Month: January 2021

After religiously striving for excellence in 50 instruments, made pretty much from firewood, does one get to work on a Martin, Gibson or a Guild guitar.

The photograph above is the Guild logo, embroidered on the semi-hard case of the Guild guitar I worked on recently. But more on that later.

If you ask me, CF Martin and Co, Gibson Brands Inc (formerly Gibson Guitar Corporation) and Guild together form the Holy Trinity of Guitar Manufacturers. Owning a guitar of any of the three brands is like owning a Rolls Royce or a Bentley. And yes, instruments from any of the three brands don’t come cheap.

Compared to Martin (1833) and Gibson (1902), Guild is a youngster, founded as late as 1952-53, when Alfred Dronge, a Polish immigrant to America, set up shop along with George Mann, former Vice President of Epiphone Company. Epiphone had moved out of New York and had left stranded many, many craftsmen and workers.

The Guild Company was registered on October 24th, 1952 with the stranded Epiphone craftsmen forming the work force backbone. The name was drawn from the craft Guilds of the Middle Ages and implied tradition and quality. Six months later, the first guitars emerged.

The company has changed ownership thrice till date but the tradition of guitar-making has continued without compromising build quality.

This guitar which came to me

was indeed a beautiful instrument. The M-240E, a petite guitar, is ideal for finger-style playing and light strumming, and that is what the owner excelled at.

Solid spruce top in satin finish and open-pore mahogany back and sides also in satin finish, the guitar was a stunner. Wouldn’t you say so?

Additionally, it sported a bone nut and bone saddle, provided by the manufacturers.

Though, I could not try out the electronics on board, I am sure they do wonders to the sound.

These chrome butterbean tuning machines had a gear ratio of 1:16, which made tuning a breeze, and then there was the the company-provided gig bag.

I know in the photograph it looks like any other padded case, but believe me when I say that I have never felt thicker padding on a guitar case…and I have seen a few. This thing was built to stop a missile!

But if everything is so good, what did the guitar come in for (and here I might add that it was just five or six months old)? 

Well, the owner, an accomplished player himself, was unhappy with how fretting ‘F’ and ‘Am’ was near impossible, and how the strings seemed ‘stiff’ on the first fret.

Immediately, I looked at the nut and even though it seemed fine from above, I knew the nut was the problem. As I turned the guitar to take a look at the nut sideways…

That gap should not have been there, and considering it was a Guild, it was almost shocking. That would have to be changed.

Another culprit could be the strings themselves. Three months is ample time for a set to be changed and the set on the instrument had lived there double that time. So, a string change was also in order.

As I took off the strings, I noticed the play-wear on the fretwires

while the fretboard looked a bit dry to me. Now that I had the strings off, I decided to give the fretboard some love potion and a buffing to the fretwires.

That is how the fretboard and bridge came out after I was done with it. 

However, as I touched the saddle to pull it out of its slot, so that I could clean the bridge, it moved in its slot. Not a good sign. I touched it again and again it moved. For sound transfer to be perfect, saddles should sit as snug as a bug in a rug in its slot.

One should never have the need to force a saddle into its slot, or, for pliers to be used to unseat it. Yet, without strings, if you turn the guitar over, the saddle should stay in its slot, and not fall out.

I took my X-acto knife and tried to insert its blade in the slot with the saddle still in there. Sure enough, not only was the saddle thinner, it was a shade smaller than the saddle slot.

While the photographs above show the space around the saddle, they are proof to the owner too. I just called him and told him about the problem and that ideally, the saddle should be changed to get the best sound. He took my word for it and asked me to change the saddle too.

As I took the nut out, I noticed an odd shine in its slot. It seemed like someone had put some super glue, let it dry and then put the nut in, as if to raise it up in its slot.

The darker portions in the slot are not shadows but what appeared to be super glue. Frowning, I went to work on the slot with my special miniature chisels. As I scraped the slot clean, whatever was in the slot, flaked off just like super glue would.

A lot of measuring and some marking followed, and I got ready to sand the nut to my markings.

Likewise the saddle

Once done, everything was near perfect and the guitar was ready to be strung up. The owner chose these.

Tuned to pitch, the guitar sounded fine to me, its intonation was slightly off, which a little bit of tweaking brought near perfect. The relief in the neck and its action was also brought down very slightly.

And this is why I keep repeating that an initial set-up by someone who knows what he/she is doing, is imperative for the instrument to play well. After that it is advisable to bring in the instrument once a year to have it checked that everything is where everything should be.

Provided that the instrument is built properly, a set-up will ensure that it plays easy and gives the player as much joy as it should. 

For those of you who feel that their guitar plays well, wait till I have worked on it, and then you can decide when it played best: then or now!

As such, the set-up includes adjusting neck relief, giving the best action possible (given the instrument’s neck angle), working on the nut slots (if they are too shallow, or if they are not cut right), checking the hardware on the headstock (for any loose screws, etc), oiling the fretboard and the bridge, and burnishing the fretwires. 

For a small fee, you will be amazed at how good your guitar can play. Of course, you can get all of this done at any time of the instrument’s life but ideally, you should get it done as soon as you buy the instrument. Why? So that you don’t get put off by high action, fret buzz (which is not always strings hitting against the fretwires), or a badly cut saddle which does not sit very well in its slot.   

The owner was pleased with the results and conceded – rather grudgingly – that the guitar was playing “much better”. He promised to contact me after a few days with a complete report, when the guitar settled down a bit. 

This is how this baby looks now

Though archtops and floating bridges go back to the early 1890s, it wasn’t until Gibson came up with the ES-150 (the first electric archtop, in 1936) and its later variants, that they became popular. Whether swing and jazz movements, a rage during that time, were a result of this evolution, or whether the music craze of the times necessitated the arrival of the ES-150 – we’ll let the historians settle that one.

Two, maybe three decades later, the guitar design must have landed in India and from that time to date, cheap imitations masquerading as guitars, with zero frets and floating bridges, keep entering the market month after month. With each lot, the corners are cut some more, making them bigger nightmares for gullible (ill-informed?) customers and yet bigger nightmares for repair persons like Yours Humbly.

One landed on my counter recently, one which probably had been stood in a corner and was forgotten about. In the interim, it managed to lose half of its floating bridge – the top portion on which the strings ride.

The other half would have got lost in time too, had not the young owner, innocently, super-glued it!

With a sudden awakening of a passion for getting on with his guitar journey, he brought me the instrument…and a replacement bridge.

He also brought me other parts

And, of course, after all this time, the fretboard was very dry and the fretwires were badly tarnished.

But what needed attention the most was the nut on the instrument – plastic needless to say – but one which had fallen prey to the experiments of the young man. No matter how hard I tried to pry, prise and knock it out of its slot, it refused to budge. A phone call confirmed that indeed the reason for it being so unmoving, was super glue!

Out it had to come – dead or alive – and it did.

And even after coming out in pieces, it insisted on leaving its mark – a matchstick: probably used to raise it on the treble side.

Finally, after much filing, sanding and even more persuasion, I got the nut slot clean of all extra pieces of wood and glue. However, when I placed a new nut in the slot, there remained a gap between the top of the nut and the fretboard enough for you to sink the Titanic in. The bottom of the nut, however, sat flush in its slot.

Now what? I turned to my discarded plastic cards and shimmed it and filed in a slope that would make the nut sit perfectly in its slot throughout its height.

The last photograph in the sequence shows you just how much wood glue (no other glue!) is to be used to keep the nut from slipping and sliding in its slot.

Then it was the turn of the fretboard and fretwires to get the much-needed attention. Some ‘0000’ steel wool, some boiled linseed oil and lots of elbow grease and the result was 

And at that point, my friends, I knew my troubles were about to begin. Removing the (super-glued) bridge and then having to bring down the new one to the height required, it wasn’t going to be as easy as tic-tac-toe!

In a normal steel-string guitar, you adjust action by pulling out the plastic/bone/tusq saddle and sanding it. Here, I had to sand the entire bridge!

With weakening pulse, I sharpened the edge on my screwdriver and gently got it under a corner of the glued-on foot of the bridge. A little tap and the bridge popped off, and as I expected, took a bit of the paint with it. I wasn’t too worried about that for the new bridge would ideally sit exactly at that place.

However, I did not take off the old bridge before marking where exactly it sat (with some painter’s tape).

Looking at what I had just pulled off, I just shook my head.

The two portions of the bridge with the rectangular hollows are called the feet of the bridge, for the bridge ‘stands’ on the top of the guitar with these. The function of these is primarily to conduct the energy of the strings to the top of the guitar. But when you have hollows, how much conduction was happening, is anybody’s guess.

Now would begin the really painful stuff, sanding the new bridge to the correct height. For that, I would have to string the guitar, because without the strings how would one know how tall the bridge was and how much it needed to be brought down. And because the strings would have to be strung through the tail piece, I would have to leave them on and then work.

But why all that hassle? The top had an arch to it (and thus, the name ‘archtop’) and the feet of the bridge needed to conform to it for the bridge to function properly and for it to transmit sound properly. So, all the sanding that had to be done, would have to be done ON the top itself!

Taking measurements with the new bridge in place, I noticed that the treble side was much higher than the bass side (in normal guitars it is the other way around because the thicker strings need a bit more room to vibrate than their plain peers). So, what it translated to was that the treble side foot would need to be sanded much more than the bass side. One more problem!

I started off like this to get some curvature on the feet

and soon taped off the area of the sandpaper falling under the bass side foot of the bridge.

For six hours, over two days, I rubbed the treble side foot of the bridge on the sandpaper, going only as fast as the strings chaffing my knuckles would allow.

What made the job even more difficult was the fact that the bridge was made of ebony. Ebony is a beautiful wood but it is also the hardest wood around. Sanding ebony is like trying to chip steel with your spoon, and it is exactly for this quality of hardness that ebony is the preferred choice of high-end guitar makers: the hardness helps in a wonderful transmission of sound.

In between I would pull out the bridge and mark the treble foot like this

and then rub some more, pull it out and check if I was sanding correct, checking if inadvertently, I wasn’t sanding one side or one corner more than the other. If I would have been, the pencil marks would have remained on the portion coming least in contact with the sandpaper. Thankfully, each time I checked, the pencil marks had disappeared.

When I was satisfied with the bridge height, I finally strung up the guitar. The nut-end of the guitar looked like this

To clarify, a floating bridge is given that name because it is NEVER fixed to the top but only held down by string tension.

But it was all worth it because the young man was happy with the action, with the overall sound of the guitar and how it looked.

I think I heard him mumble ‘Very playable’!

 

 

Regular readers of this blog are familiar with how peeved I get with cheap (Rs 3K – 3.5K) toys that masquerade as guitars.

New readers may understand it this way: granted that you wish to learn how to play the guitar and you aren’t sure whether you will be able to sustain the drive to learn it, is it alright to buy a toy to experiment, or does it make sense to buy something in the Rs 10 – 12K range? PARENTS, PAY ATTENTION!!!!

Not all cheap instruments are bad, but generally speaking, a cheap guitar is always going to give problems because it’s constructed by cutting corners (literally) to cut down production costs. A (relatively) expensive guitar (pricey ones start above 25 -28K and there is no upper limit!) will cause fewer problems and serve you a lifetime and then some. What was that Hindi saying about a cheap buy making you cry every step of the way, and an expensive buy making you cry just once??!!

So, if you buy a (relatively) expensive guitar but are unable to sustain interest in it, has the investment gone down the drain? Not so. You can always pass it on to a younger sibling/nephew/ niece, or sell it online on exchange, buy/sell websites, or sell it to a music school. You should be able to recover most of your investment, if not all of it.

In contrast to all that I have said above (and now that my rant is over and I am breathing much easier), let me introduce you to Jolly JIMM, an exception to the cheap=bad rule. It was bought for Rs 3.5 K some half-a-decade ago and came in for action correction and attention to a crack along the bass-side seam of the lower bout, caused by the guitar being accidentally dropped.

As I inspected it, I noticed that while it was a long crack, only at some places did it move under pressure. I wicked in some thin CA glue to stabilise it, and then put on some spool clamps that I had made many years ago.

I also noticed that the instrument wasn’t the usual ply-board that it was constructed out of but what looked like basswood to me. Nice! Usually guitars in this range are built out of ply-board.

Also, the bridge was lifting. The front line on the chit of paper shows how much it went under on the treble side of the guitar, while the bottom line shows how much that end went under the bass side of the guitar. But since I felt it would be some time before the lifting bridge would cause any problems, I decided to leave it be.

Of course, it had the ‘mandatory’ plastic nut and saddle. Those would go and be replaced by bone elements. The guitar seemed built well enough to be able to sport them.

Also, the bridgeplate inspection revealed that it was woefully inadequate in its dimensions. Consequently, while some bridgepin holes were half on it and half on the top, others were completely on the top. But all through, the ball ends had eaten into wherever they came in contact with. These indentations were deep enough for the ball ends to get stuck in, and while one was trying to take off the strings, they refused to budge!

Can you make out? Anyway, that needed to be attended to.

But what caught my attention immediately was the strap tied to the neck of the guitar.

And here I will go off on another bender. The tying of the strap to the neck like this, IS NEVER TO BE DONE!

Why? Understand this! Often, guitar necks are made of three pieces of wood glued together, rather than from a single piece of wood. The idea is that the joints make the neck stronger than a single-piece neck.

Try and see if you can catch the joint line in between the two red lines. So, there is a joint right where the headstock meets the neck, and a second joint where the neck meets the heel. By tying the strap along the headstock, you will be forcing the entire weight of the guitar on that joint, and it is not uncommon in such instruments for the neck to break just at this joint.

So, included in the work on the instrument, was the addition of a strap button too. The plastic one went and a steel one replaced it at the base of the guitar, while a strap button was screwed on the side of the heel of the guitar.

Now for the serious bit: attending to the bridgeplate. Initially, I had thought of adding a thin, long piece of wood and stick it against the bridgeplate along the side, and to the top along the width of the piece.

But I had to drop the idea because I would never be able to make a piece of exact thickness and would have to plane it down to the thickness of the bridgeplate once the piece was stuck inside. The problem: I didn’t have a plane that small which would be able to go inside through the soundhole (my hand and arm included).

So, I thought up this: saw dust and wood glue mixed together and applied to the deep indentations.

And what would I apply it with? Ice-cream sticks! But I failed with various lengths of sticks because I could not straighten my arm enough inside the guitar.

And so, the trusty fingers it was with which I applied the mixture.

Once I was satisfied that I had applied enough, I let the instrument sit easy and breathe for a good five or six hours before even looking in its direction.

Then, the rest of the work was relatively simple. Clean the fretboard and bridge and oil it, and polish the frets. Amazing what a little bit of attention and love does.

A new bone nut and saddle were installed and the nut was lubricated with graphite to facilitate easy string movement.

And when you have invested so much time and effort into it, a little more wouldn’t harm. So, the front of the headstock was cleaned very properly.

Meanwhile, the open tuning machines were oiled and the oil was worked into them properly

and a brand new set of strings was put on.

That is how Jolly JIMM looks now and it “sure sounds good”. And that is not me saying it, but the owner!

 

GREETINGS GUITAR GEEKS! As promised, I’m back! 

I hope all of you had a great time putting 2020 to sleep and a wonderful time ushering in 2021. May it be a year of health, happiness and prosperity for all.

During this ‘break period’ I worked on a clutch of guitars, but allow me to begin on the note I signed off: 

With that being reiterated, let’s introduce you to the job at hand.

 

 

There’s one instrument on the bench and its mirror image stands in the corner. The one in the corner I can take apart – part by part – and have allowed it to take up premium space for the sole purpose of explaining to customers and people in general, guitar anatomy and pointing out problem areas in other instruments.

One look at it and it was clear that the owner was conscious about the evils of counterfeiting. This one was called ‘Fendar’ but the owner had taken the time and effort to cover up all branding. 

To the owner: Even though the style in which the name is printed is very similar to the famous American brand, you needn’t have worried about copyright infringement. The original is spelt ‘Fender’!

So, the young man who brought in this guitar sheepishly admitted to it having been a hurried purchase some years ago. Now, more informed and wiser, he understood his mistake but still wanted to see if this instrument could be salvaged. 

The problem, as he explained it, was two-fold. One: the truss rod didn’t work, and two, the neck had way too much relief (and thus very high action) for the instrument to be played comfortably. 

He also mentioned something about either the ‘B’ or the ‘G’ string not intonating properly or going out of tune (I forget).

One look at the bridge/saddle area and a very discriminatory ‘Humph!’ escaped my lips.

You see why? 

Those of you who have been regular readers of this blog, know about the angst caused to me by nuts and bolts in bridges and plastic nut and saddles . Here I was seeing both in the same frame! The area encircled in red is where I could see a hairline crack in the saddle. 

I had decided to throw out this saddle and put in a new plastic one in its place to keep the budget as low as possible. Using only fingers, I tried to remove the saddle from its seating, but it would not budge. Gripping it with pliers, this is how it came out.

I was convinced that there was something gripping the saddle in the seating and closer inspection revealed remnants of  what could have been some sort of glue. Measuring the saddle length and width, I was surprised that it was much, much smaller than what I had. In order to put in a new one, I would have to shave down a new saddle much in height and length and thickness. Too much work!

I just super-glued the two parts of the old saddle and polished it up, and it was as good as new. However, the seating did need attention which I gave with 80 grit sandpaper and some elbow grease.

All this was the easy part. Now, began the real work.

Trying to work the truss rod, indeed, it did not work. My guess is, it never did, even in the shop from where it was bought. If I tried fiddling with it too much, the nut capping the truss rod would come off. So, I left the truss rod alone almost as if it did not exist!

The process that I tried to straighten the neck, works (usually) when you take off the fretboard, and actually focus on the wood of the neck. But then, on this instrument, investing so much time and effort would have been a waste. I still tried it with the fretboard on because I wanted to see if it would work, and besides, there was nothing to lose.

It’s a process of applying clamp pressure under hot and moist conditions. Moisture was provided by a portion of a leg of a pair of jeans soaking in water, while the heat was radiated through heat guns.

As fate would have it, one heat gun got so hot that it caught fire, melted, burnt the guitar neck rest (the block of wood) it was resting on. The molten plastic burnt the mat that I lay instruments on, and while I was fighting the fire, some of the molten plastic landed on me too.

Suffice it to say that disaster was averted, and I ordered another (better, sturdier) device to carry on with the work. For four or five days, I kept feeding the guitar neck water and heat intermittently and then let it cool completely.

Thereafter, when I released the neck from bondage, it had a bit of a bow in the reverse direction, such that it would certainly make the strings buzz. Believe me, I was very happy to see that because I knew that once I strung up the guitar, string tension would pull the neck straight.

With just the stringing left to be done, I cleaned up the fretwires and the fretboard and oiled it, exposing the pretty wood grain of the fretboard.

Look carefully at the background and you can probably see the burnt neck rest and the portion of the matting that got burnt in the fire episode.

As I strung up the instrument, I noticed to my horror that the neck not just straightened but much of the bow returned in it. Ah, well, I tried!

But I was pleasantly surprised when the owner came to pick up the guitar and pronounced that it was much better and very playable.

So much for happy endings!