Official Luthiers Forum!

[QUOTE=Mattia Valente]I'm with Rick on this one; I'm no 'fretwork master', by any means, but feel confident doing refrets, setups, levelling, dressing and similar. Stewmac/Erlewine's 'Fretwork: Step by Step' is a good, relatively exhaustive text on, well, fretwork, but it all makes a lot more sense if you just do it. [/QUOTE]

Thanks Mattia! I will look for that to read and as I stated earlier I think I am going to make a guinea pig out of a free guitar I have sitting around.

_________________
Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils - Louis Hector Berlioz

Chansen / C hansen / C. Hansen / Christian Hansen - not a handle.

Christian

I have been playing guitar for at least 35 years, and probably a little longer. By no means am I a james taylor of guitar though. I can entertain myself with my playing and at least a few people enjoy listening to me, so I am quite happy with it.

From the beginning I have been interested in what makes a good guitar a good guitar and how bracing works, finishes, mitered purflings, and how the inside of most guitars are sanded to perfection. More importantly, how some guitars are just more playable than other guitars.

I took the time and money to go to a master of the craft for training when I got ready to build my own guitars. While I could spend years picking his brain, I just dont have the time or money to do so. SO instead I got as much knowledge from him as I could and then set out on my own to learn more of the finer parts of building high quality guitars. It must be known that quite a bit of time was spent with the master telling me how to make sure that the guitar is centered and then how to do proper setups and fret work. I didint realize it at the time, but now that I am doing it full time I know why he stressed these two issues so much.... they are important!

It just so happens that this morning I got a call from another guitar builder that has built kits and he wanted to bring his 13 year old neice over for me to do a setup on a $6 guitar she bought at a yard sale. Actually, this was a epiphone knock off with the old metal adjustable saddle, but the guitar wasnt near as bad as some I have seen. I went through the process with the setup and when she left she had a very playable guitar.....not the best sounding, but I challenge anyone to find any guitar that is more playable than that one.

You may ask why he brought the guitar and his neice over to me when he has the tools and knows how to build guitars??? well, it is because he knows I know how to properly set up a guitar and can do it quickly and properly. He knows how to do it, but to have someone that does it regularly and has educated themself in the art makes a difference.

I dont mean for any of this to sound "High Hatted" by any means, but I do know how to set one up. I just wish I could hear the story she tells her friends when she goes back up north of how she visited an old man in a garage that built expensive guitars and set up her $6 guitar to play like one worth several thousand. I hope her and her friends seek me out when they get through with school and want a really good guitar.  Good will towards others never comes back void and I believe that this is the best advertising I could possibly do.

The bottom line is that no matter how you take Rick's advise and opinion, he is right on the money with this one. The rice is in the setup.

_________________
Reguards,

Ken H

Rick,

I would like to thank you for your comments and for your participation on the OLF. Your professional insight and knowledge is of great value to our community. We are fortunate to have yourself and many other pros who share information between themselves and to us who are less skilled. But as with any public forum there can be different interpretations of postings and responses. As a result we should all try to be bit thick skinned and appreciate our sharing our knowledge and our differences. If we were all perfect or knew everything there would be no need of this forum. Instead we have a wonderful community of brotherhood/sisterhood who freely share their knowledge, experience, and desire to build stringed instruments regardless if they’re a one timer hobbyist or a consummate professional. I really like the way Wayne Clark said it “I am constantly amazed at the ease of posting a question to a forum like this and getting some help from somebody who really knows what they are doing. Of course the answer isn't always going to be what you want to hear. It’s another sign of maturity to be able to take criticism without tanking it personally.”

When I first read your posting it made me wince a bit since I have few music or woodworking skills. However, I do agree that you are speaking of the foundation for any stringed/fretted instrument. Without a proper foundation you can never reach the playability or intonation that should be required for a musical instrument.
This is my goal also on my current guitar build that will most likely be on only build. Between reading, the internet, and you gracious builders who share information, I have no doubt that my guitar will come out fine. I have also learned that if something goes askew and I am not satisfied that I can make it better. Maybe that’s the most important thing that I have learned here. I reworked the ukulele I built 3 times before I was satisfied and a couple of pro players recently gave me a great review on quality of sound and intonation. In the end, I think my guitar will sound better than average but I will accept average as it would be expected with my skills. I will however make sure it is properly set up and will play to the best of its ability. The looks will most likely be quite nice but I agree that is just window dressing for the instrument. Either way, I am a winner since it is a gift for my father and if it looks like a guitar and sounds like a guitar he will be delighted.   

Regards,

Philip

_________________
aka konacat

If you think my playing is bad you should hear me sing!
Practice breeds confidence and confidence breeds competence. Unfortunately, I'm stuck in practice.

[QUOTE=JJ Donohue]
After what happened to Mario last year, I swore that I would speak loudly lest the same injustice happen to the next master builder that might ruffle a few feathers. I don't want this forum to descend into one where mediocrity is our goal and that political correctness becomes far more important than fact. I don't believe that I'm the only one who feel this way either. [/QUOTE]

Right on, man.

Mario used to ruffle a few feathers 'round here. And I had occasion to get a little pi##ed at him. Now that he's not here I can see how much we need him and the other builders with chops to give us the occasional reality check.

Glad your here telling it like it is Rick, bravo.

[QUOTE=Rick Turner] OK, I give up, Old Man. The rice is bling wood and fancy inlay; it's fossilized ivory bridge pins and twelve layer purflings and rosettes that take forty hours to make.

The true lutherie gods are the musicians who play our instruments. We are their tool makers.

Think I'll head over to Traugott's and talk some guitar making details...[/QUOTE]


The gauntlet, boss, the gauntlet. All I said was Hmmmm.

I don't know you, Rick, and I've never seen nor heard one of your instruments. Nor do I particularly desire to. However, I do know many of the members here who seem to hold you in as high regard as you hold yourself, so I cede that you build great guitars. That's not what is offensive here. What's offensive is your attitude. Everytime you post it is just to toot your own horn. I've heard the Grateful Dead story before and I'm not impressed. Give me a builder who is very, very good and willing to share without belittling others. We have several of these world class builders and world class people here. Many may not be offende by your attitude, but many are. I would love to know all that you know, Rick, but I will ignore your postings until your delivery improves. Can you handle honest criticism?

Ron

_________________
OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

    Can I add my two cents to the recent back-and-forth that has been going on? First - I hate to even really get in the subject because this isn't why I come to the website and I get frustrated when threads get contaminated with politics. I come for help, to see peoples guitars, and talk as lightly as possible (there's enough friction at work). That's it. But unfortunately I am going to give my thought for what little it's worth.

    1) Writing is not typically good at expressing intent or emotion (that's probably why those little smileys were created). So things get misconstrued very easily and unintentionally. I didn't find Rick's initial posts to either this or the "buzz" thread rude... the buzz one was blunt yes, but I didn't read it to be intentionally rude - just stating his opinion. In this particular thread Rick answered quite thoroughly and directly which I appreciate.

    2) If someone were to tell me I have no business building guitars... I'd snicker and say "ok" and go about my business. At the same time if I was a longstanding professional luthier and I saw someone fumbling through a build while claiming to be a pro... I'd snicker and say "ok" and go about my business. I don't really see why either side should get too terribly defensive. 

    3) I'm not really on anyone's side here... can we just get back to our regularly scheduled program now and let things go?

And thanks again to all the great feedback to the question-at-hand!!  I took it to heart and I plan on doing a bit of focusing on the subject and hopefully some hands-on practice before the real deal.

_________________
Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils - Louis Hector Berlioz

Chansen / C hansen / C. Hansen / Christian Hansen - not a handle.

Christian

Ron, if the criticism were truly honest, I'd appreciate it. However it's not; it's whiny and in criticizing me, you refuse to address the issues at stake. This is from the kill the messenger school of Internet posting. It's coming from a wishy-washy "let's make excuses for not doing a good job" point of view that I find offensive to my professional standards. I see no reason why a dedicated amateur should not be held to high standards of functionality in guitar making if he or she wants praise for craftsmanship and artistry.     

I'm a good guitar maker, and I'm a better designer; I know my weaknesses and my strengths. I could be better at both tasks, and I work on being better at them every day, but I will not get better if I wallow in self-congratulations and cop-out, "it's only a hobby" kinds of excuses. If it is a hobby, learn how to do a decent job of it if you're making guitars.   Otherwise you might just as well be putting together wood inlay kits of the Last Supper and calling yourself an artist.

Fret work and setup work are at the very core of being a luthier. My point is that unless you can cover this kind of work, the rest of it simply doesn't matter; you're building wall hangers.   I, therefore, think that studying and practicing these skills should come very early on in the education or self-education of anyone who wants to fancy themselves a luthier.   And this is the Official Luthier's Forum, is it not?   I would propose that in the very act of posting here, each and every one of us puts him or herself up for judgment as "a Luthier". We also put ourselves up here to learn and get better, to share ideas, and to kick around some theoretical stuff that is at worst interesting and at best inspirational.

Also, the point of the GD story (and if you've read it before then you must find my career compelling for some reason) is that the ultimate boss is the musician. It simply doesn't matter whether or not you personally like the 'Dead; the story is about an interaction between client and luthier under extremely trying circumstances for both parties. It's a real world story of how things work in custom lutherie, and it's an example of what happens when you put your own work and your own ass on the line. That wasn't no-pressure amateur hour there that night. You think I'm being tough here?...try taking that kind of heat. Or, if you prefer a Willie Nelson band story, try being called up on stage in the first tune of a set just to plug a new bass in when the player hasn't figured out a five pin XLR cable. I am used to working under pressure, and I think that has made me a better luthier. I've had to fix instruments while they're being played on stage, so give me a break for being mildly critical when there is zero at stake here on a forum.

But perhaps I misunderstood. Maybe this is really just the Official Dabbler's Forum. Is that what it has become? Is that what you'd like it to be, Ron? You may be in the minority. I've gotten enough off-forum personal messages in the past two days to know that there are many here who want the standards raised.   

I'm all for anyone and everyone participating in our craft. I'm also all for a reasonable and logical approach to learning excellence, and a combination of books, videos, and Internet research for everyone, then perhaps attending a workshop or course in lutherie for those who want to be professionals, and then finally a couple of years worth of apprenticeship in a guitar repair shop is what I'd consider reasonable and logical. In training dozens and dozens of luthiers I've come to see that it takes at least four years of full time work...kind of the equivalent of going to college...to get to where you deserve to earn a living at this. Then there can be post-grad work...several years dealing with customers in repair and building instruments on the side is good. Then you may finally reach a point where you really are worth something in this profession.      

The "rice" or "bread and butter" work as I've always called it is fretwork,
nuts, saddles, and setups. A lot of folks go straight for the the more
romantic and idealistic goals of things like tuning a top or fancy inlay
before they understand how to make it playable, which is a mistake in my
opinion. Getting the basics down first is a rule for doing well in any trade
or hobby. If you want to go work on cutting edge quantum physics or
string theory, it's a good idea to brush up on your algebra and calculus
first.

The other big stumbling block for many is keeping the right attitude.
When my current apprentice first approached me I made it very clear that
after he spent his $20,000+ on professional training he should be
prepared for at least another year or so of listening to me telling him
"looks like crap, do it again". I have no intention of crushing anyones ego,
but I also don't like to waste time looking for nice ways to say he's doing
something wrong. If something's not right then I will say it's not right. I
think it's the best way to learn. At 3-4 months in to his apprenticeship
there have been a few "looks pretty good" moments, and I guarantee they
mean a lot to him.

Taking criticism at face value is imperative to improvement in any skilled
trade, whether you're a hobbiest, amateur, or professional. For example,
if you ask a question hoping for a simple answer, then a well established
professional comes back and says your approach is all wrong, try not to
take offense. It may not be of any help whatsoever in solving your
immediate problem, but if you consider the criticism in your continued
path of learning it can be much more valuable than the quick fix you were
looking for.

_________________
Eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation.

I think it is imperative that when we are privileged to have someone of Rick's credentials here, that we listen carefully to what he has said. Rick prefaced what he said very carefully, "with the risk of being offensive and rude to some people" as he said. This meant that he was going to shoot straight, and share with us from his wealth of knowledge and experience information that he holds near and dear to his heart about a craft that he makes his living at, and obviously loves. Sometimes raw honesty can be a hard pill to swallow, but nothing in his words should have been taken offensively, it was purely honest, and also on target. If we approach what he and others of his experience have to say with an attitude of humility, we will learn. We will be enriched. He's seen and experienced more in this industry than many of us will ever hope to. Because of that, we need to try to not be overly sensitive to honest criticism and appraisal. If I were a servant/apprentice to a Master of a craft, would I not heed the Master's advice, and take to heart the lessons given? I don't think Rick is here to belittle anyone in order to try to boost his own ego. Andhe's not trying to make light of what a hobbiest wishes to achieve. He was asked a question about what is at th e core of being on the path to mastering a craft, and he shared honestly what is the most important part of it, and gave some very good reasons why. He could go hang out anywhere, but instead, he chooses to share his knowledge and experiences with us.
For that, I feel honored, and humbled, and most fortunate.

Thanks Rick.

_________________
"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

I think the "rice" would being moldable.

Let me expand. When I first started I was so sure of myself that I could
make a world class guitar on my first try and that I would, in turn, sell it
for good money. When I finished the guitar it was clear to me that I had
fallen woefully short of my expectations. I had a friend tell me it looked
horrible. I was offended at first and somewhat hurt, but I quickly learned
that to make it anywhere in this business you not only have to have the
skill to build something that sounds and plays good, but you also have to
be able to take serious criticism on your work. Be it blunt or sugar coated
you have to be able to be objective about something that is intensely
personal and meaningful.

Let me share a more recent story.

Most of you know I work at McPherson guitars now. I went into the job
feeling like I would be able to step right in at the position and not miss a
lick. I have almost double the experience of any person in the shop.
Shortly after starting the realization came and hit me smack dab in the
face that some of these guys, many who had only been building for a few
years, were achieving tighter tolerances than I was. My work was easily
clean enough to pass at other places I'd worked, but I'm seriously
understating the fact that at McPherson they have, bar none, the highest
level of quality I've ever seen on a small shop guitar. No difficulty, but
intense scrutiny on things that any and every guitar maker I'd ever
met would not look twice at. McPherson used to outsource their guitar
making to another shop and only a few (literally a few) out of almost a
hundred were good enough to sell by their standards.

And so here I am, 11 years of building, 750 guitars or so under my belt,
ran my own business for many years, and I'm being told that I needed to
use scotchbrite for fingerprint removal on the inside top, that I missed a
few wood fibers that were stray, that a mitre join was not perfect after
looking at it under a 10X magnifying lens (I'm not exaggerating on any of
this).

I could have puffed my chest and touted how I had more experience, ect,
ect. But the fact remained I was being pushed to do something better,
and to better myself as a luthier. I swallowed my pride, and buckled
down to do better. One month later I was not being corrected hardly at
all, and I had a lower re-work rate than anyone in the shop. I still have a
way to go, but that fact will never change no matter how long I build and
no matter where or what I'm building.

So I say the rice of a luthier is knowing when to admit you can do
something better and doing what it takes to make that happen.

Along the lines of what Rick is talking about..the 7th guitar I ever built I
sent to a guy and he was having trouble with some buzzing because he
liked to play hard and liked really low action. I did not know how to
achieve that for him. He was in NYC so I sent him over to Roger
Sadowsky. I talked to Roger later and he fed me up a little crow. He said
the guitar was built nice (with the exception of some finish scratches that
did not get buffed out) but the fretwork sucked. I felt going on about
how it was only my 7th guitar, and I was still learning, and to give me a
break ect, but I didn't. I went out and bought some videos on fretwork
(frank fords) and sat in my shop for a week doing 2 fret jobs per day.
After the week was up I still had some issues to iron out but I was vastly
superior to what my skill was just a week earlier.

I'm rambling now, but my point is take criticism for what it should be
taken as. A opportunity to better yourself. Even if the person giving the
criticism means for it to tear you down in a negative way take it for a
positive and improve yourself.

_________________
John Mayes
http://www.mayesluthier.com

I recently got an instrument back from a client who, after a year of apparently being happy, complained that he had great difficulty making through a 3 hour gig.  I had been feeling OK about my setup and fret work til then but I realized I needed to take it to the next level and I'm still working on that.  I'd love to hear more about how to take fret work from good to unbeatable.  I'm particularly interested in what you were saying in another thread, Rick, about the factors that contribute to feel.  How two guitars with the same scale length and same action can feel different.  I've heard a lot of theories but none I've been able to buy into yet.

As for the rice question, I'd have to say that playability isn't particularly helpful or possible without the basic woodworking skills to build something structurally sound and with the correct geometry.  And a guitar that is strcturally sound and plays like a dream isn't worth beans if it sounds like a brick.  It's a package deal.  The apprentice model doesn't seem to be relevent because most of us are working alone.  There are some pretty decent factory guitars out there for $1500 and we need to be darn good at everything to compete as pros or make it worth our while as hobbiests.

_________________
http://www.chassonguitars.com

Kent, I'd suggest that one not seriously build guitars until having done a lot of setup work on other guitars.

Playability is an issue to grab a hold of BEFORE you make an instrument. I don't see how you can address some of the core issues of building a guitar unless you know how the end result is supposed to feel.

Of course you can get basic woodworking independent of guitar making...I did in a pretty good junior high school shop and then in my parents' basement as a kid. I was pretty band saw, table saw, jointer, and sander ready when I got out of high school.

I suppose I could go out on yet another limb and state that I think it really helps to be a decent player if you're going to build guitars. I could not design and build what I have and still do make unless I'd been a professional musician for three years. That gives me the ability to judge my instruments fairly objectively and gives me the vocabulary with which to communicate with my clients in a way that they trust.   My favorite customers are the real players, and my least are the collectors. The real players help me make better instruments; the collectors want little but surface perfection or something they saw someone play on stage and want to hang on a wall with which to impress friends.

Okay, an interesting discussion going on and I'd like to respond to alot of comments made. Unfortunately Im at work right now and barely have time to read the posts.

I have a question though.

1. I have workshop in which I make guitars.
2. I have 7 years experience at making guitars.
3. Ive done a 3 week building course with Dave Freeman and Paddy Burgin.
4. Ive built 5 guitars so far.
5. I play classical guitar (average ability).
6. My guitars get "loaned" to professional musicians many of whom like my guitars in preference to commercialy made instruments including Martins and Taylors.
7. I make mistakes but I always manage to rectify them.
8. My profession is Geology...guitar building is purely a hobby.
9. I can set up a guitar and can fret up a guitar to the point where the thing plays in tune and there are no buzzes.

So what am I? Not that titles really interest me.

What a great thread!  There are way too many good issues raised to address them all, but maybe a few...

There are certain endeavors in life where people with no experience and only rudimentary knowledge can buy a $15 business license, print up a box of cards and they're in business - and more or less get away with it.  How many of you have a brother in law that's a framer, deck builder, house remodler, whatever?

Guitar making falls into this category.  I suspect there are thousands of folks currently out there that have built one or more guitars, and most of those folks have more than likely sold some of their work.  I know a guy (he's a hobby builder) that has built a total of 7 or 8 guitars and is currently selling them for a base price of $3K.  Hmmm...  I wonder what the buyer is going to think when he wants some kind of warranty repair 3 or 4 years from now and the guy's new hobby is pen turning and he doesn't have a clue how to get the back bow out of the neck.

Novices who put themselves out there in the market generally, I said generally, make life more difficult for the true professional.  There are people who think because they built a deck in their back yard they can go be a contractor.  Just like there are people that have built a guitar or two and now think they are a luthier.

Rick is correct, it takes more than reading a few books and building a couple of guitars to learn the craft.  

I for one am firmly in the hobby builder category.  My goal is to build a guitar that excels in playability, tone and durability.  Unless and until that is achieved I have a responsibility to not take advantage of potential buyers and not dilute the market with product that is underpriced.   My "rice" is learning as much as I can as efficiently as I can from the best sources I can tap into.  Heck Rick, you've inspired me to get a couple of beaters to practice set up.  Do you think I should do that before I tackle a fret grind and polish on my Gibson L4?  

I have been have been amazed by some of the "custom hand built" guitars I've seen that had generally poor workmanship, bad design, not very playable, the list goes on.  Some of these have been by builders whose names you would probably recognize.  On the other hand the overall quality of many (most?) custom guitars is amazing and inspiring.

Rick - your comments may sometimes be bit hard on the old pride, but what you and others of your experience and depth of knowledge bring to forums like this is great and much appreciated.  You could consider a name change to RICE though. 

Christian,

A very interesting topic, and a few folks squirming in our seats: good for the soul.

I had to Google "fugu." (I'm a vegetarian who lives in a cave.) But, the shoe fits me. I don't want to make sticky rice, I want to start out learning to cook the fugu. (By the way, this is an admission of guilt, not beating my chest at the top of a mountain.) I have no desire to apprentice, yet I have the notion, the dream (most would say the fantasy) that I can engineer, design, and build world class guitars. Even worse, I don't expect it to take 100 guitars to get there. I'm not there yet, but I would already hand my first (and only) guitar to any world-class player on the planet to evaluate for sound and playability. I would expect the honest ones to pick it apart. I know my skills will get better, and my instruments will get better. I believe the fastest way to get there is to engineer, design, and build more instruments, rather than widen my focus too far.

Rick, may I offer an alternate analogy? I see the field of lutherie kind of like the medical field. There are incredible triage nurses that would save lives in a disaster, but they cannot do cardiovascular surgery. There are neurosurgeons that can remove tumors in the center of a brain, but would fumble the job of a triage nurse. And there are a rare few generalists that could jump from a plane in a war zone, land in a jungle, set up a one-person MASH unit, perform surgery with a twisted piece of sharp metal from an exploded shell, and pack the wound with blood coagulating spiderwebs gathered from the jungle. Your stories of front-line on-stage "show must go on" troubleshooting and repair, your abilities as a instrument repairman, your work with D-Tar, and your abilities as a renowned luthier put you squarely in the rarefied air of the surgical paratrooper that would make MacGuyver green with envy. From your vantage point, you may not be able to see that the aforementioned nurse and specialist surgeons do admire you and your skills, but do not want to (or simply know that they cannot) emulate you. Some luthiers want to perform just a specific subset of all the possible functions of a luthier.

In a lot of ways, the job of the generalist repairman/luthier is much more difficult than that of a builder. (Ask any home builder that has done some remodeling, and they'll tell you those are really two separate fields - and that remodeling is often more difficult.)

If and when I achieve my goal of creating world-class instruments, I will not consider myself an instrument repairman, nor would I dare to stand offstage thinking I could troubleshoot and repair even a guitar I had built while it was being played. If I never make any world-class instrument, it won't be because I spent time focusing on the depth and breadth of all things lutherie related.

I think a couple of excellent points have been made:

1.) Woodworking skills do not include anything akin to fretting and setup of an instrument (from the nut to the saddle.) Those are lutherie skills, that need to be mastered (or at least honed to a "journeyman" level) in order to build playable instruments.

2.)World-class instruments have nothing to do with the "bling" of gorgeous woods, inlays, or even the precision of execution. Even though John Mayes' story of being humbled by the McPherson QC criteria is powerful, (and I really appreciate it that he had the cajones to tell that story), "world-class" is ultimately defined by musicians, not luthiers or the guys in QC, and really should be judged with the lights off.

Dennis Leahy

_________________
Dennis Leahy
Duluth, MN, USA
7th Sense Multimedia

How many years does it take to learn how to be a good triage nurse? How many dead patients? How many rigorous exams and reviews by tough MD supervisors?   

I don't want a hobbyist triage nurse in the ER when I come in having bled out 4 units of Type O Positive blood...which happened to me in 1973. If some of the self-proclaimed luthiers I read here had been triage nurses that day, I'd be dead. I had pros working on me, and they were all superbly trained. I owe my life to people who took learning seriously.

Try another analogy. That one is a bit too close to home.

what i would have said has been well put well by rick and others.

i doubt it would be worthwhile to comment on the churlish behavior of those non-masters who would gainsay him.

Rick, I think I get your point and it's a valid one.  I have done a fair amount of fret work on other guitars and my guitars.  More than 50 and less than 100.  I also took a 3 day workshop with Frank Ford.  I've also studied with Charles Fox and Ervin Somogyi.  I have had only the one complaint in more than 10 years and that was partly due to the fact that the guitar went out new and never got adjusted after settling in.

I know how to do a good setup with good relief and good intonation and have been able to troubleshoot every buzz that's come my way so far.

As you've said, there's a lot of good info out there about basic fret work. What about putting together something more advanced?  How do you personally go about really dialing it in?  I know what you're talking about when you talk about feel vs. measureable action but I only have a few basic working theories as to what accounts for it.  Instead of just insinuating that I and others are deficient, give us some specifics to make us more proficient.  Help make this the board you want it to be with info for all levels.

_________________
http://www.chassonguitars.com

Without going into major photography sessions what I can tell you is this:

For traditional frets..."T" cross section with a crown, the key is in perfect fingerboard prep. You are referencing the fret tops to the fit between the underside of the crown and the fingerboard itself.   So if you get the fingerboard surface right and seat the frets just right and very evenly, then you'll have a near-perfect fret job.

The last person I taught how to do a refret is my admin assistant, Lisa Edberg.   She has good basic hand skills, she's a musician, and she was taught how to do inlay work several years ago by Ken Lawrence up in Arcata. She has a Gibson J-200 Jr. that is a very nice sounding guitar that played terribly. She wanted to sell it, and I suggested that she learn how to refret it and make it "her" guitar. I showed her how to heat the frets up with a resistance soldering device, and she then did a perfect job of taking them out. I then went over the use of radius sanding blocks and straight edges to check the fingerboard surface. She followed my instructions to a "T" (sorry for the pun...), and also really took in what I was saying...she understood the underlying principles I was explaining about perfect prep making it easier to get perfect results.   I then proceeded to do the first 7 frets, using the difficult to work "gold" fret wire from Germany. I showed her how to use the fretting hammer as a delicate tool...carefully tapping the frets down and not hammering in dents that cause the fret ends to want to pop up. Work modifying or bending frets is the absolute enemy of a decent fret job. Lisa did the job on the rest of the frets perfectly...better than anyone I've ever taught, and at least half the reason was that she simply followed instruction. She didn't try to outguess me on anything. She didn't try to overpower the frets with the hammer. She simply got it.   When all the frets were in...no glue...we checked every area with a set of straight edges, and she patiently tapped down the high frets until there was virtually no rocking of the steel anywhere on the fretboard.   Then I had her wick in superglue and clean it off as she went.   Then she did a preliminary job on the fret ends, and suddenly she had to leave.   What to do?   I said, "This fret job is good enough for you to play the guitar for a week without a fret mill." And it was. She put the nut back in with a thin shim, strung the guitar up, and played it for a week with hardly a buzz without having touched the fret tops with anything but a hammer.

And that is the goal. Put the damned things in perfectly and only file the ends. Everything you do in fretting should be toward that goal. We rarely achieve it, but with that being the goal, there is less and less fretwork to do around here.

If any of you come to Healdsburg, do come by and see the experimental ceramic fret installation I did on one of my electrics. We are working up a way to put frets in perfectly. Frets that not only need no level, crown, and polish, but these are frets which cannot be LCP'd. The material is a super hard ceramic that cannot be worked after installation. They simply have to be put in perfectly, and if they are, they'll last way past my lifetime.

And that's another example of how doing something that practically cannot be done by hand will improve your hand skills. You have to think about what is truly important and how to achieve it even if it's all brand new.

Playability is all about the line of the fret tops. How you get them perfect with minimal labor is the riddle. Step out of trad luthier mode and think about how a Silicon Valley inventor would approach the issue. Too many luthiers are stuck in the luthier box. Get out of it and think like a real problem solver, not a guitar weenie. I think that most solutions to guitar problems are now coming from outside the guitar box technologies.

Kent, recent discussions have got me a little more motivated to make a fret
work tutorial that I have been thinking of doing for some time. I use a few
techniques that I think are more inspired more from leveling plates in a
machine shop (hand leveling still far surpasses the most advanced CNC
work) than from other fret dressing techniques I've seen.

Perhaps I'll try to get a pictorial together by the week's end. I've been
spending my "spare" time working on new tuning, intonation, and
temperament paper (largely a critique of various compensation systems) but
it's rapidly turning from a 20-30 page paper in to a book. A fret dressing
tutorial may be a welcome break. I would do full refret, but I'm saving that
for when my new tool is completed - it's gonna be a good one...

_________________
Eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation.

[QUOTE=Rick Turner] How many years does it take to learn how to be a good triage nurse? How many dead patients? How many rigorous exams and reviews by tough MD supervisors?   

I don't want a hobbyist triage nurse in the ER when I come in having bled out 4 units of Type O Positive blood...which happened to me in 1973. If some of the self-proclaimed luthiers I read here had been triage nurses that day, I'd be dead. I had pros working on me, and they were all superbly trained. I owe my life to people who took learning seriously.

Try another analogy. That one is a bit too close to home.[/QUOTE]
Touche! But remember I said I want to cook the fugu, not serve it to the Emperor of Japan or my Mom.

My point with the medical analogy was one of specialization versus generalization. I do think your advice to do setups to learn proper setup technique is good, solid advice, but I don't think every guitarmaker needs to complete years of setups (and other functions that are the specialty of luthier repairmen) before building any guitars. If we all did, we'd all be a leg up on the (critical) functionality to make the guitar playable and intoned properly, but isn't it also true that completing 10 guitars hones a huge skillset that the non-builder, setup/repair luthier does not have?

It's also true that a forum like this provides a better platform for ooooohs and aaaaaahs from the photographs of beautiful instruments without knowing whether they would make a player oooh and aaah about the playability or the sound (even with supplied sound clips.) There are probably some gorgeous instruments shown here that are "guitar shaped objects", but I think you might be surprised how many of these instruments are actually very playable and very good sounding instruments. Remember, the current crop of beginning luthiers have an incredible array of talented, experienced luthiers (as formal instructors, as mentors, in forums, in books, on DVDs) to quantum-leapfrog past many of the mistakes/negative attributes that beginning luthiers had to struggle through not too many years ago. (I took my first stab at lutherie about 25 years ago, when there was Sloane's and Young's books and not much else.)

Dennis

_________________
Dennis Leahy
Duluth, MN, USA
7th Sense Multimedia

Thanks David, I'll look forward to seeing what you come up with.  I'll even read your book when it's done but 20-30 pages would suit me better than a whole book!  Having a kid has slowed my reading.  Unless you want to write it in Dr Suess rhyme....

Rick (or others), when you have time, some more specific questions....

What about your board?  Are you starting with something like a compound radius with the goal being a flat line under each string path? 

Do you build in any relief or count on tension to pull in the correct amount in the correct place?

Why is it better to level the board before fretting and have the frets build in back bow (vs. pressing frets in a board and then gluing it to the neck flat)?

Do you account for different amounts of backbow induced by different densities of fretboard material?  I find, using the same size slot, brazilian seems to bow less than ebony when frets are installed, presumably because it's less dense and the barbs dig in more.

What do you do if you get a neck that looks good with no tension but the strings pull the relief in the wrong spot (too close to the nut or more on the treble side than the bass)?

Should this be in a new thread?

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http://www.chassonguitars.com

Dennis, would you eat fugu you had prepared, unsupervised, untrained, and unschooled? Would you prepare fugu not knowing how to sharpen your own knife?

I consider fretwork and setups to be so essential to guitar making that they come in at that level...that of knowing how to sharpen a sushi chef's knife to do a job that if not done well can result it...well, you know! It's crawl before you walk before you run level stuff. And yes, it's a hell of a lot easier to learn now, so why should anyone avoid it? For the ego gratification of making a GLO and presenting it on the Internet as a guitar, that's why. I am not the ego run wild here...the ego rampants are those who value web presentation over playability.   Then there's sound...but I don't want to muddy the waters here with that; it's a much more subjective subject than playability which is subjective enough as it is.

I'm not going to beat this dead horse anymore. Suffice it to say that I think that those who do not study and master the basics are way off track here. Use the hobby excuse if you want to, but to paraphrase Orson Welles in a famous tv ad, "We'll use no excuse before it's time..." There are only lame excuses for not learning how to make a guitar play well if you want to be considered a luthier on the Official Luthier's Forum. In my humble opinion :-)!

[QUOTE=Rick Turner]Without going into major photography sessions what I can tell you is this:



For traditional frets..."T" cross section with a crown, the key is in perfect fingerboard prep. You are referencing the fret tops to the fit between the underside of the crown and the fingerboard itself.   So if you get the fingerboard surface right and seat the frets just right and very evenly, then you'll have a near-perfect fret job.


[/QUOTE]

Up to this point I have the rim nearly completed, back and top plates joined and a rosette inlayed. Not much, but making progress at least. I am not only new to building guitars, but also to woodworking in general. Not even a Jr. High shop class to put a notch in my belt.

I think the neck, fretboard, frets, intonation, and such are to me the most intimidating to think about when thinking of lutherie. It has to be so.... perfect.... which I won't be able to accomplish. This is probably why I started on the body first - I admit I am just plain nervous to move to the next stage. I have a starting point now though, I will get a book, check the archives and maybe even do a refret first. But I have a few questions that your last response got me thinking about.

As I was typing Kent actually asked a couple of these questions -

When doing the initial fret install, do you go straight to sanding block or do you use a hand plane to start? Compound radius (Kent asked)?  I have many more questions but I suppose I should hold back for now.

Thanks,

_________________
Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils - Louis Hector Berlioz

Chansen / C hansen / C. Hansen / Christian Hansen - not a handle.

Christian