The Hub

Hey all, I have a customer that brought a mid 2000's Gold Jazzmaster to get a suggestion on what to do to the neck of it. On the Low E side of the neck it has about .08 relief, while the treble side is at .05 relief, and the truss rod is maxed out. He has had several other well known luthiers in the area work on it, one of them tried a fret dress and a setup that only fixed it for about a month, and the other one heated the neck to add…

I rarely use pickguards on my builds, as most of my guitars are intended for fingerstyle players. That said, I occasionally need to install one, and I've yet to find a cutting method that consistently meets my quality standards. I’ve experimented with several techniques for cutting clear pickguard material, but the results are always somewhat disappointing. Using a brand new X-Acto blade gives a reasonably clean cut, but there's almost a…

Hey, fellow Looths. I need a small favour… Short version: Go to https://statuesque-cocada-438199.netlify.app and listen and vote. It takes about a minute. Longer version: A friend’s son is studying music and audio production in college and is working on a project to test the covered versus uncovered humbucker question. He reached out to me for some help and I’m reaching out to you. He designed a solid experiment (even modding a guitar so…

https://northampton.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NCC/details/Luthier-Instructor_JR3840 The staff and faculty of Northampton Community College share a single goal: to help students transform their lives through education. It's a goal that reaps rewards thousands of times over the course of a career. Employees at Northampton receive competitive compensation and an array of benefits while working on campuses located in a region with a very h…

I've been slowly chipping away at a rebind on a Gretsch streamliner with full on rotted binding. The repair was started by a luthier in KC that passed away a couple years ago and I inherited the repair after it sat for a few years. I've glued some binding back in place on martins with the Pacer canopy glue, and that has worked out fine in the past. I did a test w/ some new ABS from stewmac that I was going to use for rebinding the gr…

Hey there fellow Looths! I'm still learning and just starting my luthier journey, but I'm serious about it and want to design and build my own workshop. I have space for a 4mx4m (13x13ft) workshop. I know it's kinda tiny but I think it can do the trick since I want to work analog/by hand for most of the tasks. I plan to buy a drill press and a band saw. That's all for 'the big machinery'. I'm just curious if people have tips or 'things to…

This is probably a usual discussion, but I'm interested to hear what the more experienced people in french polishing think about it.I use dewaxed shellac for finishing, but some luthiers swear that waxed shellac (button lac) makes a harder finish. Is that right? I always read everywhere that waxed shellac should be avoided. Thanks! Jorge

Working for Free as a luthier? When and Why?