Fret cutting problem

Today I was to fret the guitar, but had a problem with the fret nipper I bought. I hadn't done a fret-over-binding guitar before. I went through four feet of wire and couldn't get it right. The nipper came apart when a "c" clip came off. Maybe that was a factor in the frets getting cut way too short. The tang was getting removed along with part of the fret crown. I need to wait for new fret wire from LMI (lots this time) and an exchange of the nipper from Stew-Mac. I only ever did fretting where you filed the frets along the fingerboard edge and used binding along the edge, then scraped the binding to follow the fret contour. I'll get the mahogany Tele going some more as I wait for the parts to arrive. Be back in about a week.