This Gibson es335 still had the original trapeze tailpiece, however the owner wasn’t to fond of it, so he decided to have a ABM stop tailpiece installed. It took quite some guts to position a large drill bit on this immaculate vintage guitar and start the machine. But after triple checking every aspect, all went fine.

The old frets were worn and bumpy so they had to be replaced. To remove the frets I first warm them up with a solder iron. The heat shrinks the wood a bit and weakens any adhesives that might have been used when installing them. This way I can gently ease the frets out without damaging the fretboard too much. After repairing any loose wood chips, sanding the board level and cleaning the fret slots, I’m ready to press in the new jumbo frets. When applying even pressure while pushing in the frets, the result will be quite level, but never perfect. So after fretting I need to grind down any high spots to achieve a perfectly smooth and fret buzz free neck.