Official Luthiers Forum!

Anyone know where to get such a beast in good quality? I really like the Galalith pins that Stewmac sells but alas they are not black.

Why plastic? Get some nice ebony ones instead! Bob

The client wants plastic, the client gets plastic

Antique Acoustic pins (from the same people behind the B&H Martin reproductions) are available from Elderly Instruments and are made from a hard plastic similar to the Galalith used by Stewart MacDonald for their Waverly branded plastic pins. The AA pins replicate vintage Gibson and Martin pins in both slotted and unslotted configurations. While pricey compared to a set of $6 Stewart MacDonald ebony pins, the AA pins are accurate reproductions, include a matching end pin, and are readily available/in stock from Elderly. A Style 17/18 set appropriate to 1931-1939 (aka, Martin's Golden Era) runs $22 plus shipping, while a Style 21 set with white dots will run closer to $30 plus S&H.

https://www.elderly.com/antique-acoustics-replica-martin-guitar-pin-set-107556.htm

https://www.elderly.com/antique-acoustics-replica-martin-guitar-pin-set-107544.htm

We stock most of the common sets for 1931-1966 D-28's, 1931-1970's D-18, and some of the Gibson pin sets - expensive but worth it, as it saves us having to make up a set of 'red eye' pins for a D-28 that might have need of them.

While the vintage Martin crowd seems to be more comfortable with the AA pins, and they are the 'go-to' solution for missing pins or for reproduction work, we prefer the Stewart MacDonald product because of the greater dimensional consistency across all materials - fit one pin, and all of them fit.

The AA pins are by no means inaccurate, but can vary across sets (but not usually within sets) by a thousandth or two in diameter. For a customer attempting to decide between the ivoroid, tortoid, ebony, or the white StewMac pins, we can fit any set of standard sized pins in either a slotted (almost never) or unslotted configuration (our strong preference) and exchange them for another style of pin without further fitting at a later time or date. With AA pin sets, we have seen a few cases where we needed to do some additional fitting to accommodate a change, although this is generally not much of a chore.

The AA pins are available in 3 degree and 5 degree taper as appropriate to the replicated style. In general, this means that Martin repro pins from the 1920-1930 period are 3 degree taper and lack the trim ring at the base of the head seen in later Martin and Gibson pin styles, while the 5 degree pins usually have the trim ring under the head and reflect the 1931 and later shape and dimensions.

_________________
For the times they are a changin'

- Bob Dylan

Perfect, thanks Woodie.