Per customer request, we are now proud to offer stainless steel Zero Glide frets! These frets basically do not wear out. This means they require no maintenance and never need to be replaced. Not only that, the stainless frets improve performance for tuning and bends. These frets are specially designed with an offset tang for our Zero Glide nut system. Comes in a pack of 3.
Available in Medium (.038"), Jumbo (.051"), and Super Jumbo (.058"), or an assorted pack of each size.
Works as described but installation was a pain. I have a warmoth tele neck that I installed it to. I had to cut back the nut slot a little to fit the new bone nut and fret in place. I thought it would just drop in.. I wasn't anticipating that but my skills didn't let me down. I filed the nut and fret down on both sides a little, added some super glue and now it works great. i have a bigsby so tunning is a breeze now!
Resolves the nut-string height issue with a simple and easy installation. Worked perfect on my Heritage 16.
The Zero Glide performs like the manufacturer claims it will. It took less than one hour to complete the installation and have the guitar playing. The nut I removed was cheap plastic and the thin wires had cut down into the nut to the point that there was severe fret buzz on the open strings. The Zero Glide cured that and has all of the strings at the same level. I used a disc sander to shape the nut to length and height in a few minutes. About five more minutes and the nut was polished. The installation looks good. I suggest a person view the manufacturer's installation video before doing the installation.
I play fingerstyle guitar. My favorite guitar is a Gretsch 5420 Electromatic . For some reason the designers at Gretsch moved away from the zero fret. When You string up with 10's or 9's I guess it probably doesn't matter much because the first position will be easy with light gauge strings. My touch and style of playing requires .012's. With heavier strings while the 5420 is beautiful to see and hear the first position was challenging to play. I installed the zero glide following the instructions in the package and to my amazing pleasure the 5420 played like my '66 Nashville used to. I couldn't be happier. Thanks to the people that designed this product. The tone is great the tuning is improved and the first position action is second to none.
I bought the mandolin version and fitted it to my Gibson. There's a lot of extra material to remove, but the result was great. Easier tuning (the old nut had tight slots for the A strings), better intonation. Later I used one of the extra frets in the package to fix a tenor guitar. For that, I simply filed the necessary ledges in the existing nut and widened the string slots. It would be nice if Stew-Mac would also sell the offset tang frets separately, for retrofitting to an existing nut.