Damage caused by guitar techs

Brize

Philly_Q said:

@Brize is that your TV yellow Custom Shop SG?

Yep, one of my favourites.

wellsyboy

octatonic said:

Charlie Chandler.

The Best - top geezer too! 

Boromedic

BloodEagle said:

Currently have a guitar in with Nigel Roberts for some major work, he's been great to deal with but havent seen the results yet

I think you'll be pleased with Nige's work - he's done some fantastic repair and setup stuff for me on a couple of guitars.He doesnt half like to talk though! FTR I've had a less than brilliant experience with HS too

Nigel is great, and I only live 10mins from his place in Thringstone which is even better. Did a full setup on my CP Mexi Strat a while ago when I was less confident with the tools. Played great ever since, he is always bloody busy though (which is a good sign of course), so means a bit of a wait but it's worth it. And yes he can talk the hind leg off a donkey!!

John_A

Boromedic said:

BloodEagle said:

Currently have a guitar in with Nigel Roberts for some major work, he's been great to deal with but havent seen the results yet

I think you'll be pleased with Nige's work - he's done some fantastic repair and setup stuff for me on a couple of guitars.He doesnt half like to talk though! FTR I've had a less than brilliant experience with HS too

Nigel is great, and I only live 10mins from his place in Thringstone which is even better. Did a full setup on my CP Mexi Strat a while ago when I was less confident with the tools. Played great ever since, he is always bloody busy though (which is a good sign of course), so means a bit of a wait but it's worth it. And yes he can talk the hind leg off a donkey!!

Yes, he can talk, but all interesting stuff.  I've got an old USA Washburn neck in to get the truss rod replaced, it's a fingerboard off job, so fingers crossed he's as good as his reputation 

Boromedic

Yeah he has lots of great stories and some good insights into techy stuff as well. I think you'll be impressed, let us know how it goes.

rico

I took a brand new US Tele to a well regarded London tech for a set up and it came back with a bloody fret level and buzzing all over the neck. I was not happy! 

I took it back to make it at least halfway playable but the nice narrow tall frets were no longer particularly tall. 

Philly_Q

Brize said:

Philly_Q said:

@Brize is that your TV yellow Custom Shop SG?

Yep, one of my favourites.

I'll take it off your hands for 50 quid now that it's ruined...?

Brize

Philly_Q said:

Brize said:

Philly_Q said:

@Brize is that your TV yellow Custom Shop SG?

Yep, one of my favourites.

I'll take it off your hands for 50 quid now that it's ruined...?

Ha! It's funny - everyone seems to love that guitar and yet, when I bought it, it had been stuck in the shop for a few years and I got it for a knock-down price. It's got a great-feeling neck, both in terms of profile and smoothness - another reason why that ding was so galling.

tralfamadan

Mentioned it elsewhere on these boards but I took my Telecaster in for a service at a well-established tech in London. They put scratches all in the fingerboard and where they filed the frets to clean them they carved nice grooves into the wood at the edge of the fretboard both sides of each fret wire. They also left the filings from the fret wire stuck to all the pickup cover & polepieces ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I didn't notice for ages as I only played in dark rooms

Brize

tralfamadan said:

Mentioned it elsewhere on these boards but I took my Telecaster in for a service at a well-established tech in London. They put scratches all in the fingerboard and where they filed the frets to clean them they carved nice grooves into the wood at the edge of the fretboard both sides of each fret wire. They also left the filings from the fret wire stuck to all the pickup cover & polepieces ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I didn't notice for ages as I only played in dark rooms

Yikes. Thank goodness it was only a Telecaster and not a proper guitar.
















I kid.

Moe_Zambeek

I took my SG to Jimmy Moon for a setup about 15 years ago, before I had discovered @ICBM. I handed it over to him, explained what I wanted and he picked it up, looked it over and promptly dinged the headstock on the shop counter! A sign of things to come.

I got it it back with a distinctly unimpressive setup and discovered they had cracked the truss rod cover when they refitted it. They then replaced it with a single ply plastic one which was horrible, and were most put out when I insisted they replace it with a proper Gibson one (of which they had many new ones in single packages hanging in the shop). I was very disappointed in the quality of their work, however having played quite a few of their acoustics since im not really surprised.

skaguitar

Mine is not as bad as some of these horror stories on here but I took my AGED Collings i35 for a set up to a local luthier to me. When I went to pick it up he said  'I've done the set up and polished all the hardware and pick up covers so they are nice and shiny' ....aaarrrggghhh... when I said they were supposed to be aged he said he would age them again for me but I politely declined. A quick message or phone call to ask if I wanted him to do that would have been nice...although he was just probably trying to go above and beyond but still annoying.
Also I messaged him about another job and when he didn't get back to me I found another local guy to do it for me...when he eventually got back to me and I told him this he promptly took me off his facebook...lol

ICBM

skaguitar said:

Mine is not as bad as some of these horror stories on here but I took my AGED Collings i35 for a set up to a local luthier to me. When I went to pick it up he said  'I've done the set up and polished all the hardware and pick up covers so they are nice and shiny' ....aaarrrggghhh... when I said they were supposed to be aged he said he would age them again for me but I politely declined. A quick message or phone call to ask if I wanted him to do that would have been nice...although he was just probably trying to go above and beyond but still annoying.

Not everyone is up on the latest fashion for ‘relics’ .

He should still have asked though.

I was once told off for *cleaning* someone’s guitar! I nearly replied that he was clearly such a filthy bugger that it would be back to its old state soon enough, but thought better of it...

Brize

Moe_Zambeek said:

They then replaced it with a single ply plastic one which was horrible, and were most put out when I insisted they replace it with a proper Gibson one (of which they had many new ones in single packages hanging in the shop).

That's unbelievable!

prlgmnr

This isn't doing much to help cure me of my current method of dealing with a guitar needing a setup, namely just buying a new guitar.

StuartMac290

Moe_Zambeek said:

I took my SG to Jimmy Moon for a setup about 15 years ago, before I had discovered @ICBM. I handed it over to him, explained what I wanted and he picked it up, looked it over and promptly dinged the headstock on the shop counter! A sign of things to come.

I got it it back with a distinctly unimpressive setup and discovered they had cracked the truss rod cover when they refitted it. They then replaced it with a single ply plastic one which was horrible, and were most put out when I insisted they replace it with a proper Gibson one (of which they had many new ones in single packages hanging in the shop). I was very disappointed in the quality of their work, however having played quite a few of their acoustics since im not really surprised.

Ahem - see part two of my original post

stickyfiddle

Some of these stories are horrendous. But sadly I’ve heard plenty of similar stories from watch servicing places. Most major brands will replace anything that looks old with the new version as part of a generally service, which often means people have old hands replaced and cases polished/brushed without permission. Not impressive when you’re talking about heirloom-type stuff.

Dave_Vader

About 15 years ago I fell in love with a shitty old japanese Tele (think Teisco, Jedson, Kay etc.) and gave it to a local guy to fit a pair of seymour duncan hotrails, a proper bone nut and do a refret.

He had to rout a bit, and grind out the bridge to fit the rails (which he only did on one side so they're not quite centred and the top E sometimes sounds a bit shit as a result) but had tried to fit a new aftermarket bridge only to discover the string spacing wouldn't work on the skinny neck.

I think this must have pissed him off as when I finally got it back he had forgotten to screw the pickguard back down.

I did it myself - had to dig in my screws box though.

I don't think he's still doing it.

Fret job was great though. They're still going strong 15 years later.

guitarfishbay

prlgmnr said:

This isn't doing much to help cure me of my current method of dealing with a guitar needing a setup, namely just buying a new guitar.

That's my approach to restringing.

ICBM

Dave_Vader said:

I think this must have pissed him off as when I finally got it back he had forgotten to screw the pickguard back down.

I did it myself - had to dig in my screws box though.

I know an amp repairer who habitually loses half the original screws from everything he works on, and if you're lucky fits cheap-looking replacements.

He once told the owner of an amp I'd worked on that I hadn't even opened it up, since it didn't look like it had been touched. The difference is that when he's worked on something, you can *always* tell...