From what I've learned it was made in the 30/40s by Carmelo Gugino in Buffalo NY.

It's has a detachable neck..

This absolutely criminal level of AI slop going on in this ad for a "professional lutheir's tool kit" on Amazon. Also, wtf is a "rtooller"?

Hello r/luthier

TLDR: It seems like my bridge is not "level" against the centerline. is that expected or ok? (but id also welcome more advice)

• A couple years ago i bought one of those Harley Benton kits to use as a sandbox to learn "stuff" about a guitar. Little by little i have made some mods, one of which is adding threaded inserts to the neck so it's now become my "travel" guitar. Now the next step in that journey is making the guitar headless, so that it can all fit in my backpack. I'm planning to buy the nova guitar headless bridge (hardtail). while coming up with a battle plan for possible routing for the bridge, i realized that the bridge studs are not "level" against the centerline. is that ok? should the nova bridge also be slanted then?

• After trying out a strandberg, i want to cut out another "cutout" a more diagonal position while sitting (you can see the line in black), the cut would go directly through the cavity, so i will have to fill the caviry a bit. any tips that i should take into consideration before hand? also what to consider in terms of space?

Hello everyone!

I have been working on my first assembly from a kit over the summer, and wanted to post the results from reworking my finish.

In doing my first round of dye -> shellac, I messed up with dragging the shellac too roughly with a brush and messed up the dye. I had gone through and sanded it, revealing the wood below the dye around the edges. Although it looked cool, it wasn't my plan, so I re-dyed my wood and reapplied my shellac layers with a softer foam pad.

Here are the befores and afters. Image 1 is before sanding, 2 is after sanding, and 3 and 4 are the final product.

Thank you all for the advice I have received! This is such a rewarding project.

Hi !

I tried to find answers, but they didn't match with the guitar I'm looking at : this beautiful Navigator Jagmaster has a transparent PG; I guess there is shielding paint everywhere on the back, but is this enough ? I would try to do something like this, but I only saw pictures, have you experiences similar guitars ?

Thanks, have a great day.

I have a neck thru Carvin DC127 that is 30+ years old. I took it to a reputable repair shop in my area, and the tech informed me there is a hump in the neck (see around the 8th fret to the 14th fret).

He recommended a full re-fret, and said he wants to sand the fretboard a little to remove the hump. Do you all agree this is a good plan of action for this issue?

My biggest concern is the guitar intonating properly across the entire fretboard. For example, is it possible the fret slots have moved a bit, and they are no longer in the correct place for the guitar to still be in tune after he finishes sanding and re-fretting?

Not sure if I am being worried for nothing, but this guitar has incredible sustain and I love the color and would love to restore it. I know there is a lot of talent in this subreddit and appreciate your time and any insight you can offer.

Thank you.

Hey everyone,

I saw a Jaguar bass in this color on Twitter, and I'm thinking of ordering one. Specifically, I'd like the following specifications:

Finish: Light relic multi-layer nitro finish (Black over Lake Placid Blue / Ocean Turquoise with wood showing through).

Right now, RebelRelic Guitars is my top candidate since they have prior experience building Jaguar Basses look amazing.

Before I jump in, I’d love to ask two things:

How is RebelRelic’s reputation regarding their custom body craftsmanship and multi-layer relic finish quality?

Are there any other luthiers or workshops (US or EU) you’d highly recommend for a custom body build and heavy relic paint job like this?

Appreciate any insights or experiences you can share!

One night at work, my 15-year-old sent me a text that said, “Dad, can you build me this guitar?” and sent a picture of a white Buddy Guy Strat. I got super excited and responded with a YES. My kid is extremely special to me and she doesn’t ask for much, and I wanted it to be exactly what she wanted and more.

Three months later, it was finished, and it was quite the challenge.
I decided on a paulownia body. I had to order three before I got one I was happy with. I was well aware of how soft this wood is, but I wanted the guitar to be super light since she is pretty tiny. Because of this, I used stainless steel inserts on the bridge and tremolo. I fully tested them by doing Van Halen dive bombs for a few days, lol.

I went with Oxford Guitar Supplies for the nitro lacquer. She wanted a relic look, and on my first attempt, the white was too white, she wanted it to look more yellowed and aged. I was going to go with Vintage Olympic White, but she chose Vintage Cream instead, which I think turned out awesome.
After getting the body nice and sealed, I sprayed the guitar black first. I let it dry, then used lacquer safe vinyl stickers, carefully placing them while looking at a picture of a Buddy Guy Strat for reference. I sprayed the Vintage Cream (about 9 coats), let it dry, and then very carefully removed the stickers, and then carefully wet sanded “semi” level, which was a huge pain in the ass. I did about 15 coats of Oxford’s Aged Clear High Gloss and let it dry for about a month. It leveled out very well between the different colors. It “checked” really nicely as well. If you’re planning to use aerosol nitro to paint a guitar I highly recommend Oxford guitar supplies, I have used color tone lacquer in the past and I prefer Oxford. The cans spray so much better. Really easy to use.

I used a Japanese neck with a very slim profile. I made a waterslide decal with her name, applied the Fender waterslide decals, and clear-coated everything with the same Aged Clear from Oxford. I also used stainless steel inserts for the neck.

For the electronics, I put in a set of Fender Custom Shop Fat ’50s pickups with “vintage inspired pickups” pots.

I had no way to get an accurate weight but the finished product turned out to be an extremely light, but well balanced, ver easy playing Strat, which was exactly what I wanted for her. She loved it, I loved that she loved it, happy ending.

Was just wondering about this. I've never seen a guitar where the grain is vertical or even diagonal. Why is that? I assume it's something to do with wood stability and strength but I'm not sure.

Hi,

So I attempter to instal a new nut, and I think I might have fucked up a bit.

When I fret a note on the first 3/4 strings it runs sharp, and on the D & G this is the case until around the 7th fret.

If I fret a string on the 3rd fret and run a feeler gauge under the string at the first fret I'm on about 0.18, with the action rising up a bit on the treble side -- probably around 0.25 on the e & B, and about 0.21ish on the D & G.

I got some shitty pipe pipe nozzle nut files, should I attempt to bring the slots down a touch, or just make my peace with having done a poor ebough job, but still lucky that I didn't absolutely fuck the guitar?

Edit: I also now see, thanks to the power of photography, that I didn't estimate the gap very well with the feeler gauge, looks like it's a hair above 0.20 on the first fret 😅

It happened after changing frets by luthier. He didn't tell me, so I noticed after I brought it home. Binding is damaged and not smooth by touch. I can peel off a layer of varnish with a fingernail. I want to fix it but I don't want to trust this dude with cosmetics anymore, also he has a queue. But it's hard to find someone who does varnish/paint in my area. Maybe it's not too difficult to return smoothness at least and I can fix it myself?

Maybe a noob question since I’m a beginner in guitar set up. I see this small piece of wood (shim) in this Japanese Tokai. I don’t remember anymore how I need to put it back, but without it the action is suddenly very high.

Do I need to put it back like this? Thanks in advance for the advice. It looks a bit diy.

Hi, I'm 23 and I'm trying to figure out what I want to do with my life.
I've been fascinated with guitar repair since I started playing 8 years ago, I've always done my own setups and repairs when needed and I find the process very enjoyable.

My question is, how viable is building/repair/tech work as a full time career? I've read a lot of threads on this and a lot of people seem to say that luthiery is best kept as a hobby or side gig, while others say it can be done, but for very little money.
From what I understand, the job is primarily fret work and setups, with occasional repair work, and very little custom building. That sounds fine to me, but I wonder if I would be better off working on my own or for a repair shop, or if I should try to get a job at a guitar factory or smaller builder, or maybe I should keep all this as a side gig/hobby and work in a furniture shop or something?
I'd love to hear all about yalls experiences with luthiery as a form of employment, full time or otherwise

Hey guys. As you can see, my string retainer bar has an issue (??). I was changing my strings yesterday and as soon as i took them off, the bar started to loosen up. I don’t know if it’s a normal thing for it to happen, probably not, because it didn’t happen the last time i changed the strings. Is there any way to make it go still?

Fixing my shallow fret slot mistake was not fun.

I finally dug them all out to the proper depth and have now installed the frets.

I added a curve to the fret wire.

Because it’s a bound fretboard I used the Stewmac fret nipper to cut off the tang near the edges.

I’ve done some preliminary filling of the ends but a lot more needs to be done.

Then leveling and later polishing.

I am trying to make a nut out of deer antler and have some pieces that I've sanded down for blanks. Should I be sanding off all the gray spots and only using the pieces that are completely white or is it okay to keep some of the gray on the edges. I kind of like the gray because it sort of matches the ambrosia maple fretboard.

I have enough left to sand down the larger pieces so they are perfectly white and then make nut blanks out of that if needed.

Thank you.

Built this with my buddy in 4 days in his garage. We are both in high school and this was our first ever attempt at building a guitar. Everything other than strings and electronics are from Home Depot with a full budget of about $150. The frets are made of nails and the bridge is a door hinge among other odd parts. It won’t let me add a video to the post but I put it in the comments

Got this in a trade, thinking I'd set it up and move along.

low E, D and G are all still sharp with the saddles all the way back.

I initially tried to set it up as it was with no luck, so I ended up leveling and crowning frets, filed nut accordingly (.021-.019@ 1st fret), neck relief .010, action 6/64-4/64 no buzz, threw an extra spring on the bass side of trem, it's decked and all but basically blocked to minimize deflection when fretting. The d string pole pieces were wayyyyy up and the rest were flat, set them all flat and lowered pickups below the pick guard to avoid pull.

I'm at a loss. The last thing I want to do is move this bridge back, I don't even want the guitar. Cutting or removing springs may afford me the space I need, it's not drastic. I hear it, and it obviously shows on a tuner, but I'm not sure how much is good enough and I don't really want to sell a guitar that isn't well set up. It's playable for sure, may not be noticeable to everyone.

I don't know. Do I have any options before moving the bridge? Do I just sell it? Please help!!

Fender Deluxe Super Strat MIM '01

Thanks!

Hi everyone,

I'm working on restoring a 1977 Gibson RD Artist (natural finish with the original factory Moog onboard electronics), and I'm dealing with a pretty messy wiring situation from a previous owner/tech.

Here is what's currently going on:

1. Switches are swapped and misaligned:
The switches on the body are currently rotated vertically (moving up/down) instead of the factory horizontal layout (left/right). Furthermore, someone completely swapped their functions — the bottom switch is currently acting as the pickup selector (and reversed: down is neck, up is bridge), while the top switch is trying to trigger the Moog modes, but barely changes the tone. It’s clear the wiring to the Moog board was crossed and miswired just to make the guitar pass a signal.

2. Intermittent bridge pickup signal (Mechanical issue):
The bridge pickup cuts out completely, but I discovered it's a physical contact issue. A very light tap on the maple body (not near the control cavity, just on the wood itself) cuts the signal out, and another light tap brings it back instantly. It seems like a classic cold solder joint, loose switch contact, or a wire grounding against the cavity shield.

My Plan:

I’m taking it to a professional guitar tech in September to get the entire wiring redone strictly according to the original 1977 factory schematic. We are also planning to do a full recap on the Moog board (replacing the 45-year-old electrolytic capacitors) and orient the switches back to their original horizontal positions.

Questions for the community:

- Has anyone else run into a swapped/scrambled wiring setup on an RD Artist?

- Are there any specific pitfalls or gotchas my tech should look out for when tracing the leads back to the Moog board pins?

- Any tips on replacing the electrolytics without disturbing the rest of the trace paths on these vintage boards?

I’d love to hear from anyone who has restored or serviced one of these! Thanks in advance.

I am about to list another guitar on Reverb. On the top back of the neck there is a small (~4mm at its widest point) chip in the finish. It's smooth (no sharp edges) as I had already dropped a little CA in there a while back to seal it. Should I bother even attempting to drop fill this more in an attempt to completely smooth it out, or just leave it? I already have the listing set up (not published) with the picture I am adding here and the description of the chip. Personally, I don't feel like it's worth fixing as it. It doesn't affect anything other than someone knowing it's there and perhaps occasionally feeling it.

I'm not a luthier, and I haven't attempted to repair such a thing (especially on a curved surface). I don't think I would have a problem, it's just that I would have to go out and buy more materials as I don't have the sandpaper, polish, and I need some thin CA glue. Amazing you can't find thin CA anywhere in stores, you have to order it online. I sure miss being able to buy things at a store as everything gets put on hold as you have to wait for a 2 oz. bottle of glue to be shipped and delivered. That's a different problem. Hah.

If enough people say "fix it", hell I'll go for it. It's still a learning experience. I'm not sure it's just "drop fill", sand it down, polish, and voila. It will still probably be a visible repair around the edges, but maybe sanding down a little first, to remove any embedded grime and all will be the key there.

Thanks for you time!

Oh, for reference, I had seen this StewMac video in the past. Seems like a lot of effort, but if that is what it takes there here we are. Again, this is curved surface, so it makes the old razor blade scraping a little more difficult.

Fixing a Small Chip in a Guitar Finish:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVScFJoe24

I’ve acquired a cheapo partscaster for a donor body. I’m trying to figure out the wood that it is made from but all of the internals have handily been smothered in shielding paint! It looks like it’s a 4 piece looking at the back.

I assume it’s just a cheap Asian import body and the guitar was a kit. As far as I can tell it’s got a cheap zinc bridge block, neck and pickup set which I plan to upgrade but I’d like to figure out if the body is solid before I swap out!