Official Luthiers Forum!

As mentioned earlier for many years now the Martin designed two-way has performed flawlessly in 100's of thousands of instruments, it does every thing it needs to do at a very reasonable price. In the Engineering world of "value analysis" these facts would place the Martin rod at the head of the pack. In other words to imply the Martin rod would be better if it were made of SS, or had brass this or that, silver solder joints (in fact they have real welds) etc. it would be a better product ---- no, those things would simply add to the cost while providing zero improvement in form or function.

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

Great points. I'm tending to agree. I think one simple reason I've tempted to go with the Flexstrong rod is simply so I can point it out to customers and say "Look at the amazing truss rod I use". Other than that I totally agree with you.

Some people have pointed out that sometimes a conventional steel truss rod can rust within the neck over years of time. Can anyone speak to this from experience? Would this only be seen in a guitar that has been poorly cared for?

Sure, happy to. We repair around 1,100 instrument annually, this year perhaps more at the current rate. It's very common for us to see corroded, rusted truss rods and it's also very common for us to deal with them appropriately.

Sadly though some players attempt to do all manner of things to get a seized rod free and that can lead to breaking them, stripping them, etc and then it can be a disaster.

Stainless is an improvement in my view but I also agree with our friend Ken that the vast majority of time the instruments that would benefit from this are not maintained well anyway AND it would add cost.

I'm personally a fan of both the Blanchard rod having over 50 of them in the field myself now with never a failure and I'm a fan of the Martin rod because it works great and has never given us any grief. We are Martin authorized for warranty work and work on Martins every day seemingly.

Most of all though use a truss rod and use a double action rod. In our climate guitars dry out and can go into back bow and sometimes permanently..... A double action rod can save the day and often does in our repair practice. The next incremental step if there is not a double action rod is to call the builder every name in the book.... and then listen to the client do the same when they have pay for a fret dress or refret to reshape the neck if the guitar is worth keeping at all..... If there had been a double action rod the adjustment may have been on the house and taken one minute........

Like it or not this is real world information and builders can benefit greatly from simply using a quality double action rod. Now you have two very good choices both are highly recommended here.

I'm about to use my first one, but I don't plan on using the filler strip as I'm following Robbie Obrien's online course, and he says he hasn't found the filler strip necessary. He's built enough guitars over the years to give me confidence in that advice. I think he uses the LMI rod, but the basic operating principle is the same.
Mike

Terry, I never glued them onto the top of the T/R. With the T/R epoxied to the filler strip and that same strip glued to the F/B, might cause some restrictions. I made the spacer to fit rather tight and clamped it down to seat the T/R tight and then ran a bead of medium cyano down each side. Then I shaved the shim down.
Mike, I never skipped the shim because ebony can be brittle and I think I might remember some folks mentioning cracked F/B's a long time ago with other two way rods. Something to think about when you are putting direct pressure on the F/B.

That is a good point Haans. Do you have an opinion on how thick and what kind of wood it should be to avoid the stress concentration on the fingerboard?
thanks, Mike

I have not epoxied them to the truss rod either although his instructions suggest that as an option. I also just fit a snug thin filler piece with a little Tightbond. Seems to work fine. I'll have to try CA.

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

+1

I used the same wood as neck and made it about 1/8" thick. After glueing, take it down to flush with mini plane and sand last bit flat with sanding block. You don't want much of a shim on top because you want a slim neck...probably less than 1/16" finished.

When installing a 2-way rod, you want to prevent noises by anchoring everything except the threaded rod (which normally has a sounddeadening cover). If there is any space no matter how small between the upper flat bar and the FB, it needs to be filled -- a wood strip makes this easy. Gluing the strip to the bar also discourages noises. On a soundhole-adjustable installation, a filler strip also allows you to angle the floor of the channel 1-2 mm, so that the adjuster and hex key clear the popsicle brace.
Blanchard has sound reasoning behind his installation recommendation. Perhaps if I was trying to build a guitar in less than a week I'd take a chance on a noisy rod -- me, I use a wood filler epoxied in place, and scrape it down the next day.


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