I've made three guitars so far, and I'm very pleased with all of them, however, I think that I have been riding my luck with the nut. I don't really have a clue about them, I just buy a pre-cut one and slap it on at what I think will be the right height. All have worked fine so far.
Do you 'intelligent' builders (eg not like me), do anything to a pre-cut nut, or just use it as is?
Anyone got any good advice as to a better approach for me to use with the current guitar I am building? I'd like to improve my chances of getting things right.
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All you need to do to get the depth right is to fret each string at the third fret and look at the gap between the string and the first fret. It should be between 1/4 and 1/10 of the string diameter, ie about .001" - .003" on the top E and .005" - .015" on the bottom E, depending on string gauge. (And similarly for basses, relative to their larger string diameter.) You can check it with feeler gauges if you like, but usually by eye is close enough.
You will either need a proper set of nut files (expensive, but worth it if you do a lot of setup work) or to make your own - it's possible to achieve good results with hammered-down, rounded-off junior hacksaw blades if you know what you're doing, but they do need a bit more skill to use.
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Some famous brand guitars and basses are sold in an *unfinished* condition. The nut could do with fettling AFTER the neck has acclimatised to local atmospheric conditions.
Many guitars have a re-sale value. Some you'll never want to sell.
Stockist of: Earvana & Graphtech nuts, Faber Tonepros & Gotoh hardware, Fatcat bridges. Highwood Saddles.
Pickups from BKP, Oil City & Monty's pickups.
Expert guitar repairs and upgrades - fretwork our speciality! www.felineguitars.com. Facebook too!
It makes a massive difference to the final result. Its up there with fret levelling as one of the essential things that needs to be done right on any set-up
It's the one area of guitar building where I have not managed to find a a simple DIY tool that can do the job as well as a specialist one. Well worth saving up for a few files. You don't need all, or exact, string gauges to begin with.
Not knowing what you are doing is no excuse. You didn't know how to build a guitar at one time, but still managed to make 3 of them.
A set like this will get you started
https://guitarsandwoods.com/hosco-double-edge-nut-files-for-electric-guitar-set.html
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I'll see if I can find decent info on how to do the job and maybe give it some serious thought. I do plan to make a few more guitars over time.
(formerly customkits)
I started with a similar set stew-mac used to sell, but have since moved onto individual files
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Although I've bought a poncy Hosco set now, I always used hacksaw blades and always made an improvement over precut nuts. How much are nut blanks anyway? And how much are junior hacksaw blades? Worth a try, ain't it, even if you screw up on a couple.
Many guitars have a re-sale value. Some you'll never want to sell.
Stockist of: Earvana & Graphtech nuts, Faber Tonepros & Gotoh hardware, Fatcat bridges. Highwood Saddles.
Pickups from BKP, Oil City & Monty's pickups.
Expert guitar repairs and upgrades - fretwork our speciality! www.felineguitars.com. Facebook too!