Many (certainly not all) among my clientele, friends, colleagues, and fellow luthiers/ guitar technicians believe that fret leveling exclusively pertains to worn-out or freshly installed frets. This perception couldn't be further from reality. Virtually all metal-fretted instruments require some degree of fret leveling for a proper setup. This fact applies to new instruments and even, to my surprise, on Plek'd instrument as well. It's shocking to see/ feel that fret rocker bouncing all over the fretboard on a freshly Plek'd instrument. I love the concept of the Plek machine, and I am not a Plek hater, but I have yet to see the Plek process reach my standards for precision. 

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Consider, for instance, a premium or a top-tier instrument — you'll almost inevitably encounter variations, sometimes quite pronounced, in the heights of certain frets or spots on said frets.

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A proper comprehensive setup necessitates some measure of fret leveling. Importantly, this is unrelated to fret wear, divots, dings, depressions, etc. While fret wear does warrant leveling, incorporating some measure of fret leveling is a crucial aspect of an exceptional setup, extending even to brand-new and expensive instruments.

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• My fret leveling is executed to tolerances of less than 1/1000th of an inch (0.001") or (0.025mm)

• The Frets need to have perfect Coplanarity, evenness in three dimensions. 

• Fret crowning to a perfect semicylindrical shape (please see What Frets ShouldLook Like).

• Tongue Dressing/ fall away (slight ramping down) on the last 7-9 frets.

• Block dress.

• Bevel fret ends to 23° & 3°

• Multi-stage full dress of the fret ends to the smoothest degree possible.

• Multi-stage fret polishing to a true mirror finish (please see About My Fret Polishing).