Photo Gallery

My customer brought this guitar in for evaluation. The first thing I noticed were the frets, they were low, flat on top and could not possibly intonate correctly. We agreed on a re-fret and I went to work, pulling a couple of frets for measurement and ordering. My first thought was oh Lordie, we're going to need a fretboard. I decided to try to repair it first, and opt for a fretboard if it came to that later. Since the guitar was trimmed in gold, I ordered EVO gold frets and proceeded with the task at hand.


	Have a question about guitar repair? E-mail me HERE


	*Home*

About

In The Guitar Repair Photo Gallery you will find photographs of repairs past and present. As Accu-Tech Guitar Repair grows, I will add new repair operations, techniques and proceedure. One aspect of guitar repair I do not perform however, is guitar finishing work. Having spent the last 45 plus years of my life building everything from radio controled airplanes and soap box racers to big block V8's and motorcycle drag race engines, I am moving as far away from chemicals, air borne pollutants and curing paints as I can.

If you have any questions or want to know more about the repairs displayed below, please e-mail me through the link on the Contact page.

Repair Services

Repair Tools
- Store Bought Tools
- Hand Made Tools

Nut Replacement

After scoring around the nut with a razor knife to avoid any finish chipping (be careful), gently tap the nut from over the fret board toward the head stock using a light hammer and a block of hardwood as a drift. If the nut is recessed in the wood and will not tap out from the side, it may have to be sawed and collapsed to remove it. Gently clean the dried glue from the nut slot working in from the sides to avoid chipping the finish. Clean the end of the fret board and use a fine finishing file to square the nut slot, again, working in from the sides if needed.

facebook

Fit the new bone nut to the cleaned slot leaving excess material on either side of the slot to be removed later. This allows for a small margin of error and to shape the ends of the nut to the contour of the neck and headstock during final shaping. Use fine sandpappers, 220, 320 and 400 grit and go slow fitting the nut snug, not tight.

Measure the two E string locations from the outside edge of the fret board on the nut first, usually about 2 to 3 32nds with a possible 5/64ths. Match the two outside string marks up on the spacing rule and mark the 4 inside strings (left). Start the nut slots with an accurate, perpendicular back-draw on the razor saw (right).

Once the nut is roughed in, it's time to take a little off the top and shape it up. Final nut slot depth is determined by string size, playing style, setup preferences and the guitar itself. Be on the safe side, start high and work your way down as you repeat the setup adjustment process. Repeatedly hold the guitar in the playing position as you go.


	With a final filing, shapping, sanding, lowering of slots and polishing, you have a new bone nut.

	Single Coil Pickup Shielding On A Stratocaster

	Just after I bought my MIM Straocaster in 1998, I found a web site by John C Atchley appropriately called, Guitar Nuts. When I took this guitar home I ordered the replacement parts I wanted for it and proceded to gut it. The only parts that remained were the body, the neck, the jack plate and the tremolo. The pots, switch (5 way), pickups, pick guard, saddles, tuners and rear tremolo cavity covers were upgraded. I shielded this guitar according to the Quieting The Beast article on the Guitar Nuts site. Many guitarists have heard and played this guitar and agree that it has outstanding tone and is quieter than most any of them come. Click on the link and find out more about shielding.

	If you look closely in the center of the photo at the right, there is a large blue 1.0 uF capacitor. The design of the Stratocaster shielding on the Guitar Nuts web site included this capacitor to absorb DC voltage spikes, should one occur, from vintage tube amplifiers. Since I performed this shielding modification, the components have been updated to prevent against shock from polarity reversal between the guitar amp and the PA system in the event a receptacle has been wired in reverse. I will research and include the updated components to protect against polarity reversal soon.


	Expand the photo to the right and take a close look at this capacitor. This baby will take a 400 volt DC hit before giving up, protecting you from at least certain discomfort in the process. For detailed information on this and other modifications for electric guitar electronics, click on the Quieting The Beast link above.

	Blocking A Floyd Rose Tremolo


	This guitar came in with action and tremolo problems. The guitar had been setup several times but always returned to string action that was too high and uncomfortable to play. While talking with the owner of this guitar, he mentioned he never used the tremolo. I explained to him I could block the tremolo (a completely reversible modifcation), get it to stay in tune, and get better tone and sustain through string to body coupling. This modification works on most all spring loaded, through body cavity tremolo systems.


			The blocks for tremolo modification have to be cut and tapered to hold the top perfectly level and to fit flush against the body in the tremolo cavity and the tremolo tone block. It takes two blocks, one in the front and one for the back of the tremolo tone block.


	In this photo, you can see the tremolo blocks are fit and tapered to sit tightly against the metal tremolo tone block in the center. The better the fit, the better the tone and sustain from the guitar.

			In this last photo, the tremolo tension springs have been re-installed and the spring holder screwed into the body as far as possible without pushing the shoulders of the screws into the screw holes. The rear oak block fits tightly into the cavity and is held in place by the cavity cover. The front block is held in by the springs and the tension on the springs greatly increases string to body coupling. This guitar went from an good sounding guitar with tremolo to a great sounding rock guitar with exquisite tone and sustain.

	Neck Alignment and Repair

	We are always trying to determine the value of guitars in dollars and cents. Recently, I had the pleasure of being asked to repair a neck separation on a Tres guitar, hand made in Cuba. You would stand a better chance winning a wrestling match with an aligator than getting anything out of Cuba. A Tres guitar is a guitar played in Salsa music and has three pairs of strings (paired like a 12 string), tuned to open 'C'. The guitar is of great value to my customer so I agreed to make the repair since I had the perfect tool to do it with.


	Click on the photo to the right and you can see the arrangement of the six strings as well as the signatures of three famous Salsa performers. Amazingly, there were no cracks in the top and the sound hole rosette was quite ornate.

	Using the neck jig, I was able to apply just the right amount of pressure to close the separation between the neck and the heel. Since there was no reason to separate these parts in the future, I thined an epoxy and used a pipet dropper to feed the glue between the wood. I am currently converting another guitar to a Tres for this customer so that this guitar can be retired to a keepsake : >)

	Gibson Les Paul Custom Refret

	This is an ebony fretboard and undoubtedly chippy. It was worse in the main playing area between the nut and the fifteenth fret. This told me that acids from sweating hands helped dry out the board and it had not been properly treated with oil (lemon, linseed, take your pick), over the years. Other unknowns like wood origin, quality and drying process may have added to the problem. After removing all the frets, cleaning the glue that was in the slots from the origional fret job, I decided this was to be a Don Teeter glue in fret job. I could not take a chance on fret barbs chipping the board any further going back in. I widened the slots from .002 to .004 thousandths, dammed the slots, dressed the chipping and chamfered the edges. I maintained a back bow with the truss rod during removal and initial installation of the frets. After removing what was left of the fret end nubs on the binding, I pressed the frets in ever so gently with a fret press. Just before clamping for 24 hours of curing, I released the pressure on the truss rod to make sure the neck would show relief and returned it to dead straight.

			After straightening the neck, I clamped on my fret retaining jig and neck caul for 24 hours of glue curing. Expand the photo and you can see the ends of the two oak dowells glued to the top piece of wood at the tuner head. The dowells are about 3/8" in from the edge of the fretboard on each side and widened with the fretboard toward the guitar body. This method works nicely to keep the center as well as the ends of the frets secure during drying.


	The frets over the body of the guitar need a little extra attention and care. Since it's hard to get to them with the beveling tool, they have to be done with a file that has good cutting teeth that are very close together for quick, smooth cutting.

			The existing nut on this guitar had been cut too low. The old frets measured anywhere from .022" to .030" depending on where you were on the fretboard. The new frets, after leveling and crowning measured a nice .043" to .045". This guitar was well deserving of a nice new hand carved bone nut, since the nut from the factory was a hollow piece of plastic, YUK! This guitar had NO string to neck coupling to speak of, no ring, no vibe, no nothing. I cut the nut slots in by measure and final adjustments after shaping by feel. This guitar came alive. The unamplified sustain was incredible, the mass of the frets made it sing in all octaves and the rollaway of the nut slots as the strings led to the tuners was perfect and allowed exellent, chiming harmonics.

	Gary Willis Design Bass Ramp/Finger Rest

	Recently, a bass guitarist called me to see if I could (or would), fabricate a specialy designed accessorie for his guitar. Having logged decades of fabrication experience, I agreed to look at his Ibanez 5 string bass and the non-commercially manufactured part he wanted for his guitar. After extensive research, I agreed to build a Gary Willis design bass guitar ramp/finger rest. Since the part has a physical funtion as well as sonic wave change value, I took on the project with much enthusiasm. Below, are the results of this project and another happy customer.


	The guitar, an Ibanez 5 string came in with a midi/synth pickup system previously installed and a well done installation. The modifocation I was asked to do is directly related to playability and has a tested and proven sonic wave response improvement. For more information on this modification click here. The part I'm building is to be installed between the two pickups, although, some are installed the forward pickup and the neck especially on bass guitars with only one pickup.

			The photo on the left shows the radius that was matched to the radius of the neck and the desire saddle radius. The photo on the right shows the ramp finished, with countersunk screw holes all except for 1200 grit sanding, polishing and oiling.

			With the ramp installed, it keeps the player fingers from diving too far between the strings while playing. It also produces a more even sonic string wave by preventing too hard a pluck and causing wave cancelation through exagerated string oscillation. For more detailed information, click on the 'click here' link above.

	Copyright©2010-2012 Accu-Tech Guitar Repair LLC. All rights reserved
			Site Map