenm9361]

What kind of frets did you use? I need to re-fret my epiphone sg and I’m unsure of what frets to use. Their website says the guitar uses medium jumbo frets. I see online that fender sells medium jumbos but Gibson doesn’t appear to. Can I use any style of medium jumbo frets to re-fret an epiphone sg?