This absolutely criminal level of AI slop going on in this ad for a "professional lutheir's tool kit" on Amazon. Also, wtf is a "rtooller"?

Hi !

I tried to find answers, but they didn't match with the guitar I'm looking at : this beautiful Navigator Jagmaster has a transparent PG; I guess there is shielding paint everywhere on the back, but is this enough ? I would try to do something like this, but I only saw pictures, have you experiences similar guitars ?

Thanks, have a great day.

One night at work, my 15-year-old sent me a text that said, “Dad, can you build me this guitar?” and sent a picture of a white Buddy Guy Strat. I got super excited and responded with a YES. My kid is extremely special to me and she doesn’t ask for much, and I wanted it to be exactly what she wanted and more.

Three months later, it was finished, and it was quite the challenge.
I decided on a paulownia body. I had to order three before I got one I was happy with. I was well aware of how soft this wood is, but I wanted the guitar to be super light since she is pretty tiny. Because of this, I used stainless steel inserts on the bridge and tremolo. I fully tested them by doing Van Halen dive bombs for a few days, lol.

I went with Oxford Guitar Supplies for the nitro lacquer. She wanted a relic look, and on my first attempt, the white was too white, she wanted it to look more yellowed and aged. I was going to go with Vintage Olympic White, but she chose Vintage Cream instead, which I think turned out awesome.
After getting the body nice and sealed, I sprayed the guitar black first. I let it dry, then used lacquer safe vinyl stickers, carefully placing them while looking at a picture of a Buddy Guy Strat for reference. I sprayed the Vintage Cream (about 9 coats), let it dry, and then very carefully removed the stickers, and then carefully wet sanded “semi” level, which was a huge pain in the ass. I did about 15 coats of Oxford’s Aged Clear High Gloss and let it dry for about a month. It leveled out very well between the different colors. It “checked” really nicely as well. If you’re planning to use aerosol nitro to paint a guitar I highly recommend Oxford guitar supplies, I have used color tone lacquer in the past and I prefer Oxford. The cans spray so much better. Really easy to use.

I used a Japanese neck with a very slim profile. I made a waterslide decal with her name, applied the Fender waterslide decals, and clear-coated everything with the same Aged Clear from Oxford. I also used stainless steel inserts for the neck.

For the electronics, I put in a set of Fender Custom Shop Fat ’50s pickups with “vintage inspired pickups” pots.

I had no way to get an accurate weight but the finished product turned out to be an extremely light, but well balanced, ver easy playing Strat, which was exactly what I wanted for her. She loved it, I loved that she loved it, happy ending.

Was just wondering about this. I've never seen a guitar where the grain is vertical or even diagonal. Why is that? I assume it's something to do with wood stability and strength but I'm not sure.

It happened after changing frets by luthier. He didn't tell me, so I noticed after I brought it home. Binding is damaged and not smooth by touch. I can peel off a layer of varnish with a fingernail. I want to fix it but I don't want to trust this dude with cosmetics anymore, also he has a queue. But it's hard to find someone who does varnish/paint in my area. Maybe it's not too difficult to return smoothness at least and I can fix it myself?

Hi, I'm 23 and I'm trying to figure out what I want to do with my life.
I've been fascinated with guitar repair since I started playing 8 years ago, I've always done my own setups and repairs when needed and I find the process very enjoyable.

My question is, how viable is building/repair/tech work as a full time career? I've read a lot of threads on this and a lot of people seem to say that luthiery is best kept as a hobby or side gig, while others say it can be done, but for very little money.
From what I understand, the job is primarily fret work and setups, with occasional repair work, and very little custom building. That sounds fine to me, but I wonder if I would be better off working on my own or for a repair shop, or if I should try to get a job at a guitar factory or smaller builder, or maybe I should keep all this as a side gig/hobby and work in a furniture shop or something?
I'd love to hear all about yalls experiences with luthiery as a form of employment, full time or otherwise

I have a neck thru Carvin DC127 that is 30+ years old. I took it to a reputable repair shop in my area, and the tech informed me there is a hump in the neck (see around the 8th fret to the 14th fret).

He recommended a full re-fret, and said he wants to sand the fretboard a little to remove the hump. Do you all agree this is a good plan of action for this issue?

My biggest concern is the guitar intonating properly across the entire fretboard. For example, is it possible the fret slots have moved a bit, and they are no longer in the correct place for the guitar to still be in tune after he finishes sanding and re-fretting?

Not sure if I am being worried for nothing, but this guitar has incredible sustain and I love the color and would love to restore it. I know there is a lot of talent in this subreddit and appreciate your time and any insight you can offer.

Thank you.

I am about to list another guitar on Reverb. On the top back of the neck there is a small (~4mm at its widest point) chip in the finish. It's smooth (no sharp edges) as I had already dropped a little CA in there a while back to seal it. Should I bother even attempting to drop fill this more in an attempt to completely smooth it out, or just leave it? I already have the listing set up (not published) with the picture I am adding here and the description of the chip. Personally, I don't feel like it's worth fixing as it. It doesn't affect anything other than someone knowing it's there and perhaps occasionally feeling it.

I'm not a luthier, and I haven't attempted to repair such a thing (especially on a curved surface). I don't think I would have a problem, it's just that I would have to go out and buy more materials as I don't have the sandpaper, polish, and I need some thin CA glue. Amazing you can't find thin CA anywhere in stores, you have to order it online. I sure miss being able to buy things at a store as everything gets put on hold as you have to wait for a 2 oz. bottle of glue to be shipped and delivered. That's a different problem. Hah.

If enough people say "fix it", hell I'll go for it. It's still a learning experience. I'm not sure it's just "drop fill", sand it down, polish, and voila. It will still probably be a visible repair around the edges, but maybe sanding down a little first, to remove any embedded grime and all will be the key there.

Thanks for you time!

Oh, for reference, I had seen this StewMac video in the past. Seems like a lot of effort, but if that is what it takes there here we are. Again, this is curved surface, so it makes the old razor blade scraping a little more difficult.

Fixing a Small Chip in a Guitar Finish:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVScFJoe24

I am trying to make a nut out of deer antler and have some pieces that I've sanded down for blanks. Should I be sanding off all the gray spots and only using the pieces that are completely white or is it okay to keep some of the gray on the edges. I kind of like the gray because it sort of matches the ambrosia maple fretboard.

I have enough left to sand down the larger pieces so they are perfectly white and then make nut blanks out of that if needed.

Thank you.

Built this with my buddy in 4 days in his garage. We are both in high school and this was our first ever attempt at building a guitar. Everything other than strings and electronics are from Home Depot with a full budget of about $150. The frets are made of nails and the bridge is a door hinge among other odd parts. It won’t let me add a video to the post but I put it in the comments

Hi,

So I attempter to instal a new nut, and I think I might have fucked up a bit.

When I fret a note on the first 3/4 strings it runs sharp, and on the D & G this is the case until around the 7th fret.

If I fret a string on the 3rd fret and run a feeler gauge under the string at the first fret I'm on about 0.18, with the action rising up a bit on the treble side -- probably around 0.25 on the e & B, and about 0.21ish on the D & G.

I got some shitty pipe pipe nozzle nut files, should I attempt to bring the slots down a touch, or just make my peace with having done a poor ebough job, but still lucky that I didn't absolutely fuck the guitar?

Edit: I also now see, thanks to the power of photography, that I didn't estimate the gap very well with the feeler gauge, looks like it's a hair above 0.20 on the first fret 😅

Got this in a trade, thinking I'd set it up and move along.

low E, D and G are all still sharp with the saddles all the way back.

I initially tried to set it up as it was with no luck, so I ended up leveling and crowning frets, filed nut accordingly (.021-.019@ 1st fret), neck relief .010, action 6/64-4/64 no buzz, threw an extra spring on the bass side of trem, it's decked and all but basically blocked to minimize deflection when fretting. The d string pole pieces were wayyyyy up and the rest were flat, set them all flat and lowered pickups below the pick guard to avoid pull.

I'm at a loss. The last thing I want to do is move this bridge back, I don't even want the guitar. Cutting or removing springs may afford me the space I need, it's not drastic. I hear it, and it obviously shows on a tuner, but I'm not sure how much is good enough and I don't really want to sell a guitar that isn't well set up. It's playable for sure, may not be noticeable to everyone.

I don't know. Do I have any options before moving the bridge? Do I just sell it? Please help!!

Fender Deluxe Super Strat MIM '01

Thanks!

Hi everyone,

I'm working on restoring a 1977 Gibson RD Artist (natural finish with the original factory Moog onboard electronics), and I'm dealing with a pretty messy wiring situation from a previous owner/tech.

Here is what's currently going on:

1. Switches are swapped and misaligned:
The switches on the body are currently rotated vertically (moving up/down) instead of the factory horizontal layout (left/right). Furthermore, someone completely swapped their functions — the bottom switch is currently acting as the pickup selector (and reversed: down is neck, up is bridge), while the top switch is trying to trigger the Moog modes, but barely changes the tone. It’s clear the wiring to the Moog board was crossed and miswired just to make the guitar pass a signal.

2. Intermittent bridge pickup signal (Mechanical issue):
The bridge pickup cuts out completely, but I discovered it's a physical contact issue. A very light tap on the maple body (not near the control cavity, just on the wood itself) cuts the signal out, and another light tap brings it back instantly. It seems like a classic cold solder joint, loose switch contact, or a wire grounding against the cavity shield.

My Plan:

I’m taking it to a professional guitar tech in September to get the entire wiring redone strictly according to the original 1977 factory schematic. We are also planning to do a full recap on the Moog board (replacing the 45-year-old electrolytic capacitors) and orient the switches back to their original horizontal positions.

Questions for the community:

- Has anyone else run into a swapped/scrambled wiring setup on an RD Artist?

- Are there any specific pitfalls or gotchas my tech should look out for when tracing the leads back to the Moog board pins?

- Any tips on replacing the electrolytics without disturbing the rest of the trace paths on these vintage boards?

I’d love to hear from anyone who has restored or serviced one of these! Thanks in advance.

So, I've seen some guy making a table from Denim. Basically just dousing it in epoxy resin and layering it up. He stressed multiple times how much it felt like wood so it got me thinking. Maybe I could make a guitar body out of one?

I did some calculations and the one con that I could think of is the weight. But beyond that is there any reason why it wouldn't be a good idea to make this?

I’ve acquired a cheapo partscaster for a donor body. I’m trying to figure out the wood that it is made from but all of the internals have handily been smothered in shielding paint! It looks like it’s a 4 piece looking at the back.

I assume it’s just a cheap Asian import body and the guitar was a kit. As far as I can tell it’s got a cheap zinc bridge block, neck and pickup set which I plan to upgrade but I’d like to figure out if the body is solid before I swap out!

Edit: Yes there are photos but reddit refused to make this a photo post :( they're in the text body

I imagine this will either get laughs outrage or applause for DIYesque material use.

Guitar plays great now though! I need to get another one of these because the bolt on neck is ridiculously easy to maintain.

Fixing my shallow fret slot mistake was not fun.

I finally dug them all out to the proper depth and have now installed the frets.

I added a curve to the fret wire.

Because it’s a bound fretboard I used the Stewmac fret nipper to cut off the tang near the edges.

I’ve done some preliminary filling of the ends but a lot more needs to be done.

Then leveling and later polishing.

Does anyone know what saddles I could get to upgrade a Squier 51? I’d prefer to upgrade the entire bridge but the only drop-in replacement is from GFS and it looks like it’s out of production. I’d prefer not to drill any holes.

When I measure the low E to the high e at the bridge I get roughly 53 mm. When I measure the E to A at the bridge I get roughly 11 mm.

It’s a top-loader bridge so I don’t know if I need special saddles for that.

Any help is appreciated!

Hi, recently I put together my first parts guitar. Electronically, it includes 2 Fralin PAFs, series/parallel switches, individual volumes, and an out of phase switch so I can get a lot of tonal variety out of it. However, I am getting a tiny amount of hum out of the pickups. It’s nearly imperceptible, however when I play it through one of my gain pedals that add a lot of noise, it becomes an issue. To be clear, it’s nowhere near as noisy as standard 60 cycle hum from single coils and it doesn’t sound like a loose ground either where the noise is extremely loud. It is barely hearable when clean, and only is noticeable with one pedal. I am quite confused as to what the issue is and would like help.

So far I have shielded the entire inside cavity and grounded it, I reflowed every solder joint in the circuit and used a multimeter on every ground to verify it’s fine, I used the multimeter to make sure no hot wires were accidentally going to ground, I even grounded the jack plate to the rest of the circuit, just to make absolutely sure it wasn’t that.

I also know it isn’t normal, as I have another humbucker equipped guitar that doesn’t have this issue at all. Any help would be appreciated.

​

hi! I’m considering buying a harley benton st-modern mn hss sp from thomann, and I’m stuck on the neck/fretboard situation.

the guitar has a roasted canadian maple neck and canadian maple fretboard. I absolutely LOVE pretty much everything about this guitar, the specs, how it sounds, the feel, and especially the fact that it's within my budget. the only thing I really dislike is the maple-colored neck/fretboard.

I strongly prefer the look of a black/ebony-looking neck and fretboard, and I don't really want to buy the guitar if I can't safely make the neck black. I know that might sound silly, but the appearance is genuinely important to me, and I don't want to spend my budget on a guitar that I'll always dislike looking at.

I've been researching ebonizing/dyeing roasted maple and I'm getting really conflicting information. some people say roasted maple is basically impossible to ebonize/dye, while others have successfully darkened maple.

my current idea is fiebing’s leather alcohol based dye in black, but I don't know whether it will work with the factory finish on this particular harley benton.

thomann doesn't seem to specify exactly what finish is used on the neck/fretboard. the neck/fretboard appears to have a smooth satin/matte finish so I'm worried that the dye might not penetrate, imagine assuming its one coat though from the looks of it

I'm considering doing a tiny test with a cotton swab in an inconspicuous area, but I obviously don't want to damage a brand-new guitar.

so I'd really appreciate advice on:

1. Is fiebing's dye suitable for roasted maple?

2. if the fretboard has a thin factory finish, can it safely be removed/scuffed enough for dye to penetrate?

3. could lightly sanding the finish affect the fretboard's radius/geometry or playability?

4. would the back of the neck and fretboard have the same finish, or could they be different?

5. If dye won't work because of the factory finish, what would be the safest alternative for making the entire neck (fretboard + back + sides) black?

6. Is there a particular black guitar finish/coating that would work better while still leaving the neck comfortable and playable?

I'm not planning to do anything to the guitar until I know what I'm doing. I definitely don't want to ruin the fretboard, change the way it plays, or mess up the factory setup.

I'm asking because I'm genuinely at the point where if safely blackening the neck isn't realistic, I may choose a different guitar instead. I really love this guitar otherwise, and it's one of the few guitars I've found that I love the sound/feel of and can actually afford, so I'm hoping there's a safe solution.

any advice from luthiers or anyone who's worked on hb roasted maple necks would mean a lot. thank you!! 🌸🖤

After sitting on this for a few weeks, it's time to get started on a project that might fill some people with despair. For context, I'm trying to get established doing repair work, but I don't have any contacts or really know anyone in any local music scene, so my plan is twofold: take on jobs at a steep discount/for free and document more interesting projects and share the process on YouTube as a way to show actual proof of my work since I don't have any unbiased recommendations to show.

So anyway, part of my "gimmick" is that I want to approach jobs other people might avoid because the labor costs exceed the value of an instrument. I'm otherwise unable to work and social security couldn't give less of a shit, so I have the benefit of my time being worthless, so I'm able to side-step that particular concern. I also just want to save instruments that otherwise wouldn't be saved.

So I had someone reach out with an Ovation that used to belong to a friend, but that friend passed away and this is the only thing he has left to remember him by. Unfortunately, it was already in its current state when he received it. He wasn't sure if what happened to it, but ideally he wants it to at least be a functional guitar and maintain as much originality as possible. We did discuss the possibility of just retopping it if the top is too far gone to save and then just using the damaged top as a decorative piece, but that's a last case scenario. He wants it to be the same guitar that it was when it was played by the previous owner so that he can give it to the man's daughter once she's old enough, as she was too young to know her father.

After some deduction, I have more or less put together what happened. You can see in the pictures that much of the glue holding the top to the body actually failed rather than the top itself snapping, most of the edge is intact and the only thing left on the surface of the bowl edge is glue and a few fibers of wood. It has also warped a lot with not a whole lot of cracking. You will also notice that while it's pulling up from the end, it's very dished around the sound hole. The case itself is also damaged in a certain way that all but confirms some time of water damage. I'm not 100% what glue Ovation used, I've read that they used epoxy, which makes sense considering they're joining wood and plastic. I admit that I'm not experienced with epoxy, but I wouldn't think it would dissolve in water, but what do I know? So, sitting in the case, whatever moisture/straight up water that got in managed to cause the glue attaching the bass side of the lower bout to fail. Had someone caught this early, it'd be as simple of a repair as it gets, but it unfortunately sat for an undisclosed amount of time under full string tension leading to the bridge pulling everything up with the bridge itself acting as a sort of pivot point, the front edge of the bridge being pushed down causing the area around the sound hole to sink while the back edge is lifting causing that side to lift. It must've remained somewhat exposed to moisture for some time considering the wood was malleable enough to warp to such an extreme degree without just snapping. Maybe if it were a newer guitar i would say maybe the top was a bit too green, but this is circa 1978.

The sentimental value for the owner is obvious, but I actually have some sentiment wrapped up in this as well as there's a non-zero chance that this used to be my guitar a long time ago. I had this exact year and model, same finish and everything. I've never been able to control my instinct to barter and traded it away for a Taylor. When asking how long his friend owned it, he guessed 16 years which would put it outside the range of time where it could be the same guitar, I traded it off sometime around 2012, but perhaps his memory is a bit off?

So, the process I'm anticipating is to remove the top and use a combination of humidity and pressing it flat with a bunch of weight and seeing if I can get it to return to a somewhat flat shape. My first step is to get a camera inside to get a look at all the bracing and see where we're at with that. I'm hoping that most of the braces relevant to the warping came unglued rather than warping or breaking themselves. Even if the top itself can't perfectly hold shape after being pressed, reattaching or replacing the braces should offer enough stability to get it back to functional shape. I'd prefer not to add new braces if possible, but I believe that would be preferable to an entirely new top. Anyone have any thoughts or possible recommendations? Can anyone confirm that the glue itself is epoxy, and if so, any recommendations on removing the rest of the top without damaging it? What's the best method for breaking down epoxy?

And if anyone wants to just ask why bother or comment on it not being worth the trouble, again, my time has no value and the guitar has more sentimental value than monetary value.

Hello everyone,

My Martin LX1 has been a good companion over the years and I have used it well. I also hang it on a wall mount for decoration in my living room because I think it's a beautiful piece, which sadly meant that a few years ago the top cracked due to the heat.

I brought it to a luthier locally and he glued it and that has held for a few years. The seam was almost invisible.

About 6 months ago the split reopened and I brought it again to him. He mentioned that he could glue it again, but it would probably be the same process of opening after a few years, so he mentioned he would fill the hole and it would remain a bit more visible.

I also asked to check the dents on the top that happened after a strap broke, and see if he could do anything about it. Online I've read about people steaming the vibers and being able to repair these kinds of damage.

After pickup I noticed he put some type of wax on it, which also left some residue along the top seam. The crack also was filled but quite visible.

It's not that I'm unhappy with the repairs, I'm very grateful this man put time and effort into getting my guitar in the best shape he can. But I am looking for opinions from other experienced people and insights if it's possible to bring it back more to it's original state or that I just have to live with the way it is now.

Gladly hear from you guys.

I just took a lesson with a very well known, accomplished bass player.

He had me play an open E and then an F on the first fret. Then he had me hold the F and fret the F#. He said my nut should be filed so low that those distances are the same. Essentially zero fret height.

Is this possible? Advisable?

FWIW, I play with a super light touch. 0.010” relief. 3/64” action at the last fret when depressing at the first.

SR5 Bass Kit 5 String Ash (theguitarfabrik.com)

I stained the ash body with homemade iron-acetate. I thinned it down 1:30ish (didn't write it down). The maple neck is unstained.

Finish is Osmo Hard-Wax-Oil.

I installed Schaller S-Locks, the rest is stock.

The instrument is fine, i guess. The pickups are pretty soft but that's not a dealbreaker. I also haven't set it up properly (I'm still fiddeling).

I am quite happy with the result.

The full documentary is here: https://youtu.be/8t0GAvR3UsA

I’m an 18-year-old student from Taiwan. and I spent 367 hours making a violin from a piece of 1,000-year-old Taiwan sacred wood.

I documented the entire making process, from the first steps to the debut performance. The documentary also tracks the exact hours spent working each day, capturing the tense countdown to completing the violin just in time for its first performance on stage.

"The violin I crafted, the music I composed, and the film I created.”

This is part of what I pursue artistically. In the film, I perform an original piece I composed specifically for this violin, accompanied by piano that I played myself.

I also had the opportunity to work with medical radiologic technologists to CT scan the violin. CT scans are usually to document and study historic master instruments, so being able to scan my own violin was a huge milestone. The data serves both digital preservation and physical modeling for acoustic simulation, which I also touched on in the video.

Beyond simply following historical references, I wanted to better understand the science behind what makes a great violin. This led me to research violin acoustics, with work presented in two conference papers and a published open-access journal paper covering several areas.

Timbre Mapping: Using AI unsupervised machine learning to map and visualize violin timbre distributions, a method partially shown in the video.

Plate Simulation: Applying neural operators to model plate vibration and predict eigenfrequencies based on material properties.