Official Luthiers Forum!

I finished my first guitar today. Seems like a dream. Anyway, I have some questions.

1) How far should the bottom of the strings be from the top of the first fret? When I slotted the nut, I drew a line with a pencil on the bone that is around 3/32 higher than the fret plane. I just went down to this line.

2) The sound is not bad, but the G string is somewhat "dead". It doesn't have the volume of the other strings. It looks seated in the nut and ok at the saddle. I did use these strings to setup the guitar. They were strung to pitch and un-strung about 3 times. Maybe this has something to do with it. I used the medium high tension GHS strings from Stew-Mac.

I want to thank everyone who has helped me along the way. I couldn't have done it without you. Now that I'm done this "test" run, on to the real thing with real wood and not scrap!

Thanks again,

Doug Ubele

_________________
Guitars...One's too many...Twenty is not enough.

NO pic? Well a dead third (g) string is something of a problem with a lot of Classical/nylon strung guitars. Could be a simple as a dead string. Maybe something else. You say you used scrap? What type?

Congrats on your first born!

Ronn

Thanks. I'll post pictures of my second. There is nothing special looking about this one. It served to walk me through the basics. It is a classical that I built out of the Cumpiano book. I didn't even install a rosette on it, and the back has a dozen worm holes.

It has:
Mahogany - neck, back, sides, back bracing, head/tail blocks, and back kerfing.
Spanish Cedar - top.
Bass wood - top bracing, top kerfing.
Ebony - fingerboard and bridge.
Walnut - head stock veener, end graft
maple - head stock veener.

90% of this was left over stock I had from '97 when I had a cigar humidor making business.

Do you think high tension strings will be ok without a truss rod? What are your thoughts on question #1 from the first post?

Thanks,

Dougdubell38465.8556481482

_________________
Guitars...One's too many...Twenty is not enough.

[QUOTE=dubell] I finished my first guitar today. Seems like a dream. Anyway, I have some questions.

1) How far should the bottom of the strings be from the top of the first fret? When I slotted the nut, I drew a line with a pencil on the bone that is around 3/32 higher than the fret plane. I just went down to this line.
[/QUOTE]

Put a 6" rule across several frets and measure (with a feeler gage) how tall the frets are above the finger board. Let's say they are .035" tall. The nut slot of the first two strings should be .055" above the fretboard, the middle two should be .060" above the fretboard, and the last two .065" above the fretboard. This is a starting point and will get your action at the nut "in the ballpark". You may need to cut them deeper if it is still to high.

_________________
tim...
http://www.mcknightguitars.com

Just a guess but I would say High tension would be ok. Most classicals don't have truss rods.

Ronn

Hi Tim,

Are those measurements for a steel string or classical?

Thanks,

Doug

_________________
Guitars...One's too many...Twenty is not enough.

[QUOTE=dubell] Hi Tim,

Are those measurements for a steel string or classical?

Thanks,

Doug[/QUOTE]

Hi Doug:
The measurements are for a steel string. I don't have any experience with those classical thingies.

_________________
tim...
http://www.mcknightguitars.com

3/32 above the top of the fret is too high. Keep in mind I'm a rank amature but I use the Half pencil to make a line on the nut then file my slots down about half way through the line.

Ronn

Ok Doug I just measured mine and this is in no way a standard or anything. It's just what I ended up with and no one has expessed concern over it so here goes...


My frets are 3/64 above the fretboard. My low E is 3/64 above the first fret. It is just shy of 5/64 above the fretboard at the nut.

My high E is 1/32 above the first fret. It too is just shy of 5/64 above the fretboard at the nut.

Hope this helps.

Ronn