www.KitGuitarsForum.com

I am considering building my first guitar. I wonder if there is a site selling used tools? Most good tools for any endeavor last nearly forever. Seems like there ought to be a market for used guitar tools, but even on this forum there is not much activity.

Anyone know of a place to find good quality, used guitar building tools?

Doug

Good used luthier tools are hard to come by, but do come up on EBay from time to time. They don't come cheap though.
For simple passive tools like radius gauges and blocks, I buy from China on Ebay.

Doug--Modern luthierie suffers from "Stew-Mac itis". Really very few tools are absolutely necessary. Find yourself an old copy of a David Russell Young's " The Steel String Guitar" or Irving Sloane's "Steel String Guitar Construction". These were the early books that many of us started with 40 years ago. You can make most of what you need.

Bob Gleason wrote:Doug--Modern luthierie suffers from "Stew-Mac itis". .

Yes -- I strongly suspect StewMac has somebody whose job it is to dream up new gadgets that they try to convince luthiers they can't live without. I suppose at least some of them might be useful, but you don't NEED them to build a guitar.

Bob Gleason wrote:Doug--Modern luthierie suffers from "Stew-Mac itis". Really very few tools are absolutely necessary. Find yourself an old copy of a David Russell Young's " The Steel String Guitar" or Irving Sloane's "Steel String Guitar Construction". These were the early books that many of us started with 40 years ago. You can make most of what you need.

Very true. I got Irving Sloane's Classical Guitar Construction book ($8.95), two Klemmsia-Zwingen (wood cam clamps) and my only specialized guitar making tool, a purfling cutter and together with using a handful of ordinary tools out in the garage made my first four guitars in the early 70's. All the stewmac/LMII items can make it easier, but aren't necessary to produce viable instruments.

Doug, what tools do you need? Many of the building jigs you can easily make yourself. Items like chisels don't need to be expensive, just kept sharp.
Razor blades for scraping, make your own sanding blocks, inexpensive palm routers will get the job done, etc, etc,etc.

If you are in need of a block plane or hand plane, I can probably help supply you or Ed Minch here on the forum might have planes to sell also.

Tell us all what you are looking for, and we will try and help you out.

Kevin

Ditto what Kevin said. I may have some tools that I have doubles on, or I've found I don't use as much anymore as I've upgraded. I'll check my shop tomorrow and I'll send you a pm.

Guitars were made for almost 300 years without electricity (and other stringed instruments for thousands of years before that). A guitar does not even need purfling or binding (see Martin's 0-15) to sound great. Some standard wood working tools are all you "need", and as Kevin said, there are plenty of them available right here on the forum.

Ed

MaineGeezer wrote:

Bob Gleason wrote:Doug--Modern luthierie suffers from "Stew-Mac itis". .

Yes -- I strongly suspect StewMac has somebody whose job it is to dream up new gadgets that they try to convince luthiers they can't live without. I suppose at least some of them might be useful, but you don't NEED them to build a guitar.

I would agree to the extent that many of those tools aren't strictly necessary for the home-builder. But they do make sense for the professional luthiers, for whom time is money ... if they have a tool that can cut the time involved by a third, and if they build a lot of guitars, it's money well spent.

There are really only a few tools that are absolutely necessary, and if there's an amateur guitar builder like yourself in your area, you may be able to borrow those tools. It's worth asking around.

My daughter was head of repair at Retrofret - the coolest vintage instrument place around - before opening her own shop (brooklynlutherie.com). She was trained by a couple of old school guys that have been repairing since the 70's and it is cool to see her low-tech shop. For heat straightening a neck, she has a block of oak about 2-1/2" X 4" planed flat on one edge. She shapes a saddle with her hand and her belt sander. She makes replacement braces with a hand plane. She has just a couple of files she uses during a refret. One tools she uses a lot is the Jaws II fret setting tool from Stew Mac.

I am a vintage tool fanatic and she has a nice collection of hand tools I have set her up with (mostly Stanley Sweetheart because she is a, well, sweetheart) but she uses remarkably few in her day-to-day.

For building new, it is mostly jigs that are easy for you to build. As an example, most people (me included) have an easy-to-build plate joining jig that uses ropes and wedges to pull the pieces together, but it can be done quickly and effectively with some tape and the "tent" technique

Consider using what you have the first time to see how things can be better for you next time.

Ed