Hmm, maybe I’m one of them and didn’t realize it. This conversation made me curious, so I went and checked the tuner ratio on three of my guitars. My American Strat has tuners I find acceptable, and their ratio turns out to be 12:1. I have an ancient Gibson SG that ca 1980 I put Grovers on, and I always liked those; their ratio was 15:1 (seemed like 15.5:1, maybe they’re 16?). Then I checked my LP’s hated Klusons and they’re …15ish:1.
Huh. Now I’m scratching my head about why I hate the feel of the Klusons, when it’s obviously not the gear ratio. They just feel kind of grumpy and imprecise to me, and I’m not sure why. Do I hate that plastic tuner key’s shape? Is it entirely that all the strings hang up on the nut and that causes the keys have apparent jumpiness? Something else? I’ll have to think about this.
Yeah - you can’t get a read on the tuners if the strings are binding up at the nut. Filing one isn’t that big of a deal given other stuff you done - try looking up how to do it on YouTube??
God damn it, I didn’t need any further reminders of how fragile a guitar is!! This time, it’s my good classical, Little Ed. I’m getting ready to record in May, so I was over coaching with a friend this afternoon. We’re finishing up, and just getting ready to leave his place. I had my guitar case on the floor; I put the guitar in it - the cloth that I use to wipe or mute the strings is back in the other room where I had been playing. I even heard a voice in my head saying “You should really shut the case; the floor is a stupid place to leave your guitar. Better still, close it up and carry it over there with you.” I don’t know why it Hell I didn’t. Next thing I hear, Graham goes to put his cell phone in his jacket pocket and misses. He drops his phone from chest height and it lands corner first on the sound board. BAM!! The affected area is about 2" x 1".
I’ve played it very briefly since - there are no buzzes, it doesn’t sound like any of the braces got loosened, and the cracks don’t move. This may be repairable. I keep telling myself that.
Off to see my luthier tomorrow; pray for me, if you would be so kind.
At least my nose has stopped bleeding from the last few times I banged my head against the wall…
Guys, if you buy a guitar online, new, does it still need its “action” adjusted by a music store mechanic?
I ask because the nearest place to me has a price list up and over the counter. I didn’t notice a specific cost for this, but one of the items mentioned was the $40.00 per hour labor fee.
I realize they have to make a living, but that seems to be a little excessive.
Oh no. So sorry. Keep us posted. I just got an old archtop; it comes with a decent scratch at the waist and one well-repaired crack - so I’m not afraid of dinging it as much
Yes, and your knowledge was absolutely correct, as far as I can tell. This feature seems really common on bass tuners. Why do tuning machine manufacturers hate my fingertips?
As I’ve said elsewhere, it’s not that I just generally hate them, it’s that the factory ones break on me all the time. The Klusons on a Gibson are the first functional thing to break or bend on one. The strip tuners that most acoustics get are just as bad. The tuners on a generic Fender strat copy are usually pretty good, to me. Nice and durable. I really never paid any attention to the ratios, and probably won’t in the future.
Well, not necessarily, but it’s likely. Setup is a personal thing. The Furrian I bought recently came with a setup that I was happy with. It was a little high, but I was playing slide on it mostly, so it was good to me. Scabpickerina picked it up, played two chords, and said “the action is high”. After a few minutes with the allen wrench and the tuner, it was at an in-between place we could both live with.
Sometimes, the guitar will just need work, though. The EB-3 I bought about a year ago needed about $100 of setup and fret leveling before I was happy with frets 4-9. If nothing else, if the repair shop is good, they’ll make you feel pampered and important while they take care of you
Yes, it could. With so many different player preferences, the manufacturer is always going to err on the side of leaving it too high, because it’s much easier to lower action than raise it (at least with acoustics, I know almost nothing about electrics). With that said, you might like it at the factory level.
Personally, I like really really low action so I need to get every new instrument setup, even the Taylors.
You would basically feel like the guitar feels relatively easier to play and makes you sound a bit more in tune. Beyond that, you’d show it to someone who like a guitar yech and ask. You can also search YouTube and I am sure they can show ways to check the neck straightness vs. the strings, etc…
The frets themselves may need adjusting?! I thought it was just at the bottom where one raises/lowers, so that $40 doesn’t seem so expensive now.
Back in the 60’s a friend’ brother bought a Kay electric from Sears and lord, those string were set so high I wondered why I didn’t have sculpted fingers!
You might not. I don’t know how much of a beginner you are. What I consider a setup for an electric consists of 3 parts.
Neck bow: You don’t want a straight fingerboard; you want some bow in it to avoid fret buzz. I believe* you check that by putting a capo on the 1st fret and the 12th fret and check the distance between the 7th fret and the string. I check it with a medium Fender pick.
B. String height: Unless you’re playing slide, you probably want it as low as you can without any buzzing. Setting this is much easier with a tune-a-matic type bridge cause there’s only a nut to adjust on each end.
iii. Intonation: You want a good tuner for this. Strobe or one with a needle. Play the string open and tune it. Then play that string on the 12th fret. You want it to be precisely an octave higher. If the needle is off, adjust the nut piece for THAT string fore or aft as necessary. Start with no more than a quarter turn, retune that string, then check at the 12th fret again. Rinse, lather, and repeat until the intonation is set for that string and repeat for all your other strings.
For an acoustic guitar, about all you can have set up is the neck bow and string height.
Those are things you can check, but basically, if you’re not putting 3/8 inch deep slots in your fingers and the strings aren’t buzzing, you’re probably good enough. Once you’re used to the feel of your guitar, spend some time in a music store trying out different guitars. They’ll probably feel different; you’ll have to decide if they feel better or worse than yours. At THIS point you might consider bringing your ax in to get set up for you. You have to be able to tell the tech what you like and don’t like.
*It’s been a while since I went through the precise procedures, but here’s a link to the Product Manuals at the official Fender site which will tell you how to set up a guitar to factory specs. I suspect Gibson has something similar available.
The tops of frets should all be the same height from the fretboard. The ends of the frets should have no sharp points to cut your fingers as you slide your hand up and down the fret board. And they should be properly seated so your 1st string doesn’t get stuck between the fret wire and the fingerboard (a friend’s guitar did this). And sometimes frets need to be replaced from normal wear over an extended period of time or abuse. For quality guitars, the frets are most likely good out of the factory.
I like the color (except for my “Beatle” bass all my guitars are blue), but as one of the respondents wrote in that thread, Gibson will blend a new blue, give it a fancy name and tack on a couple of extra thousand and there you have your special “custom” Gibson. Doesn’t seem hardly right for them to do this, but hey, free enterprise right?
I just got back from meeting with my luthier friend Edward Klein - I’m a very lucky fellow. There are three parallel cracks on the sound board, and they are in a triangular spot between the transverse brace, the diagonal brace and the side of the guitar at the upper waist. Because of that location, the cracks are extremely unlikely to propagate, and are not likely to affect the sound quality. They’re also quite easy to reach once the instrument is de-strung. He’ll apply pressure to the affected area, patch and glue the cracks and re-finish. “This isn’t going to be an expensive or difficult repair.” was what he specifically said.
So other than an object lesson in looking after your most precious possessions, and a couple of sleepless nights (Do you ever dream in Psalms? “My tongue clove to the roof of my mouth, and my heart was as melted wax in my bowels as I cried out in anguish” sort of thing…), I seem to have got off lightly.
Actually, we had a very good chin wag over tea - luthiers are fascinating people! Part engineer, part sculptor, part watchmaker, and like a playwright, their work never really comes to life until it’s in someone else’s hands…
I’ve asked him to take pictures - when I get the guitar back, I’ll see if I can put them up on PhotoBucket.
Which brings up a question I’ve been meaning to ask, but am afraid to. After not taking my Martin out of the case for a few years, I opened it recently to find a crack on the top side of the guitar (not the soundboard, the side), starting at the bridge and going back to about three inches from the button on the rear. Is this repairable?
Le Ministre - as they say in French “le whew!” Glad to hear it is simply another sign that you love the guitar enough to use it a lot, not a real tone-changer.
FP - unless the crack has dislocated, it should be readily repairable. Get thee to an authorized Martin repair person forthwith! My 1948 D-18 has a 12" crack on the lower/treble side that was repaired decades ago. Nobody ever asks if it affected the tone
It’s all repairable with time, money, and a blind eye to Theseus’ paradox. I’ve seen guitars where the lower bout was being held together with tape that were repaired and looked new afterward.
