Thoughts on string ferrules?

[hamburder]

Flush or raised with a lip?

Assuming Warmoth only drills holes wide enough for the ferrule shaft, not the lip. I ordered a set of each. I didn't realize that the lip would cause them to be raised on my first order, so found a flush set to try. Not a big deal. I never really paid attention to string ferrules before, but I noticed on my other guitars none of them are raised. Looking at pictures online, raised ferrules look unfinished to me.

 

[ThisIsHuhWow404]

I had an issue like this when I was refinishing a MIM Tele once. I didn’t think about ferrules at all until the day came I decided to start hitting the old finish with a heat gun. It created a dilemma where I wasn’t sure if I should take the ferrules out and replace them or just try to very precisely tape them off when spraying.

I just hit the old ferrules with the heat gun to soften them, tore them out with pliers, and bought new ferrules from Fender.

From what I can tell the size for holes is standardized and the raised lip/flush to body aspect is dependent on the ferrules rather than the holes. As long as you can bang them in with a rubber mallet you should be fine.

Replacing already installed ferrules is a way bigger issue, as apparently you can rip the wood around them if you don’t take certain precautions. If you have a fresh body with fresh holes you can do whatever you want.

 

[hamburder]

With flush ferrules, do you use a little wood glue in the hole?

 

[teleme01]

String tension will suffice, I would not use glue, unless it's a rescue

 

[NovasScootYa]

Use a suitable size wood screw and pull the ferrules out or insert a rod through the string bores and drive the ferrules out. The only recessed flush fit ferrules I ever used had bores where the ferrules were flush with a vintage strat body. Those were difficult to fit evenly, not so much for the later raised flange fit. Fender part# 0994918000

 

[aarontunes]

My preference, just on principal, is for them to be flush. Warmoth does not rout for this and I don't have the tools necessary to drill for flush mounting, so on all my guitars I've just installed them with the raised lip, in the Warmoth fashion.

And you know you what? I've found that I just don't care about it as much as I thought I did. I never feel them when I play, and it's just become a non-issue for me. Now I don't care either way.

OTOH, start talking about strap buttons and you'll see fire in my eyes muy pronto!