Official Luthiers Forum!

I've decided to spend some time writing and posting an on-line tutorial here on the OLF how I set-up guitars. I'm envisioning two tutorials one for acoustics that will be first and then a follow-on for electrics. Both tutorials will be contained in this one, single thread for future reference.

The goal is to keep this simple but also as comprehensive as it needs to be so that when you are finished with the building you can use this tutorial as a guide to do the final set-up on a new instrument.

The methods described in the order that they are accomplished should provide you with a resulting set-up that is excellent and commercial quality from a quality shop.

Additionally I want this to also be a guide so that you can start getting comfortable setting up your other guitars, friend's and family guitars etc. If what results is you find an interest in repair work I will be happy as can be. You will learn our commercial methods for how I set-up around 600+ guitars annually now when I'm semi-retired working only several mornings a week.

The intent is also to minimize any purchases that you will need to make but there will be a few things all of which any guitar builder should already have anyway.

With this said I'm a couple weeks out from the first lesson and wanted to provide you fine folks with some time to obtain the following:

1) Gauged nut files such as the ones from StewMac. That's what we have always used and even wore out a dozen or two of which StewMac recently replaced for us. Thanks StewMac! If you use 12's for strings purchase the six that cover the string gauges you use. A smaller file can make a larger slot but a larger file can't make a smaller slot to please keep that in mind. If you plan on taking the electric guitar set-up course too that will follow this one you will need some additional nut slot files also depending on your choice of strings and there will be some overlap too, likely.

2) 6" engineer's scale, my most used tool. The StewMac one is excellent and so is a Starrett. I use both of these and they are both great. We will be speaking in 1/64th" terms so my metric friends should have a handy conversion available.

3) String lifter shop made. I am unaware of these being commercially available in this format, pic will be provided. So you can make your own. It's optional, you don't have to have one of these but highly recommended and it's the second most used tool in our shop.

Everything else I am going to presume you have if you have built a guitar before.

If you purchase new files or an engineer's scale from StewMac please use Lance's link to StewMac at the top of every page here because that helps support the OLF.

For now let's gather these things so you are ready to go in a couple of weeks.

Lastly Some of these concepts will be difficult to convey with still photos or video so please bear with me I'll do the best I can but I am always open for questions via PM or in the threads. The best way for me to know what is not clear is for you to let me know, please.

Below is the string lifter that Dave makes for us. It's self explanatory brass sheet folded in half, shaped and cut and soldered and then filed so there are no sharp edges. It's a nice little one hour if that project if you wish to make your own. I am unaware that you can purchase these like our's.

Thanks

I have everything but the string lifter. I just use my fingers. It hurts but gets the job done. I will make a copy of yours when the time comes.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

Thanks so much for doing this, Hesh. I am very much looking forward to following and coming back to this thread often.

Great and fingers are fine just be thankful we are not doing a 12 string.

You are very welcome Matthew and thanks for the thanks. My hope is that this will be exactly that a future reference for folks.

You are very welcome Matthew and thanks for the thanks. My hope is that this will be exactly that a future reference for folks.

Also you have a famous guitar making name! I had a Huss and Dalton CM as my last acoustic that I owned that I did not build myself. It had a lot to do with getting me interested in building. Great guitars, Huss and Daltons any relation to Mark Dalton?

I wish! My family is from South Western Virginia originally, going WAY back, so not TOO far from H&D, but according to my dad, no relation. Bummer! There has to be some correlation somewhere in there! They make fantastic guitars, for sure. I need to make the trip up and visit sometime.

I apologize if this is the wrong place to ask, but I'm curious - how big a deal is it to "properly" size the slots for the strings, or is "substantially" larger than the strings OK?

For example I made this nut for a mandolin - the strings are 0.025 and my file set has 0.024 and 0.032. With my first attempt I tried rocking the 0.024 to make a wider slot, but in the end my string was still levitating above the bottom of a too-deep slot. My next attempt I used the 0.032 and it seems to work perfectly. A couple people over at mandolincafe said this isn't right and it's going to cause issues.

Problem? Maybe on a straighter headstock, if the string wasn't pulled sideways?

Great stuff Hesh. As you have pointed out in the past we amateurs do tend to skimp on this all important part of the build. I know I have been guilty of this in the past but am trying hard.

You have given us bits of this over the years but bringing it all together should be invaluable.

Dave

Really looking forward to this Hesh.

I’d especially love to see pics or video of the “tink” sound I’ve seen you describe when testing the nut slot depth by pressing the string down on the bridge side of the second fret and tapping the string at the first fret to make sure it has a tiny amount of clearance.

Save Hesh some time

https://youtube.com/shorts/URlnGYd7saQ? ... p6qIdALfJ6


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

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I've got a SM string lifter, will that do?

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I've got one of the SM lifters (I don't use it anymore) and it will get the job done but the one Dave C. makes (I've got one of those too) works a lot better. I believe it's well worth the time and effort to make one. Dave's lifter lets you lift the string and place it to the side where you want it, something the SM version doesn't do.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Hesh, do you know what gauge the brass is ?

Brad thank you!
That’s just brilliant and exactly what I was hoping for.

The latest Ken Parker Neck Journey video shows a similar effect, but somehow sounds to me like bigger gaps than I expected. Not that I put much stock in my judgement there…

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wd_yh-GtF ... 10&pp=iAQB

I like your “tink” better.

Looking forward to it Hesh! I'm a self appointed expert who is still learning.

I was advised in the 80's by a lawyer to never claim to be an expert. Experts are not allowed to answer "I don't know". Instead, claim to be an authority.

And that's what I did when I was called as a witness in 2 different trials against a crooked pawn shop here in town.

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

Hey Daniel good questions and I am happy to help.

So the standard that I work toward is to make the slot a couple thou wider than the desired string AND capable of doing fine with the next logical gauge up. So for example the B string on a guitar with 12's on it is a 16 and a 17 for 13's. So I will cut my slot so a 17 does not bind and is fully seated.

I'll show you a technique when the class starts how I scrape the side of the slot on both sides with the file on the down stroke intentionally to widen a slot or relieve binding. So again we can make a slot wider we can't make it narrower.

Since I have to work on things that others have hacked up and this is not unusual, many people won't seek a luthier until they screw up their own instrument with the wrong tools and no knowledge.... I frequently have to address slots that are WAY too wide.

In that case and since 90% of the time the slots are NOT deep enough or low enough if you will I have an opportunity for say a 16 string to use my 16 file in a slot that is already a 30... I then make a slot in a slot and take it down to our levels of lowness and it works great, problem solved, no need for a new nut.

If the slot is already all the way low and too wide I can always fill with light cured dental fillings and recut a proper slot after that.

I'm going teach the course with the assumption that you guys do not have the ability to raise low slots with dental fills so no worry you don't need to took up for that. It will mean that I won't be suggesting you guys go as low as I do since I am backstopped with dental fillings but I'll get you so close it won't matter.

To get back to your question for a 25 string a 28 slot would be OK and a 32 night cause some issue but it might not either and since the tension is very high on a mando my bet is that it would not matter and the people on the mando cafe are wrong when the string is under tension. And again if it is not low enough and they rarely are you can make a slot in the bottom of the slot that is a 25 - 28 and with tension I bet it would be fine.

Nearly every day I have to make a slot that is a 11 - 12 in a high e slot that is a 16 or whatever the person using an X-actor file screw up the instrument with last.

Kind of a neat remedy isn't it, a slot in a slot.

Noted Leo and I will think on that one. I'm not video savvy and pretty old school with still pics. But you're right that "tink" tone is important and good on you for remembering that too!!! I like to call myself Blind Mellon Luthier so the sound helps me with what is hard for me to see.

If no tink the slot is too low and the string is laying on the first fret so that's important. I'll see what I can do to make that clear and thanks for the idea too.

Yes!!!! Thanks a million Brad that's the tink we want too hear. So he's doing it on a lower string I use the sound only on the high e and b because we cut down to only less than 0.001" at times and I can't see that. Dave claims he can, dang whippersnapper....

For the bass strings I need to see some gap too but hearing the tink we know it's not laying on the fret and way too low. A bass sting can still tink and be too low because they are more massive.

Thanks Brad want to be my TA for this and I am serious? You already took our course, you are great at communicating and your work is excellent. Want to help me with this my friend since you just already did? PS: I'd like to see you as a moderator too.

Maybe in some places but we hate those and tossed ours. You can't get in-between courses say on a 12 string or mando with them. You can see our hook is shaped to get in tight spaces the big white nylon or whatever block is poorly shaped on the SM one. Also on say a slotted headstock the downward pressure on the string is HUGE and a vertical lift is way easier to do with the tool that having it come in from the side.

So you can certainly try it but we don't like those much. Sorry I wish I had better news for you Colin on this one.

Exactly and Steve would you like to help with this too and just be available in the thread like you just were to weigh-in when you feel like it. You also know the material and your work is also excellent so I would love to have you help here too?

Folks Steve and Brad took/survived... our courses and they both did great. Steve went on to do a lot of repair work with lots of fret work too and he knows his stuff!

BF I will find out and report back I'm headed into the shop in a couple of hours and have three to do this morning. More to come and good point, thanks.

The tink. The tink is really only useful to us on the high e and b where seeing any gap is very difficult. The more massive string will tink too but they could have gaps that are excessive and still tink.

So I think of my old computer stuff when I think of how I use the tink. I only use that sound and want to hear it to indicate the presence of absence of any gap below a string over the 1st fret when I fret and hold between the 2nd and 3rd frets. It's on or off if you will, tink or no tink.

Make sense? I'll get deep in it when the class starts the tink!

Me too Darrel me too.