Official Luthiers Forum!

I've had a lot of contact with StewMac in the last 6 months and it's been all very positive and appreciated and I wanted to share this here.

In the age of more Lutherie tool sellers and producers I wanted to share some of our recent experiences.

For the power fret crowning tool that Dave developed and that gets used in our shop every day we tried every diamond crowning file alternative on the market. Only the StewMac files did not dull or have the abrasive fall off... in a very short period of time during our trials. I will not mention names with the exception of StewMac whose files were in a completely different league performing flawlessly in our trials. I personally own 16 year old StewMac files that I still use nearly every day commercially.

As you know I just completed the 5th StewMac amp kit build and it is now my primary amp a 66 Deluxe Reverb clone. When I fired it up the first time it worked flawlessly the first time with no mistakes and nothing to chase down. With some of the other amps I built I did require Stewmac assistance at times and they were always there for me often in only a few hours the same day. I am thrilled with StewMac support.

And I recently asked them for warranty replacement of 10 nut slotting files and they with very little requirements on my end, no receipt required quickly sent me 10 brand new files. The files I turned in had been used thousands of times and we only use quality bone for the nuts that we produce suggesting that our files had reason to dull over time. Many of the files I turned in were 15 years old of more with daily use. We also used these files with light cured dental fillings, harder than bone so they had some heavy use.

With this said as a commercial, high volume shop we received thousands of uses from our StewMac tools and then when the time came they gave us brand new ones.

It does not get any better than this and the warranty they provide is real and extends the value indefinitely in our direct experience.

With this said StewMac continues to be in my view the industry leader in innovative, well made tools that last very long times and represent real value to both hobbyist and professional. If hobbyists think that cheap tools may be OK for you we found other flaws in the alternatives too that were deal breakers such as poor precision that produced lesser results.

Lastly there is a progression here on the OLF that we sadly see but such is life. Someone comes to the forum, builds and participates for a few years, disappears and then reappears in the classifieds selling all their tools and getting out of the hobby. If this could be you StewMac tools will to some of us be worth far more when you go to sell them than some of the cheaper alternatives that we found not to be ready for prime time and in some cases.... junk.

* Disclaimer I am not affiliated with StewMac in any way I simply appreciate quality stuff and superb results.