Left Hand Acoustic Guitars

[Irish]

I am going to make a 1st attempt at building an acoustic guitar from a kit. The kit is designed for a right hander. I called the company and they told me I can adapt the kit to a left hander by reversing the bracing pattern and bridge set up. I do understand about changing the bridge set up but,. is this an accurate statement about reversing the bracing pattern for a left handed player? Just one day before a salesperson for the same company told me I can't adapt the right hand kit to a leftie.

Thank you

[tippie53]

There isn't much difference but here are the main ones that should concern you,
Bridge , the slot for the saddle will be opposite a right handed on. The slot will be closes to the front of the bridge on the high e and further on the bass . So you want to see that looking at the bridge from the tail of the guitar get further from the front of the bridge as it goes from treble to bass .
There are 2 tone bars they should looking at the braces from the right side of the X or the Treble side to the bass side. The pickguard would also be opposite.

[Ben-Had]

And then of course when it comes time you have to cut the nut opposite. If you have a pre-slotted right hand nut you'll need a new one.

[Darryl Young]

Yeah, the bridge is likely the only component that can't be used on a left handed guitar if it were slotted for a right hand guitar. Likely the saddle and nut are not pre-cut and the tone bars can be glued on the opposite side easily. Might also need to check the pickguard but if it doesn't have glue applied, you can probably still use it.

[Ken Hundley]

You know, there was a debate about this in some older forums a few years ago. There were a lot of luthiers that created a lefty out of a righty...new nut, inlaid and rerouted the bridge for a new saddle, and that was about it, unless a pickguard was involved. They said the sound was absolutely no different.....which means the direction of the braces on a lefty versus a righty may not be as important as the fact that they are simply assymetrical. You could reverse all the bracing, though I would find it confusing. According to the pros in the other forum, you could also just build it normal, and limit the lefty mods to the bridge and nut. If you are doing a cutaway, however, that complicates things.

[johnnparchem]

My gut feel that there is not really a treble side and a bass side of the guitar in terms of the bridge. The bridge is a pretty good sized brace. The asymmetry of the bracing design does help but I think the side that it is on is less important.

There probably is some difference as Kasha had an asymmetrical bridge and isolated bridge to separate the bass and treble.

But that is just a gut feel. An interesting experiment would be to just string a guitar up backwards and see if it sounds different.

[Darryl Young]

I think Ken pointed out that has been done (at least using right hand braces on a left hand strung guitar)........and it sounded no different.

I too think there is no bass/treble side of the guitar. The answer seems to be in the vibration modes of the top.

[Jim_H]

I'm also of the opinion that the side the braces are on makes no difference in the final outcome.

Many a right handed guitar has been successfully converted to left handed by re-slotting or replacing the bridge/saddle and nut.

[darren]

just string it up regular and learn chords upside-down like the guy in the Hyundai commercial. :)

I'm amazed every time i see it...

[Jim_H]

Lot's of notable guitar players play(ed) right handed guitars (left handed and upside down).

Two that come to mind...
Elizabeth Cotten (of "Freight Train" fame")
Doyle Bramhall II (Eric Clapton backup guitarist)

Here's a little clip of Doyle playing at on of the Crossroads Festivals..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Vj2gP9Yb7M