My Fluke's frets are worn out

interp1

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I just restringed my Fluke (concert) with white Aquila strings. It's my first experience with Aquila. They sound much brighter than the Hilo and Worth strings I'm used to, but I'm surprised how much tenser they are. It's like I have to make an effort to pluck the strings now, whereas I just had to gently pet the old strings to get sound out of them. I also have to press harder to barre or it sounds muffled. I hope they're worth this extra effort.

Anyway, I noticed the frets are very worn out and gotten grooved out under the A string. I probably should have gotten a rosewood fretboard instead of the standard polycarbonate fretboard, but I saw this Fluke from Jim Beloff's booth at the local ukulele festival and couldn't resist.

Does anyone know if getting the fretboard replaced is an option? Otherwise, I could always spend $300 for a new Fluke with a rosewood fretboard and designate the current one for practice.
 
If you are in the US, check with their customer service for fretboard replacement. Apparently, it can be free (in some cases, among which regular wear?). I believe some send it in and have the rosewood fretboard installed instead, but that is a paid repair no doubt.
 
I read that fluorocarbon strings like worth are not good for plastic fretboard. I only use hilo and aquila on my flea and got no fret problems.
 
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well, you wouldn't keep a pair of shoes around if the soles were completely wore out, would you? Although you can still play it, you should buy another one just for kicks :) Never can have enough spare ukuleles.
 
Back in March I was quoted $85.00 to put a rosewood fretboard on my Fluke. This included the fretboard, labor and return shipping.
 
I just restringed my Fluke (concert) with white Aquila strings.... but I'm surprised how much tenser they are. It's like I have to make an effort to pluck the strings now

I'm not sure, but I think the Fluke concert scale length is a little longer than what Aquila designed their concert strings for (at 15.5" it's longer than my other concerts).

I have Aquilas on my concert Fluke, but I keep them tuned down a half step -- so to "B-Tuning". You might try that too, it would relieve some of the tension.
 
All good tips!

I'll make a phone call during business hours (how quaint) to the company to find out about options. $85 sounds encouraging. I wonder if I'll have to take off the strings to ship it to Connecticut(?). I imagine they'll do so over there to work on it anyway.

The Fluke is unit #5, so another addition to the family won't be a big deal at this point, but I'm thinking Kiwaya's rock uke might make a novel new sibling. :) If there's a review thread for that somewhere, I'd appreciate a link to it.

The ukulele's always been a GCEA instrument for me, so I'm reluctant to try "slack" tuning. Of course, I don't have perfect pitch, so it won't bother me if I get used to it, but I'll probably try to get chords in the original key, which might make for uncomfortable fingering.

Then again, then again, if I ever were a Bb instrument player (but I'm not), perhaps a Bb slack tuning wouldn't be so unnatural.
 
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