Please educate me about fan frets

[rmsstrider]

Originally Posted by paulzoom

I have one and fretting is no problem at all. Great fingerstyle guitar. Just above $1500 for the fan fret is about right. Great workmanship and value. Bashkin is the designer of these.

Thanks for all the replies. Very interesting topic for me. That Avian Ibis looks very interesting. Thanks for pointing it out. This looks to be an affordable approach to trying a Fan Fret guitar.

[murrmac123]

Originally Posted by ljguitar

I don't understand why shifting the offset all to one end would change the intonation.

No, that wouldn't affect the intonation , Larry .... it's the seven parallel frets that I don't get.

If the nut is perpendicular to the fretboard central axis, and the bridge is slanted to give whatever scale difference is required between bass and treble, then all the frets from #1 onwards have to be slanted as well.

I don't see how you can have seven frets parallel to the nut and then start slanting from the eighth fret onwards ...

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by murrmac123

No, that wouldn't affect the intonation , Larry .... it's the seven parallel frets that I don't get.

If the nut is perpendicular to the fretboard central axis, and the bridge is slanted to give whatever scale difference is required between bass and treble, then all the frets from #1 onwards have to be slanted as well.

I don't see how you can have seven frets parallel to the nut and then start slanting from the eighth fret onwards ...

Hi mm…

Would you believe English is my first language? I'm thinking you are right.

It's my description (based on my perception) which is off. The luthier never said the frets were 'normal', that was my language. It was at his shop, and the story about the guy not playing above the 7th fret was true. I just played it for a few minutes, and that was at least a decade ago.

I'm still dusting out cobwebs and rethinking how to describe the guitar based on those few minutes with it (less than half hour). I think because there was no offset at one end, the first 7 frets seemed to me to be near-normal (though they would have to have seen some 'slant').

The story was the buyer wanted a fan-fret, but it had to play normally in the first few frets, and the luthier's solution was to build it so the offset was totally at the bridge. My perception was the first 7 frets were pretty normal, then it began to lean, and beyond the octave, it really began to slant and the space between frets on the treble side shrank too close to articulate notes (for my fingertips).

Thanks for continuing to reason with me. Like I said - I'm nearing 69yrs old and need sometimes to sort through memories to keep the story straight (or properly slanted in this case).

I cannot find pictures of anything comparable (I did a very speedy google-image search). Interestingly, my guitar shows up a lot in a google search for fanned fret guitars (it won some awards for the luthier, and it's a beautiful instrument).

Sorry for any brain cramps I may have caused you…

[murrmac123]

Larry, I get it .

Thinking about it, I do see that if the player didn't want to play above the seventh fret, then having the nut as the perpendicular would in fact lead to a more "normal" perception for the fingers.... even if the frets from #1 onwards were slanted.

Can't help thinking, however, that if the builder had offset the nut by, say, 1/8" ...or even 3/16" , it would have been an overall benefit.... wouldn't have changed the fingertip "perception " overmuch .

[Pitar]

Supposed ergonomics, it's predicated mostly on the index finger's use as a barre. That said, the fan fret design sacrifices the range of motion of the ring and little fingers to favor the index and middle fingers. Doesn't make much sense to me so I see it as gimmicky.

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by murrmac123

Larry, I get it .

Thinking about it, I do see that if the player didn't want to play above the seventh fret, then having the nut as the perpendicular would in fact lead to a more "normal" perception for the fingers.... even if the frets from #1 onwards were slanted.

Can't help thinking, however, that if the builder had offset the nut by, say, 1/8" ...or even 3/16" , it would have been an overall benefit.... wouldn't have changed the fingertip "perception " overmuch .

Hi mm

Art versus science…?

It was 'new-ground' for the luthier who had only built equally split fanned frets to this point. It wasn't the builder's recommendation to the client, but the client dictating what they wanted.

[rogthefrog]

Originally Posted by Pitar

Supposed ergonomics, it's predicated mostly on the index finger's use as a barre. That said, the fan fret design sacrifices the range of motion of the ring and little fingers to favor the index and middle fingers. Doesn't make much sense to me so I see it as gimmicky.

None of this is actually correct.

They're not "predicated" on barres. If anything I'd expect FF users to use fewer barres than the average strumming player.

It doesn't hamper the ring and pinky fingers for the benefit of the index and middle finger. If anything the opposite is true, as the index and middle fingers stretch more (the ring and pinky don't get compressed).

Have you ever tried one?

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by Pitar

…Doesn't make much sense to me so I see it as gimmicky.

Hi P
This is just an opinion - what you said doesn't make sense to me.

My style and fingerings don't change on my fanned fret guitar over my conventionally built acoustic guitars.

[BenSherman]

With a fan-fret tuned to DADGAG, would it still beneficial to use a string set that is specifically gauged for DADGAD? Or would this be two separate solutions working at the same time (and end up with the detuned strings being over-tensioned)!

[Alan Carruth]

I've made a couple of multi-scale guitars, using about a 1" difference. In several cases I'd show them to players, and when I asked about the fanned frets they'd be surprised. They didn't feel any difference, and had to look.

'Fanned Frets' is, or was, a copyrighted description of Ralph Novak's. He came up with the idea as a way to get the bass sound of a Strat and the trebles of a Les Paul. He actually took out a patent, which was challenged, I believe, citing the Orpharion as prior art. As far as I know, the copyright on 'fanned fret' still holds, though.

It's hard to say how much of an effect the tilt of the bridge has on the tone. That might be a hard one to sort out! It need not effect the way the top is braced if you use a pinless bridge. Most steel string guitar tops are asymmetrically braced anyway, so maybe the alterations required are not so much of a penalty after all.

[murrmac123]

I have refreshed a previous thread ...

[iim7V7IM7]

I own two guitars with multi-scale fingerboards. They are not dramatic amounts of offset (1/4" on my Sexauer - top and 1/2" on my Klepper bottom). I decided on multi-scales to capture sweeter trebles of a shorter scale length with a fuller bass response on the E and A strings. I play in standard tuning. I honestly don't even notice that their multi-scales after a minute of playing each. The Sexauer has the most offset at the nut and is close to vertical at the 19th fret. My Klepper is vertical near the 8th fret and has increasing offset above and below.