b'Zero fretsSuppose you read an article about a new stringed instrument,about something very tiny, but I believe that instruments with where one hundred and twenty-odd of the possible notes arezero frets need less intonation correction, and produce a more defined by holding the string gently against sections of purposeaccurate package of overtones.They are not easy to fit and made nickel silver, carefully fitted into accurately machined slots,adjust properly, and some styles of playing can be difficult to and then individually levelled, contoured and polished. You thenaccommodate, but as far as I am concerned, a standard nut is a read on to discover that six other notes, ones that are perhapsshort cut and a compromise.the most frequently played, are defined by pulling the string, at various angles, through a slot cut with a file, into a piece of dead cow, glued onto the end of the fingerboard. You would rush out to buy that wouldnt you?Some makers talk about making the nut or saddle from a different material, and the difference it can make to tone. If that is true, then it is impossible to argue against some of the implications of a zero fret, and I could stop the argument there, but there is a lot more.A zero fret is not a short cut. It can be used that way, but I am interested only in improving my guitars; if it didnt improve them, I wouldnt use it.A very thin string is almost perfect in the way it vibrates; all of its overtones are in proper proportion to each other. For thicker, stiffer strings, that is not the case, the stiffness means that each component part of the note, each overtone/harmonic/partial will not be in its proper relationship to the others, because stiffness has a different effect at different frequencies. Holding the string in a slot makes this very much worse than holding it against a fret.Most of what is written about zero frets is nonsense, and this is one of those situations where an awful lot could be written 203'