Official Luthiers Forum!

As a player of over 40 years there are things about steel string guitar construction that I have never understood.

1/ Truss rods. Why? Surely with carbon fibre and modern engineering a neck that doesn't bend with nimsey wee wee modern strings 11-50ish or less is possible. I know Vigier produce necks that don't need truss rods.

2/ Fret board radius. Why? The classical and flamenco guys play massive 2" nuts with FLAT fret boards.
Doesn't seem to cause them a problem. I move between several nylon string flat boards to steel string radiused boards. Flat is cool. Just think how much easier this would be for set ups etc.

3/Why do some makers still dish the bass side of an electric neck. I hate this because they never play as well as a flat board IMO. An electric is never going to be thrashed like an acoustic and PAs have reduced the necessity to thrash an acoustic any way.

I know this is controversial but I like a good debate!

"Truss rods. Why? Surely with carbon fibre and modern engineering a neck that doesn't bend with nimsey wee wee modern strings 11-50ish or less is possible. I know Vigier produce necks that don't need truss rods."

Sure it's possible to make a neck that will not flex but relief in the right amount is desirable and please don't call me Shirley.... Truss rods are often what saves the day later in a guitar's life when someone wants very heavy or very light strings outside the norms. Truss rods are also key to precision fret dressing and a good Luthier can manipulate the rod to even improve a neck angle on a guitar soon to need a neck reset during the leveling process. Stuff happens too, guitars dry out, get abused, makers use green wood, etc. having the ability to shape the neck in both directions (double action) is cheap insurance. By the way not everyone likes a guitar set-up the way that you or I might.

"Fret board radius. Why? The classical and flamenco guys play massive 2" nuts with FLAT fret boards.
Doesn't seem to cause them a problem. I move between several nylon string flat boards to steel string radiused boards. Flat is cool. Just think how much easier this would be for set ups etc."

Not everyone is a classical or Flamenco guy and it's not uncommon for even the differences in radius between Fenders and G*bsons to be problematic for some. Wayne Henderson I believe builds with a flat board and did so with Clapton's guitar when not eating blueberry pie or having a turkey buzzard take a dump on his windshield. But not everyone likes a flat radius board AND there is tradition as well to consider.

"Why do some makers still dish the bass side of an electric neck. I hate this because they never play as well as a flat board IMO. An electric is never going to be thrashed like an acoustic and PAs have reduced the necessity to thrash an acoustic any way."

Terms please: by dish do you mean impart more relief or scallop the fret board? Relief is important for lower action with a bit more on the bass side desirable and a bit less on the treble side being desirable. YMMV

It sounds like you have your preferences, me too, but it also sounds like your not allowing for the fact that lots of folks like very different set-ups for very different reasons. We have a jazz pro player who played with Joe Pass who likes action so low that it would not be possible without the very best fret plane possible in terms of precision. We also have a pro jazz player who likes action high enough to hang out your laundry to dry.

Regarding electric players not being heavy handed ever watch a video of Pete Townshend? For acoustic players how about Richie Havens and Woodstock?

Different strokes for different folks.

Thanks for your erudite and informed opinion.

However I still think a lot of this stuff is just based on...... well that's just how it's always been done.
None of my queries stops different set ups for different styles.

Why does the fret board need more 'relief' on the bass side? Why not just lift the string a little higher on that side. The relief thing makes no sense to me. The max point of string vibration happens depending on where the string is fretted (not always around the 10th 12th fret) no matter how hard you play.

If the guitar is non flexible and the board is dead flat in every respect then 'Shirley' a perfect set up is a sinch??? Has anyone made such a guitar? I had an aluminium neck Kramer once that came close.

You're welcome.

Sorry but you are operating with some misconceptions and relief is one of of them. The bass strings are positioned higher both at the saddle and the nut but that's not good enough to prevent the moderate player, in terms of being heavy handed from getting the bass strings moving enough that they will interfere with the frets. That's where relief in conjunction with a higher cut nut slot and higher saddle for the bass strings does do the trick for the vast majority of players. To a lesser degree the same holds true for the treble strings and the treble side of the neck is typically set for less relief but relief is still necessary to prevent string lash from interfering with the frets.

Sure where you fret is a function of where the strings will lash the very most but typically guitars are built with the capability to be played without unnatural acts over the entire fret board even though some styles of guitars won't have this happening and of course some players have arrested development with cowboy chords.

A dead flat board, no radius, no relief should not be easy if even possible to set-up either because again relief is necessary to prevent the strings from interfering with the frets.

You are most certainly free to experiment and learn what you are interested in and that's part of the fun of Lutherie. I'll add though that the more that I learn the more I understand that "tradition" is often far more than simply how things may have been done in the past. The Martin style built and braced acoustic guitar for example is actually a wonderful evolution of technology, woodworking, material science, and player requirements often for emerging styles of music too as well as traditional tunes. The expression "everything for a reason" holds very true with some of the traditional designs for both electrics and acoustics.

My advice to everyone has always been we all approach Lutherie with the idea of making a better mouse trap and some will indeed come up with innovations that are worth while. This is also very rare by the way.... because of all the good work that has been done before us. But I always advise folks to read and learn all you can about how things are done now, in the past etc. before reinventing the wheel so to speak or you may find that your innovation is actually something that has already been thought of and should be attributed to someone else. It may not be beneficial either....

Most of all though what exactly is wrong with current and traditional guitar design that won't get you where you want to go even though it does get 99.999% of current players very much where they want to go. Or, in other words, just exactly what problem are you trying to solve?

PS: Glad you got my Shirley joke!

Had another thought that I wanted to share. Classical guitars typically have much higher action than acoustic steel string or electric guitars and Flamenco guitars have even higher action. As such the fret plane, relief, radius of the board, etc. are not nearly as critical so perhaps we should be specific about what kind of guitar it is that we seek discuss?

A lot of modern classical guys are now going for slightly lower actions. I have to disagree about flamenco actions. In my experience the flamenco guys play with crazy low actions. It's part of their sound.

I fully get the relief thing on a purely acoustic. But on any electric with adjustable bridge, PUs, pole pieces, I don't get it.
Also on all of the guitars I have owned/played the issue of the relief is that when the fret board passes onto the bodey of the guitar the relief stops and it goes flatish. On a moderate action this results in worse buzzing when fretting higher at say the 8-10 fret.
Martins were designed for players who had to thrash their guitars to be heard pre amplification. Mostly playing open chords at the nut end. Things are different now. I recently read that James Taylor now plays an action '' just a bit higher than buzzy''.
However as you say. Horses for courses. We all want our own thing when it comes to guitars.
By
Cheers Shirley

I set-up around 25 guitars a week and these are not store stock but belong to folks who want the set-up that they want. The vast majority like low action and just a tad beyond buzzy for how THEY play. Mind you this is as individual as all of us are so it's important to have some understanding of how your client plays, what they play, even age can be a factor in that younger and older dudes and dudettes often benefit from very low action in so much as the hand strength is not there for anything else.

Regarding the fret board extension, the part that goes over the body be it acoustic or electric sure you are correct no relief there but it is desirable to have "fall-away" and certainly no kick-up or ski ramp on the extension. Fall-away could be described as having the very same benefit as relief and for the same reasons.

My comments are independent of amplification because not everyone plugs-in and most of the amplified acoustics are rarely played that way in my experience. Maybe that's why I frequently see 10 year old Martins with no battery installed or an old crusty thing that is dead as can be.

I like action just above buzzy by the way but it's also a function of what I'm playing. When playing Purple Haze on my strat Hendrix was pretty heavy handed with those hams he had for hands and to begin or even dream of sounding like him I tend to have to get heavy handed too which means my action has to go up to play his stuff.

When I play say Leonard Cohen low action is fine but when I play Pinball Wizard I need much higher action or my windmills buzz out....

Anyway the beauty of Lutherie is that you my friend can do what ever you like and build what ever you like too, always and that's a good thing.

I'll add one more thing. We frequently work on small builder guitars too including some of the very best of them. In my experience builders who do something way out of the norm may not have their intentions understood as time passes, the instrument changes hands, etc. As such if anticipating building for clients it's a pretty good idea to keep the idea of serviceability in mind in so much as it represents greater value for your clients AND you won't have someone such as I coming along 20 years later not understanding what the original intentions were.

I would suspect that a week does not go by that we don't have to tell someone that their guitar, their life long buddy is toast without major surgery and a very big expense. It's not a pleasant position to be in trust me and I take no joy in being the one to inform people of this either. So again if building for clients convention and serviceability can represent greater value as opposed to a "disposable" instrument with a non-serviceable neck joint, maybe it was finished with the neck on, or a host of other things that builders may do that create real issues for their clients down the road.

None of this comes into play with personal guitars that we build for ourselves but you never know if you build them right they should last 100 years or more and so too will what ever we do that others may not appreciate.

Regarding the flat neck with no relief and built to never flex. Instruments, successful instruments will need to be refretted in time. Martin until the 70's did not use truss rods making them more complex to service in so much as we Luthiers have impart relief by using various fret tang thicknesses in strategic locations to shape the neck as we wish. It's not a lot more difficult but compression fretting is an art unto itself and not everyone is good at it or has even ever done it. It's just so very much easier to have a neck that you can adjust if you wish even if flat is the goal.

Lastly for now before Shirley II signs out for a while guitars dry out and the dissimilar materials used to make the neck expand and contract at different rates. If the wood is prevented from reacting naturally as it will with say CF or steel reinforcements something will have to give at some point. With the pre-truss rod Martins the neck can still flex including into back bow if dried out too much. If we engineer a neck to never move, and we most certainly can, perhaps wood is not the best material choice since it will want to move sure as shooting and if it can't over time we may see some splitting or cracking.

talking about me behind my back again, eh?

shirley this is true...and heavy handedness often (and shirley in my case) extends to the left hand and requires specific compensation to sound true

OK, I did wonder about the effects of expansion/ temperature and the two materials. Perhaps you could make an entire neck from ebonite?
I play just finger style or with the side of my thumb. I accept that I might be in a minority.

Ok guys keep building those bendy guitars with the bendy corrector thing so that if the guitar bends more than the amount of bendyness expected it then can be bent backward to counteract the original overbending.

Hey md,
I ask "why" a lot too.
The main reason for all these things is picky players, (ha !).
Some players want super low action,
and the relief, and truss rod can really dial that in.
Flat vs radius?
I could care less one or the other.
One adjusts to what is there,
at least I do.
Some can't.
Oh, why didn't you mention the different scale lengths?
I never had a problem adapting to the different lengths,
and never noticed any tonal difference.
You put your fingers where the frets are, right?
Don't get me started on bridge pin angles!

Scale lengths !!! I forgot.

I've learned answers or reasons for everything mentioned so far and don't really question why they are unless it's something new.
Sometimes I learn more about them which may change everything or nothing at all. ( I do wonder/question whether or not I could make improvements)

I'll add that compound radius, neck profile, finish, fretwire type/size, fretboard (wood type-scalloped or not) haven't been mentioned
(or I missed them) which are also for players feel, preference or perceived improvement of function. ( such as SS frets have a better tone to their ears)

I can't get my head wrapped around a debate about whether or not there should be only one type of neck- one size, one scaled length, one profile, one material of construction, one nut, one radius, one finish...etc. (if that'a what this thread is about)

I can understand a player explaining why they have a preference for something such as a short scale because it's easier for them to bend strings and make chords due to the closer fret span and lessened string tension opposed to a longer scale. (we know not all hands are created equal...or should)- not to mention other features they may prefer such as radius with an example being that a player doing mostly rhythm finds a radius of 9.5 just feels better and doesn't tire their hand compared to a 12"-14" or flatter. (understanding the reasons for the radius selections and scale lengths- is there a debate about the reasoning?)

The questions about these are either me asking myself what I prefer or me listening to another player answering my question what they prefer...not really "things" that I would debate but more of an opportunity to share knowledge about them.

I think Fender and Gibson defined the standards, most folks probably learned to play on one or the other. I grew up playing Gibson, so the board radius and neck angle feels correct to me.
A fender feels awkward to me, but natural to other players.
The early designs were influenced by players as they are today.
Hardware, such as truss rod, tuners, bridge, etc, can always be improved with new innovations, but I am content using current stuff because it has been proven to work.
Choices are mostly personal preference.

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As to adjustable truss rods, I fall back on two main principles. First is that our concept of stiffness is often grossly unrealistic. When I am setting up my old radial arm drill press, with extremely heavy duty 3" steel frame, just the weight of my hand rested on the head will bring a few thousandths deflection. A 4" thick granite surface plate must rest on 3 feet, because if you try to support it on 4 it will shift and distort to irregularities of the bench it rests on. We might be tempted to think of steel, carbon fiber beams, titanium, whatever, as stiff, and although relatively speaking they are, this stiffness is far from absolute. Put them in the context of a 7/8" thick beam of a neck however, and the fact is it will move and deflect, sometimes immediately, and to another level with stress over time. What we like to think of as stiff and stable, once put in to application rarely seems to be as invincible as one would think.

Second is that players styles and demands differ. There are many different styles of attack, each imparting a different wave shape in the strings. In my personal opinion, even if one could build an infinitely stiff neck which would never move, it is a bit arrogant to assume that the straightness or degree of relief you determined to be ideal would apply equally to all players who may eventually own that instrument. Attempting to lock the neck in to a predetermined straightness or curve not only impedes serviceability over time, but also unnecessarily removes choices from the player.

Which brings us to why relief can be necessary. It isn't always needed, and many players will do well with a perfectly straight neck. As mentioned above however, different playing and attack styles impart notably different wave forms on the string, many of which cause wave amplitude to carry much higher toward the ends of the string that our image of the ideal parabolic harmonic wave form. If waves always took the shape they do in simplified pictures of harmonic waves, relief would be totally unneeded. They don't though, and this is why there is a whole range of straight necks being great for shredders and pop-n-slap bass, to ample relief for claw hammer banjo and traditional Gypsy jazz, and everything in between. Relief is a necessary evil so to speek, a compromise to allow for "imperfections" imparted to the string wave by different players to varying degrees.

Fretboard radius - there's not a better or worse, but simply varying needs for ergonomics and comfort. While traditional classical styles with large flexible low tension strings lend well to flat boards, most steel string players find less fatigue and more comfortable chording with varying degrees of radius to the board.

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Eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation.

When I first started playing seriously I thought a perfectly flat fret board would be ideal. Until I got one. I HATED it! Not because it was different or non-traditional, but because it made my fingers cramp when I tried to play it in the position I prefer. Yes, I could have raised my strap way up and tilted the neck up to put it in a classical playing position, but that's not what I want.
The first guitar I built had a 10" radius and I really like it. I've already ordered a fretboard for #2 and it's also a 10" radius. And I bend like crazy.

Speaking of action, I basically play an electric the way Richie Havens played acoustics. I make Pete Townshend seem a bit light-handed. Every guitar I've ever owned needed a bit of truss rod adjustment at one time or another except the one that had no truss rod. Which then warped and made the guitar virtually unplayable. COULD the necks have been made in such a way that they were impervious to any bending? Possibly. Would I be fine with a metal or carbon fiber neck that is far too rigid to ever need adjustment? Sure. But if there's wood involved it IS going to move sooner or later unless it's in a sealed, climate-controlled chamber.

I think a better "Why?" question would be "Why do so many guitars have two or three pickups when so many players only ever use one?" or "Why do electric guitars typically have 22-24 frets when there should be a law against playing above 18 or so?"

I think a better "Why?" question would be "Why do so many guitars have two or three pickups when so many players only ever use one?" or "Why do electric guitars typically have 22-24 frets when there should be a law against playing above 18 or so?"

2 reasons I can think of for the 2 or 3 pickups.
1 is many tone choices.
I like 2 pups, personally,
but Strats have 3,
and what's nice about that is the tones you get from putting the switch between 1 and 2,
or 2 and 3!
The reason for the 22-24 frets is to play really high notes!

The truth is guitars are like people..... Deeply flawed. Perfection does not exist. This keeps the guitar making industry in business and the guitar buying community forever frustrated.

"Perfection" is a goal and can be reached. "Tolerance" is one of the reasons why.

It's simply if one recognizes it or not. Surely you agree and understand when people state something like "I love it! It's perfect!". "I love it just the way it is, I wouldn't change a thing". etc.

From this thread and your other I think I understand why your opinion that the guitarist and industry is frustrated and deeply flawed.

I think it's horrible that if what I think has happened to you did...you have been put in a corner and you have a guitar in a troubled state and the only person (luthier) to help correct the issue(s) failed.
Now you see no satisfactory resolution, everything sucks and if it's going to work out you're going to have to do it yourself.

I also think that you have been given some excellent advise about what it may take to correct the issues by some very competent luthiers.
You've also been told that it is hard to give you better advise because the guitar can't be seen- and you offered no pictures to help those trying to help you.

The way I read it...you just want to vent. I understand but don't you think that everybody will agree with your opinions of guitarist, guitars and the guitar industry.

Good luck with it all.

Well I think it's possible that manufactures added truss rods to help with warranty-not everyone is going to treat guitars the same way and many were coming back warped twisted with many problems.
Fret board radius allowed for more appeal to more people.
Personally I tend to look at as an obvious evolution of the instrument which I may add enhanced the development of music in areas such as technique.
As for 3 I think it helps increase the range in dynamics and expression, to be able to beat the guitar-
-I feel later 20th century brought about the need for more dynamics and artistic expression as folks veered off composed set style of music of the earlier era and adopted more artistic freedom.
Luthiers adapted to changes in the artist requirements, and still do.
Just look at the plethora of high end ,7,8,9 string electric offerings coming out in these days Djent and other extreme range and sonic requirements for artists to explore.
Now that's just my take on your questions-maybe in the end, like everything else, it just because we could or can?

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You just pick up a chord, go twang, and you're got music. -Sid Vicious