Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi Guys,
I'm doing my first fingerboard replacement on a Takamine EAN40Cx and I have a question maybe someone with more experience than I have could talk me through.
I measured the scale from nut to mid 12th fret (322.5mm) but from the 12th to either saddle that length doesn't reach, in fact its about 3mm short.
322.5x2=645mm which would equate to a 25.4" scale length for a pre cut finger board, but if the scale is out by that much at the saddle what are my options.

Do I buy a fingerboard for the guitar for the advertised scale (which is the 25.4" confirmed by my 12th fret measurement) and just replace it as the old one was (but is wrong at the saddle going by the measurements) Any advice is gratefully anticipated. What would you guys do?. I have removed a few fingerboards by now so I'm pretty comfortable with the mechanics of the job, but this is just making my head ache. Am I over thinking it?

I have had my measurements confirmed by another guitar tech guy but he's never done a fingerboard replacement and tends to specialise in the electrics side of guitars and amps, though he does understand the theory of my issue. (Coincidently I have a different Takamine in for refret this week and though its a different scale and model of guitar, the scale measures just about perfect at the saddle, as I would have expected)



This last pic is the second takamine with the 12th fret measurement indicated by the red tape and it looks much more as i would have expected the other one to have.


Thanks guys

The distance from 12th to saddle should be a fraction longer than but to 12th - this is compensation, to keep the intonation good as you stretch the strings by fretting them.

If the guitar has good intonation then work from the nut to 12th measurement.

But, i believe that some suppliers calculate the scale to include compensation, others as 2 x nut-12th. Other posters may know details. Worth checking out when you order.

You are seeing compensation as Prof. Chris said. I don't have my shop notes near by but it should be around .080 - .100 of an inch. You can do the conversion.

My first thought was why are you replacing fret boards? And then I read that you've done a couple of them and are comfortable with it.

Replacing a fret board and doing it well with no tell tale that it was ever done is not easy.... AND very rarely has to be done. Why all the fret board replacements?

Customer requests it and to be fair, the wear is bad in places. This had 12 stainless steel frets put in about ten years ago as a partial refret and it was it's third refret then (not by me, but I remember it being done ) the wood has worn round and low and is hard for him to play, outer strings wont stay on frets as they're worn at the edges now too and replacing the frets so that this wouldn't happen is hard as theres no wood for the fret to sit on at the edge. I could try cutting a new nut and force the strings into a tighter space but he's not into that as he has big fingers, in some spots its worn so the tang is visible - originally none of them were. I'm basically doing as the customer requests. he plays hard 7 nights a week and he's worn this out like crazy in some spots the fret tang is visible from above when its laid on my bench looking down on it and as I just looked at it now, so are the fret markers on the top of the neck at frets 3,5 and 7.....this is a real old working guitar, it's almost through on the soundbpard too but I cant persuade him to retire it and just love its service given. Thats what I'd like him to do, but he's insisting we give this a go. I can't see him being bothered about no tell tale signs, although I will do my absolute best to make it as good as possible. My experience of this tells me that the more care i take getting the old one off will be a factor in how it ends up finished. It's a challenge for sure. Thanks for the help guys.

Thanks Marc that makes perfect sense. I love real working instruments and musicians.

We recently did a number of basses for someone we all have heard many times. From the Tonight Show, Miles Davis he's on the recordings or was on TV and we got to work on his basses.

It's amazing how some of the most beat-up instruments can be the best sounding.... in the hands of course of someone who knows what they are doing.

Me too, I did a fret stone/level on a very well used and beaten up Lowden that the client prohibited me from doing any cleanup beyond what was absolutely necessary for the job as it had "me auld brothers blood in it" from a fight that broke out on stage between them years before. Another guitar with more miles on it than it was strictly built for given the extra curricular punishment doled out to it in the course of a normal gig. Nice to see them being used.

I completely agree Marc.

There is a sort... of client that we get once in a while who's all stressed out and may be suffering from erectile dysfunction over a 1/8" scratch that they may have done or their kid or who knows what. Once I actually can see the thing... and I am speaking of imperfections that you have to look for depending on the client I have two standard answers.

Answer one for client who we like: Great now you can relax and enjoy the thing.

Answer two for client who may be an arse hole: Now you have an opportunity to stop compensating for being a lousy player and actually learn to play the thing.....

Nice to exchange some real world stories Marc, take care.

Going back to the original post for a sec, I'm still a little puzzled....being a 0.100 out you mean either way of a centre line that spans the compensated saddles? in my case with this guitar case the scale length doesn't reach the saddles from the 12th - not at the high E and even further from the Bass E - it falls about 0.100 short of any saddle contact on even the closest E abd G strings....where as in the last photo, the other guitar thats there for comparison only - the 2x12fret measurement line falls directly between the outer edges of the compensated saddles.....what I'm trying to understand is one of them must be wrong? or is it ok to be a whole 0.100 away from the string touching a saddle. the manufacturers spec is 25 3/8" scale but it falls well short. maybe I'm missing something in terms of my understanding of compensation, which I'm thinking is the case as I still cant get my head around it being so far short.

Put your measurements into the fret calculator on the stewmac site and compare it with their saddle location. It may solve your problem.

Bob

I don't think you’re over thinking it. It must be made right. But I would'nt spend too much time trying to figure out why Takamine botched it.
You need to either work backwards from the distance between your nut face and saddle break points, (Find a scale length + compensation that fits that distance), or move the saddle or bridge so the scale+ compensation is correct for the fingerboard you get or make.
Published scale sizes from guitar manufacturers are often not the same as the length they use to lay out the frets. The number used to calculate fret spacing is what I call scale length.
Some fretboards don't have the nut end cut exactly at the #0 fret position. So, measuring from the nut end to the 12th may not equate to 1/2 the number used for spacing the frets.
If you’re not going to move the saddles or bridge, the only wiggle room to fit a nominally cut fingerboard would be changing the nut thickness.
A fret spacing calculator (like the one on stew mac's site) would be a good place to plug in available fingerboard scales, add compensation, and see if the total fits the distance you measure on the instrument. The compensation their calculator recommends works for "typical" string heights and gauges. I think the also have a description of how their compensation numbers relate to saddle position.

http://www.stewmac.com/FretCalculator?g ... ArOE8P8HAQ

Any chance this guitar has a 650mm scale length? Not uncommon among 'offshore' instruments. Not all manufacturers mimic Martin's scale lengths.

_________________
Peter Havriluk