FRETS.COM Index
Use the table above to jump to departments or scroll down below. It's ALL here. . .

Of Interest to Players:

• FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions  
• Restringing Clinic:
  • Steel String Guitar
  • Removing Tight Bridge Pins
  • Slotted Headstocks
  • Archtop Jazz Guitar
  • Classical Guitar
  • Mandolin
  • Banjo
• Strings
  • A Beginner's Look at Strings
  • Make Your Own Loop End Strings
• General Maintenance
  • An Introduction to Instrument Finishes
  • Advice on Cleaning Your Instrument
  • Packing for Travel or Shipment
  • Heat Stress - It Kills Summer & Hot Weather Special
  • Another Hot One
  • Vinyl is Your ENEMY
  • Looking at Cracks
  • Loose Parts Can Rattle and Buzz
  • Tapered (Friction) Tuning Pegs
  • Tune Up Your Gears
  • Loose Screws? Fix 'em Yourself
  • Glue in a Label for Security
• Accessories
  • The Capo, Now and Then
  • What's Wrong With Cases?
• Instrument Setup
  • Looking at Frets
  • Buzz Diagnosis
  • Truss Rod Adjustment
  • Checking Action at the Nut
  • A Closer Look at Nuts
  • Reducing String Breakage at the Saddle
  • Quick Tricks for Better Setup
  • Watch Those Hands, Buster!
  • Everything About Strap Buttons
• Acoustic Guitar
  • Steel String Guitar Restringing
  • Restringing Slotted Headstocks
  • Classical Guitar Restringing
  • Removing Tight Bridge Pins
  • Cracked Bridges!
  • Looking at Saddles
  • Lowering Action at the Saddle
  • Making a New Saddle
  • Conversion to Left Handed
  • A Gallery of Guitar Top Bracing
  • Checking Neck Angle
  • Basics of Archtop Guitar Setup
  • Some Styles of Archtop Jazz Guitars
  • That Ugly Skin on New Pickguards
  • It's the Insidious "Key Crack"
  • Some Basics About Guitar Tone Woods
  • A Survey of Acoustic Guitar Pickup Types
  • Watch Mike install a Fishman Matrix pickup
  • What are Scalloped Braces?
• Jazz Guitars
  • About the Selmer Macafferri
• Banjo
  • Banjo Restringing
  • Common Types of Banjos
  • Cleaning Banjo Heads
  • Banjo Practice Mutes
  • Keith Tuners - How They Work!
  • Five String Banjo Anatomy
  • Banjo Heads: Types and Construction
  • Replacing a Banjo Head
  • The Banjo Fifth String Nut
  • Looking at Banjo Pegs
  • Installing and Using the Fifth String Capo
  • 5th String Spikes
  • A Unique Fifth String Capo Idea
  • How to Avoid Sagging Bridges
  • Mounting Skin Heads
  • Cleaning Banjo Heads
  • Banjos and Nickel Plating
  • Coordinating Rod Adjustment
  • Pete Pardee's 23rd Fret
• Mandolin
  • Mandolin Restringing
  • Mandolin Diversity
  • A SuperLight Mandolin Bridge for More Volume
  • Getting the End of the Fingerboard Out of the Way
• Ukulele
  • Working with Wooden Ukulele Pegs

Back to Top of Page

Repair/Restoration BLOGS:

• 1867 Martin 1-26
• 1940 Martin D-28
• 1937 Martin D-28
• 1920 Gibson K-2 Mandocello

Special Feature Articles:

• C. F. Martin & Co., Nazareth, PA
• Collings Guitars, Austin, TX
• Gibson's Acoustic Instrument Division, Nashville
• Guitar Building with Jeff Traugott
• CFox Guitars, Healdsburg, CA
• Vogel Guitars, Quito, Ecuador
• Kamaka Ukuleles, Honolulu
• Tacoma Guitar Co.
• USA Custom Guitars
  

Gryphon

• Visit Gryphon
• Gryphon's 30th Birthday Party, October 30, 1999
• What's New at the Store?
• Cats and Jammers House Concert 4/12/98

Book Reviews

• About the Reviews
• GUITAR FINISHING, Step by Step - - - by Dan Erlewine
• MARTIN GUITARS - - - by Richard Johnston & Jim Washburn

Back to Top of Page

Instrument History & Lore:

• Looking Backward at the 20th Century
• The Way We Were"obsolete" repair styles
• Origins of the 12-string Guitar
• The World's Oldest Guitar
• C. F. Martin & Co.
  • Martin's Current Top Bracing Patterns
  • History of the Martin Ukulele
  • A look at Martin Neck Reinforcement

Back to Top of Page

Fun Stuff:

• Guitar Center Visits Gryphon
• The Luthier's Kitchen
• The Yowl-A-Lele
• Alice's Gryphon Page
• Luthiers' Licenses
• Washburn Made a Lot of Everything
• Father & Daughter United after 32 Years!
• Gryphon's Famous Free Picks
• The Folk Art Gallery
• Fine Art Instruments by Robert Armstrong
• Every Circus Needs a SIDESHOW
• Has anyone seen the rest of this banjo?
• The ORIGINAL Dreadnought!
• Photos of GRYPHON
• Nothing Like Those Old Master Finishes
• Hide glue in action <g>

Back to Top of Page

My Field Trips:

• Healdsburg, CA
  • Allied Lutherie
  • C.Fox Guitars
  • L.M.I. (Luthiers Mercantile International)
  • Tom Ribbecke's Shop
  • 1999 Acoustic Guitar Festival
  • 2001 Acoustic Guitar Festival
  • 2003 Healdsburg Guitar Festival
• Santa Cruz, CA
  • Ed Claxton, Guitar Maker
  • Santa Cruz Guitar Company
  • Rick Turner Guitars
  • Jeff Traugott Guitars
• Nashville, TN
  • Guild (Fender) Custom Shop
  • Gibson's Acoustic Factory at Opry Mills
  • A.S.I.A. Symposium, 2000 Photos
  • NAMM, July 1999
  • Marty Lanham's Nashville Guitar Company
  • Gruhn Guitars
  • Hatch Show Print

• Tom Ellis Precision Pearl Inlay Austin, Texas
• Shubb Capos, Valley Ford, CA
• Rick Davis Running Dog Guitars, Richmond, VT
• Ted Megas Guitars San Francisco
• Collings Guitars, Austin, Texas
• Hideo Kamimoto's Shop San Jose, CA
• 1999 Northern California Ukulele Festival
• Taylor Guitars El Cajon, CA
• Northwoods Guitar Repair Seminar 2000
• Northwoods Guitar Repair Seminar 1998 Bryan Galloup's Guitar Hospital, Big Rapids, MI
• 1998 Acoustic Guitar Festival San Rafael, CA
• Guild of American Luthiers Convention, July 1998
• Mario Martello It's Super Mario!
• Bills ABC Music, San Bruno, CA
• Joe Grubaugh & Sigurn Seifert, Violin Makers Petaluma, CA
• Down in Brian's Basement Palo Alto, CA
• Roberto-Venn School of Luthiery Phoenix, AZ
• What have I been doing lately?

Back to Top of Page

Items for Luthiers:

• Technical Q & A

• Product Reviews
  • About the Reviews
  • Tools
    • Parrot Vise or "Return of Versa Vise"
    • Adjustable Bridge Fitting Jig
    • Bridge Pin Slotting Fixture
    • Wagner Safe-T-Planer
    • Roy Noble Router Attachment
    • Triangular straightedge for checking frets 
  • Materials
    • Zinsser's Hot New Shellac
• Data
  • Materials
    • Sources of Things I Use
    • Deionized Water
    • Everything I know about Hide Glue
    • Heat Testing Glue Joints
    • Some more sticky business about Glue
    • Good Old Shellac
    • Lampblack
  • Guitar
    • Taylor's new neck joint

  • All About Adjustable Truss Rods
  • Calculating Compensation Correction

• Shop Tips
  • Cutting Shipping Boxes Down to Size
• Repair Technique
  • Setup
    • Buzz Diagnosis
    • Making a New Nut
    • Setting Nut Action
  • Tuning Gear Repair
    • Fixing Loose Tuner Bushings
    • Installing Plastic Tuner Buttons
    • Vintage Celluloid Tuner Button Transplant
    • Broken Shaft Repair
    • A New Bone Roller
    • A Cracked Brass Cog
    • Bearing Replacement on 1867 Vintage Tuners
  • Inlay
    • Basic Repro Inlay Technique
    • Moving a Fret Position Inlay
  • Frets
    • When Frets Go Wrong
    • Filling Fingerboard Divots
  • Tool and Fixture Making
    • A Thin Kerf Circular Back Saw
    • Heavy Duty Scrapers, Cheap
    • Precision Bridge Saddle Routing Mill
    • Neck and Body Centerline Finder
  • Tool Use
    • Hand Sanding and Sanding Blocks
    • Using Knives - what's the point?
  • High Tech Department
  • Using Rare Earth Magnets
    • Magnet Power - Read this!
    • Molded Magnetic Clamps
    • Heavy Magnetic Clamping
    • A Magnetic "Spin Sander"
  • Light Speed Repairs
    • Light Cured Nut Fill
    • Light Cured Finish Filling
  • Finish
    • Testing Finish Composition with Acetone
    • Setting Up My Baldor Buffer
    • A Simple Spray Gun Modification
    • Filling a Strap Button Screw Hole
    • Reattaching a big loose finish flake
    • Amalgamating Checked and Damaged Lacquer
    • Drop filling Nitrocellulose Lacquer
    • Repairing a lacquer check
    • "Steaming Out" Dents
    • A Quick Intro to Stick Shellac
    • What is French Polish?
    • Razor Blade Scraping
    • Dry Staining Touchup
    • Protecting A Celebrity Signature
  • Truss Rods
    • Removing and Repairing a Broken Harmony Truss Rod
    • Rethreading a Broken Truss Rod
  • Structural
    • Filling Holes in Spruce
    • Regluing Plastic Binding
    • Compressing Distended Loose Sides
    • Plaster cast for Tracing Contours
    • Garolite Bushing for Friction Peg Holes
    • Celluloid Fingerrests for Archtops
    • Cloth Reinforcement Patches
    • A Volume Conrol to Cover Side Damage
    • Fitting Tone Bars with Tom Ribbecke
    • Fret Marker Inlay Dots
    • Quick Fix for a Loose End Pin
    • Magnetic Clamping
    • Reading Grain Runout
    • Molded Clamping Cauls
    • Broken Headstocks
      • Split Pegead
      • Peghead Crack
      • Simple Neck Crack
      • A Severed Head (Banjo)
      • A Shattered Peghead
      • A Long Break
      • "Backstrap Overlay"
      • Backstrap Heat Failure
      • A "Hybrid" Repair
      • Dyed Maple Delamination - Concealed Dowel
      • Dyed Maple Delamination - Spline
  • Glue
    • Using Hide Glue
    • Thickened Epoxy
    • Colored Epoxy
    • What to do with Leftover Epoxy
  • Guitar
  • Tuner Installation
    • Downsizing to "original"
    • Waverly's Oversize Bushings
    • Filling & Drillling Slotted Headstock for New Tuners
  • Structural
    • A Major Peghead Reconstruction
    • Fingerboard Replacement
    • A Chipped D-28 Soundhole Edge
    • Martin Heel Cap Replacement
    • "Deinstalling" an Endpin Jack
    • Long Reach Tools for Crack Repair
    • Archtop - ES175 Broken Tone Bars
    • Bridge Plate Replacement
    • Bridge Plate Overlay
    • Conversion to 8-st. Octave Mandolin
    • 1949 000-28 Top Failure
    • Top & neck restoration - 1887 Martin
    • The Loose Cross Brace Top Wrinkle
    • Crack Repair
      • Side Crack Reinforcement
      • Taylor 12-string: Top & Side Cracks
      • Martin D-28: Cracked End Block
      • A Simple Top Crack
      • The Fingerboard Top Crack
      • A Really Bad Fingerboard Top Crack
      • Archtops: The f-hole Crack
      • Vacuum Leveling for Crack Repair
  • Neck Resetting
    • Neck Reset Technique: 1935 Martin 000-28
    • Neck Reset: 1931 Martin 000-45
    • A D-28's New Neck: Upgrade to Adj. Rod
    • Impossible Neck Reset - it's a Spanish heel!
    • 1946 Epiphone Triumph Neck Reset
    • Taylor Neck Reset - Bolted Butt Joint
    • Collings Neck Reset - Bolted Mortse & Tenon
    • 1973 Gurian Neck Reset - Pinned Mortise & Tenon
    • Classical Guitar Fingerboard Wedge
  • Frets
    • Refretting: 1935 Martin 000-28
    • Refretting: 1973 Martin D-35
    • Replacing "Bar" Frets
  • Pickguards
    • Making Celluloid Pickguards
    • Removing "Self Stick" Pickguards
    • Installing a Clear Pickguard
    • Regluing Martin Pickguards
    • Filling Finish for a New Martin Pickguard
  • Bridges
    • Making a Saddle
    • Removing Martin "through-cut" saddles
    • String Ramps for Steel String Bridges
    • Making a Martin Guitar Bridge
    • Rebuilding a Shattered Flamenco Bridge
    • Locating and drilling bridge pin holes "in situ"
    • Martin Guitar Bridge Blanks
    • Regluing a Martin Guitar Bridge
    • Correcting Warped Bridges
    • A Bridge Upgrade for A Gibson Hummingbird
    • Carving the Martin Pyramid Bridge
    • Repairing an Ivory Bridge - Filling Screw Holes
  • Pickups
    • Installing Fishman Matrix Pickup
    • Piezo Elements &"Through-Cut" Saddles
  • Dan Erlewine's Special Pages
  • Banjo
    • Installing Five Star Planet Pegs
    • Ressurrecting an old Kay 5-string Banjo
    • Geared 5th String Peg Installation
    • Resetting a Gibson Mandolin Banjo Neck
    • A Whyte Laydie Gets a Face Transplant!
  • Mandolin
    • Fitting Mandolin Bridges
    • Mounting a New Fingerrest
    • Raising Nonadjustable Mandolin Bridges
    • Vintage Tuner Repair
    • Hidden Serials in Old Gibson Mandolins
    • Structural
      • A Little Mandolin Repair on the Side
      • Gibson Mandolin Brace Regluing
      • Reinforcing the Sagging Top of a Gibson "A"
      • Truss Rod and Fingerboard Replacement
      • Some Nasty Top Damage
      • Loose Binding
      • 1920 Gibson F-4:A Bad Looking Peghead Break
      • Broken Peghead Scroll Repair and Reinforcement
      • Flatiron 3K: broken back brace
      • 1906 Gibson A-4: Rebuilding a Collapsed Top
    • Frets/Fingerboard
      • Refretting: Gibson F-5
      • Scooping the Fingerboard End
  • Ukulele
    • Bridge Regluing
    • Crack Repair and Inlay
    • Hiding a Bad Break
    • Lowering Action at the Bridge
      
  • Harp
    • Repairing a Broken "T-Brace"
  • Case Repair
    • Handles
      • Handle Post Loops
      • Relocating a Handle
      • Tightening ABS Molded Case Handle Hardware
      • A Simple Vinyl Handle Replacement
    • Preventing Neck Yoke Finish Damage
    • Modifying the Neck Support
    • Hinge Pins
    • Wow! It's a Banana Peel Rivet
• Tools
  • My Work Bench
  • Making a Fluorescent Inspection Light
  • My Traveling Tool Kit
  • Proportional Nut Spacing Rule
  • Kenny Hill's Spring Go-Bars
  • A "one use" molding plane
  • Modified Soldering Gun for Pulling Frets
  • Upgrading Loose Dremel Bearings
  • "Slo-Mo" Stationary Belt Sander
  • Dry Pigment Storage
  • Selecting String Cutters
  • My Refrettimg Tool Kit
  • Fret Height Gauge
  • A Simple Magnetic Fence for Power Tools
  • Taylor's Super Driver
  • Bent Tools
  • Shot Bag Neck Support
  • Half a Pencil
  • Bridge Carving Machine
  • Shop-built Semiautomatic Lining Kerfer
  • Gryphon's Fret Saw
  • The Joint Knife
  • A Two Bit Finger Saver
  • Long Probes
  • Articulated "Take Apart" Crack Clamp
  • "Clamp Points" for easy positioning
  • Bench Clamps
  • Adjustable saddle routing base
  • Special & Modified Clamps
  • Refret Saw Guide
  • Roy Noble's Dremel Router Base
  • Bob Gleason's Nut Handle
  • Folding Inspection Mirror
  • Dan Erlewine's Rockin' Pin Puller
  • Steve Crisp's Classical Guitar Tuning Stand
  • Bridge Pin Hole Slot Saw
  • Making Ergonomic Tool Handles
  • Tim's Saddle Pal
  • Making My Fret Expander Pliers
  • My Favorite Power Tool
  • My Weirdest Power Tool
  • Neck Removal Fixture
  • Neck Removal Air Harness
  • Some of My Favorite "Stock" Tools
  • Check Out the SpyCam!
  • Taper Thickness Gauge
• Quickies
  • Blow Away Chips When Routing for Inlay
  • Velcro String Retainer
  • Scraping Wood Dust for Inlay Filling
  • Hot Epoxy for Dent Filling
  • A quick and easy pickguard contour sander
  • Tracing Body Outlines
  • Adjustable bridges: the easy way
  • Extracting Adjustable Bridge Posts
  • Hydraulic Glue Injection
  • Cleaning the Inside
  • Fret Files are for Saddles
  • Countouring Reinforcement Cleats
  • Easy Plaster of Paris Molds
  • Side crack repair - clamping a loose flake
  • Cutting Binding to Size on the Band Saw
  • Matching Bridge Footprints
  • The Easy Way to Shim a Nut
  • Perfect Aged Amber Lacquer
  • Richard Hoover's Perfect Miters
  • Pull-Cutting Back Saw for Frets
  • Twisted Rope Clamp
  • A Third Hand?
  • Soda Straw Tricks
• More Tips and Tricks
  • Burnishing Dowels to Size
  • A Bit of Flush Trimming
  • Coiling Band Saw Blades
  • Reinforcing Those "Berna Assemblers"
  • Klemmsia Clamp Extender
  • A Quick One-Use Plug Cutter
  • Shaping Celluloid on a Belt Sander
  • Cut Sandpaper on a Bandsaw?
  • "Power" Filtration - a finishing trick
  • Magnetic Screwdriver Deluxe
  • Mario's Bottle
  • Plastic Wrap for Protecting Clamp Cauls
  • Hide Glue From the Supermarket
  • Capillary tips for disposable pipettes
  • Toothpick "Brush"
  • Keeping On Top of All Those Supply Catalogs
  • Old Time File Cleaning Trick
  • The "Steinway Touchup Kit"
  • Lay Out Perfect Curves with Drafting Weights
  • The Recycle Page

Back to Top of Page