Official Luthiers Forum!

Here’s a question for the pros: when doing a setup for a guitar that is upside-down (say a lefty if you’re right-handed), does it worry you if the ‘upsidedowness’ means you can’t give it as thorough a test play at the end of the process as when setting up a right-handed guitar?

If so, are their any other strategies you use to ensure you’ve really nailed the setup?

I ask because I’m left-handed. In addition to hobby-building I take in small guitar repair jobs as a side business. I do mainly crack repair, finish repair and electronics and tend to avoid doing setup work. It’s because it worries me that no matter how carefully I ensure get a right-handed guitar in-spec, I’m missing that final QA stage of playing it to check all is well. I can play every note to check for buzzes, and play a few simple upside-down licks and chords but I feel like it’s not the same.

Recently I’ve been getting more customers asking if I do set ups. It’s tempting to take these jobs. But I’m still uneasy about it. Am I overthinking this?

Since Wichita has a number of good left handed guitarists, I've been doing lefty setups almost from the beginning when I started back in '77. For me it's all about the measurements, and I want that treble E at a certain setting no matter which side of the neck it's located. I don't sit down and rip on a lefty axe (heck, I barely rip on righty stuff anymore), but I can play each string and fret and determine that the feel is correct. About the only thing I change is the position of the instrument on my bench to check certain things (body on the left hand, not the right).

Some people have a problem with it in their heads, and I don't understand that at all. The one time I really thought something was screwy was when a local luthier - trained at Red Wing Vo-Tech by David Vincent - refused to make lefty nuts for his clients. He actually told them to bring it to me. I was floored. What the heck do you mean you can't make a lefty nut? doEs nTo cOmpoot.

As for setups - that is the BASIC job that repairmen do. If we can't do anything else - we can do a setup. Then it's nut making and doing excellent fret levels. It's all about the neck, and that's what I am known for most in this town. Heck - I've got gaps in my skills. You do NOT want to see me waving around a soldering iron. I don't do electronic repairs or installations at all. I can do the mechanical work, but I leave the soldering to Mike Metz of Thesis Audio or some of the other guys who are comfy with that.

So for a lefty - I say you MUST do setups, and don't get hung up on not being able to play a righty guitar the same as you would on a lefty. I can still make my fingers do the correct shapes, do hammer-ons, pulloffs, and so on. You're supposed to be the guy who fixes it right. There is no requirement to be a great player. So don't sweat it - just bear down and fine tune your setup skills. Go for it.

_________________
"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Chris, thank you for this - it’s super helpful to hear this from someone with your experience. You got me fired up to quit second guessing myself and get in the shop.

Yeah I agree it's more about the measurements. You are going to set action up to measurements more then by feel. I do like to play guitars after I set them up and I get very few lefty guitars in. In fact I cannot remember the last one I got in. Often times they are converting righties to leftys but anyway I still pick up the lefty guitar and play it. I will play it left handed then flip it over and play it upside down. It's always fun to try and play left handed

But in the end you are measuring string heights over the 12th fret, measuring relief, and measuring the nut slot heights to your specification and that's that.

Same hear, it's all about the measurements. When I'm finished I do a few final checks, I check each string at each fret to be sure every note is clean and, if it is an electric, I make sure the controls work properly and the pickups are balanced. No real need to play it although I usually do.

_________________
Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Ditto here. I do setups for one guy who seems to have an unlimited number of guitars. I just tackle it the same way I would with a righty. I'm not a rippin' player, but I can definitely fret each note and pluck the string, and do the standard chords and strum on a lefty. I did mess up and cut a new nut for him as a righty. Duh! And once I started to put the strings on backwards when replacing the strings. So I do tend to slow down and double check my thinking before moving forward with a lefty.

_________________
Tony Thatcher
Bozeman, Montana

Lefties…all of the work, none of the fun!

But yeah, what Chris said. It’s all about the numbers.

Thanks everyone! Sounds like a consensus to me. Appreciate you all taking the time to talk me through that.

You caught us all on a good day.

_________________
"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

I set-up and do other repairs on tons of lefties every year and there is no difference. I set-up to specs and then do a quick note test hitting most notes and bending in certain regions too making sure that the set-up and fret plane supports how a player would play. I can't play left handed of course and do my Stormy Monday or Purple Rain test tunes but I can hit every note and bend notes too so that's what we do.

Be sure to set the intonation (if electric and adjustable) with the instrument in the proper playing position. Necks droop.... and it makes a difference on a right or left handed instrument to set intonation in the playing position as opposed to flat on it's back on the bench.

Set-ups are the bread and butter of a successful repair business and account for around 55% of our annual revenue. It is the single greatest value providing thing repair Luthiers offer in so much as it is ultimately the "user interface" to the instrument from which all other things happen, or...... not. Set-ups are also superb stalking horses for additional issues and work. And if it's in for fret work or a crack repair or a nut or saddle or new bridge and dozens of other repairs it should be set-up properly before it's buttoned up and your pricing should reflect this too uncharging for the set-up work that you do.

We have pretty much morphed our business into the set-up being our minimum service level and we will not put pen to paper for anything less. Out the door with new strings it's around $100 to have us set-up a guitar and it also starts a relationship as well for future work. We will not restring or do anything less than a full set-up, no truss rod adjustments etc UNLESS someone has had us set-up their guitar prior and then we are happy to make seasonal adjustments on the spot and at no charge.

Lastly a very high quality set-up which is very rare by the way based on the crap that we see coming our way... is something that your client will notice at once. They will find they can do things that were harder for them prior with low nut slots and they will also find that the guitar plays in tune when strings don't have to be unnecessarily stretched because of poor action, nut slots, relief, etc.

Some Luthiers have looked down their noses at the set-up and prefer to proclaim their Luthier prowess with neck resets or other more complex repairs. I paid off my mortgage doing set-ups and Dave just bought a new house in the woods. We do all other repairs too but we have embraced the set-up as easy money, in and out, fun and gratifying and it lets us help many, many people in the same time frame we would struggle with one more time consuming repair.

And lastly no matter what the repair it's likely that a final set-up would and should be part of the servicing so learn to do them well, learn to enjoy the work (I love it and I love the variable nature of different guitars one after another too) and you will never be sorry.

Thanks Hesh, appreciate it, great tips and perspective on the wider context of the value of a good setup, I hadn’t thought of it in those terms.