My First Bad Warmoth Experience

[TonyFlyingSquirrel]

"Fall away" is the process of deviating from perfectly level frets and actually making the upper frets gradually shorter to allow for lower action without buzzing/fretting out.

Because this is where the strings vibrate the widest, and allowance needs to be made for it in order to prevent such buzzing.

 

[vikingred]

Got it, thanks.  So I would imagine that even though most Warmoth fretted necks are level, they do NOT come with the fall away thingy, correct?  Like if you want that you have to have it done.

 

[Cederick]

Warmoth just presses in the frets and fixes the fret ends, and nothing else. And they generally do a very good job with it :glasses10:

But yeah, it's no garuantee for absolutely perfection, it might be affected by different pieces of wood, but I'm not an expert.

 

[stratamania]

When a fret is pressed into wood there is a certain amount of compression of the wood. Therefore even in hardwood there are slight deviations of how that wood will react to the fact of a piece of metal being pressed or hammered into it. 

Frets needing to be levelled to a greater or lesser degree is a part of the instrument building process.

When I mentioned earlier that most good guitar manufacturers do this, rather than parts suppliers I was referring to higher end builders. Unfortunately a lot of players have no experience of how good some of those fret jobs are compared to the off the shelf guitars they are used to. Steak Mignon, can't really be compared to a Big Mac.

If you were to level, crown and dress the ends of a set of stainless steel frets yourself you would begin to appreciate that this is a lot of very detailed work and it just isn't something that a supplier of parts is going to invest time in. Your neck would probably end up double the price in some cases.

If you buy a neck from any parts supplier be prepared to do some work. It may be that you end up something that's passable for you in which case consider it a bonus.

 

[Wizard of Wailing]

    While the same bad fret job could happen at USACG I don't know what their reaction would be to my problem. I will be sure to find out from them what their standards are.
    I figured the people on this site who get fretwork done did so out of luxury, not necessity.  I had no idea that Warmoth necks are such a crapshoot. If you can live with that, that's fine.  However I can't.  My expectations of a $400 neck are higher.  Warmoth's own website says ,"Quality is paramount. Our entire operation is geared towards crafting excellence...Be assured we won't send you anything less...A lot of good hands work on these guitars.  Guys who know what perfect is, and isn't"  Warmoth is selling themselves as fine craftsmen, not  a run of the mill parts supplier.
      That being said, I got my guitar back last night and it plays better than any other neck I've owned.  It's a roasted maple, 16" flat radius, Wizard profile with 6100 frets.  This is my first experience with the 6100 frets and I'm kicking myself for not getting these frets earlier.  I'm playing like Yngwie on speed today.  If you're on the fence about getting 6100 frets, I say go for it.  These are amazing.  I'll post a photo soon in the Strat section.

 

[stratamania]

I think the crux of the matter is one of expectation. Remember the difference between what might be deemed playable by one person with a high action may not be with another who prefers a lower action. The difference between playable frets and not may be a matter of a couple of thousandths of an inch.

I have no connection with Warmoth other than I like their products and I think perhaps you could have had things explained in a more congenital way.

For me doing fretwork to the standards I try to attain is a necessity and never a luxury. So if I had received the neck you had it would have been levelled, crowned and polished prior to me ever playing it.

I'm glad you now have your 6100 fitted neck back after the needed work and it's playing well.  Perhaps now compare your other necks ;-)  are the 6100s stainless steel ?

 

[Wizard of Wailing]

      The 6100 frets (along with all the hardware), are gold.  I'm thinking I may have to get this fretwire put into my #1 Warmoth strat which currently has 6105s.  By the way my #1 has a 5 year old maple fretboard that is starting to get dark spots.  I'm hoping in a few years the Warmoth relic market will take off and I can sell my worn neck for big bucks, ala a Fender Custom Shop job. :icon_biggrin:

 

[Wizard of Wailing]

    One more thing about expectations and this guitar.  I purchased a Super Vee Bladerunner Tremolo for this shred beast. This is the 6th trem I've ordered from them.  It didn't come with a spring claw or the claw screws.  Figuring this was a mistake I called them and found out that since I last bought from them, they have stopped including those items and they must be bought for an additional $5 (which makes no sense to me).  However, the guy on the phone understood my surprise and sent me the items free of charge.  :icon_thumright:

 

[stratamania]

Oh gold very similar to stainless I'm going to try them on my next neck.

That's useful information on the Supervee. I suppose they were mainly selling them for replacing the standard Trem and the claws and springs were not always being used. But I would not have guessed that they were no longer included.

 

[Cagey]

Oh gold very similar to stainless I'm going to try them on my next neck.

You won't be sorry. I've put gold 6100s on several necks, including the L5S in my sig. Still have some of that wire in stock for a couple others in the queue.

 

[Cederick]

I wanna chime in and say the Supervee Bladerunner is a great vintage style trem.

I had one for a couple of weeks, and it wasn't that I didn't like that trem in itself, I think I prefer it a lot to other regular vintage trems, but I'm really a Floyd Rose guy and couldn't bond with it. If I'm going for a more "traditional" strat design any time in the future, it will definitely be a Bladerunner bridge.

At the moment I'm simply enjoying my freshly setup Gotoh Floyd Rose, strings are still perfectly on green after 30 minutes of constant divebombing and shredding.  :toothy12:

 

[stratamania]

Oh gold very similar to stainless I'm going to try them on my next neck.

You won't be sorry. I've put gold 6100s on several necks, including the L5S in my sig. Still have some of that wire in stock for a couple others in the queue.

I think you'll like the next neck. It won't have any markers either  ccasion14:

@Cederick, I have a bladerunner that I put on one of my Fenders, agreed it's a very good Trem with a positive feel.

 

[Cederick]

Yeah I really like the smooth feeling of it!

 

[Verne Bunsen]

I know it isn't the main topic of the thread, but I'm glad to hear the positive Bladerunner reviews. I've a Strat build in the wings and have been spending a lot of time window shopping over at Super Vee, always good to hear "real world" reviews.

 

[vikingred]

I have the gold EVO GD6100 frets on the Maple Soloist, and I love them.  HUGE mountains of joy.  All my future builds will get the 6100's -- either stainless or gold.  JESCAR EVO!

 

[musicispeace]

    It'll all work out ok in the end.  I just wish I knew that Warmoth's policy was (as the associate stated) is ,"As long as the frets are pressed in all the way, anything else is up to you to take care off."  I don't know what USACG's policy is but I will definitely talk to someone from the company to find out before I order anything from them.  Lesson learned.  It just seems that a small refund would've gone a long way toward some good will with me.  I've bought 8 necks and would've kept on buying from Warmoth, but now I'm going to look elsewhere for necks. However,  Warmoth's bodies are still the best buy on the market.

I know Tommy and have a neck from him as well as necks from Warmoth. Happy with both. I always have a proper set up done on anything I get put together for me or buy retail because (especially for a parts guitar) once it's all together it still has to all be dialed in. I personally have not had to get frets done but it is a possibility as you either do a good set up or pay for a good one. My conclusion is you'll get good work from either company but I will say Tommy is a stickler about how frets turn out.

 

[aarontunes]

Hey guys....just chiming in to clarify Warmoth's philosophy on the fretting process, and why we do things the way we do.

Warmoth sells TONS of necks in every state of completion, from glossy finished with frets and nut installed to completely unfinished with no frets or nut, and all the myriad points in between. We then ship those necks all over the world, to climates of every extreme. Depending on climate, temperature, humidity, the species of wood, whether or not it has been finished, and a host of other factors...the wood is going to move. That is just what wood does. Warmoth expertly glues each individual fret into its new slot to keep them from popping out as they travel the world, and this has been very effective at keeping them where we put them, but it doesn’t keep the wood from moving and changing in relationship to the frets from the time we box it up in mild/temperate Puyallup to the time you unwrap it in hot/humid Savanah or cold/dry Denver.

Even if Warmoth were to spend a lot of time doing more fret work (and raise the price of their necks commensurately) it wouldn’t solve the problem. The wood is still going to move. We don't feel like it makes a lot of sense to do (and charge our customers for) a major fret leveling/crowning/dressing until after the neck has been strung up and left to sit for at least a week to settle in to the new tension/climate. Isn’t it better, and doesn't it save money in the long run, to leave the fine fretwork for someone to do at the appropriate time, for the best results?

Most of the time our necks are playable right out of the gate. Given all the variables at play, that seems like a pretty good track record and says a lot about our process. I hope that sheds some light on our approach to fretwork.

 

[Wizard of Wailing]

      Thanks for the response.  From the sound of it 7 out of 8 being perfectly playable isn't that bad. The completed guitar is the Shell Pink Shredder in the Strat section.  I guess I've always had good luck with guitars, since in 25 years of playing I've only needed fretwork done one other time (and I've owned a ton of off the rack Fenders).  I guess I won't rule Warmoth out on my next neck purchase.  By the way, this roasted maple is the best neck wood ever, and I've tried maple, wenge, bloodwood, and goncalo alves.