My GUILD Story -- Is it time for a new Guild?

adorshki

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Based on this, I will hold off on the ramps. I will do the Neck Reset eventually.
I like his answer, especially part B.
I wondered if he'd favor not mucking around with the bridge in case it was in good enough shape to leave in place when re-setting the neck.
In that case the ramps may have been counter-productive.
 

adorshki

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Well, I should probably double check that all of that was included in the neck reset. But, yeah, his prices seemed REALLY reasonable considering who he is and what he has studied.
From your description it sounded like he was making that clear, that those were part of the complete job.
In previous discussions of neck reset pricing we've discovered that different luthiers quote different levels of "service", and that the low-ballers ($400.00) usually don't include the little details that one would think should be part of the complete job.
A $400.00 reset may get your neck reset, and then you may be told you still need to get your fingerboard planed which means a re-fret (because they need to be removed to plane the neck), which needs a real set-up afterwards, anyway.
And what if the "luthier" told you he couldn't touch-up the damaged finish at the neck joint, AFTER he'd one the work?
Re your previous comment about prices, Silicon Valley has one of the highest costs of living in the country, thus the $1200.00 complete neck reset.
Luthiers gotta eat and pay rent, too.
So still sounds like "your guy" is in line with your region, and deserves kudos again for explaining what your money gets you.
:friendly_wink:
 

PittPastor

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Re your previous comment about prices, Silicon Valley has one of the highest costs of living in the country, thus the $1200.00 complete neck reset.
Luthiers gotta eat and pay rent, too.
So still sounds like "your guy" is in line with your region, and deserves kudos again for explaining what your money gets you.

Oh absolutely! It frustrates me when I hear about guys trying to talk skilled craftsmen down off of their prices. I always believe that when you find someone who is good at what they do, it is not in your best interest to try to skimp them out of a living!
 

Rayk

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Oh absolutely! It frustrates me when I hear about guys trying to talk skilled craftsmen down off of their prices. I always believe that when you find someone who is good at what they do, it is not in your best interest to try to skimp them out of a living!

My job skimps me all the time so does every other company that bills me lol

If I do repeat business I’m not ashamed to barter it’s quite fun and pays off at times lol 😜
 

tefan

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"It frustrates me when I hear about guys trying to talk skilled craftsmen down off of their prices. I always believe that when you find someone who is good at what they do, it is not in your best interest to try to skimp them out of a living!"

I agree totally. To do so is short-sighted. Glad you found a trustworthy guy.
 

PittPastor

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OK, so I wanted to add some final details to the long story of my D40C and tell you where my head's at right now...

I just got my Guild back from Stuart Day. I had him refret it and glue rosewood plugs in the string pin holes. I figured the refret would add to playability and the rosewood plugs would help keep the strings more steady (I had a weird rattle every now and then)

Mission accomplished on those. The hope was it would also mitigate the "quack" I was getting from the Fishman Matrix pickup. And the answer for that was... um... no. In fact, now that there is no buzz to distract you, the quack is more noticeable. I suspect the real problem is the Micarta bridge. I wonder if there is something about the way the vibrations are being transmitted to the Under Saddle Pickup that is the real issue. But I guess we'll never know... here's why (bear with me):

As I said before, when he first examined the D40C, he was surprised because the action of the Guild looked pretty good to the naked eye. When he put his meters on it, he could see a slight rise in the action, but for a 36 year old guitar -- not too bad.

Then he looked at the bridge. And that is where I got the dreaded: "Oh oh" from him. The bridge is very low. He told me that what has happened was that over the years, as the neck started moving, my guitar tech had to file away the bridge to keep the action right. And although that worked, it was out of room, and he gave me the dreaded diagnosis: "It needs a Neck Reset."

But here's what's weird. I have never had my guitar worked on before. Not ever. I was the first and only owner of the Guild D40C. I had never had it in the shop. Not even to have strings put on it. The only person who ever worked on it was the tech who put in my Matrix pickup (not the Luthier guy, another one.) It seems HIGHLY unlikely that he filed the bridge down.

I mentioned the huge crack in the side of the guitar. There was a tech who worked on it to glue it together. Did he look at it, see the action was too high, and maybe figuring it was due to the split, filed down the bridge to compensate?. IDK. Maybe.

It seems just as likely that it happened at the Westerly Guild factory. The theory being that the guy who built the guitar (maybe he was new?) set the neck wrong when he initially glued it up. Rather than reset the neck, they filed down the bridge and sent it out as is. IDK.

But does that account for the quack? Stuart (my luthier) doesn't think so. He doesn't have a good answer for it, either. He has installed the Matrix in some of his custom guitars, and he has never had an issue like this.

Stuart, obviously, thinks I should do the neck reset and replace the bridge with bone. That might solve the quack, but even he won't guarantee it. My hunch tells me the quack comes from the "non-bone" bridge. I think replacing the bridge would fix the issue -- but there is no sense in doing it unless/until I get the neck reset.

The thing is, I no longer care. There is no quack when I am full acoustic. And the sound I get thanks to the Aura Pedal is really close to my Guild's natural sound (I picked a Guild Dread image from their library). I think before I would bother with the neck reset + bridge and nut replacement (which is pretty pricey) I'd probably give tone dexter a try. It probably would give me the exact sound I am looking for. But what I have now is so close, that I'm pretty content to leave things as they are... and start saving up for my next guitar instead.

Here's the final thing I am thinking -- sanity check guys, let me know if I am missing something.

The neck reset, for me, wasn't just for the tone, or the quack. It was a longevity issue. If the neck keeps pulling up, it will put stress on the top of the guitar where neck meets body. My concern was that as time passes, it will pull more and more, eventually causing a crack in the guitar top. Sure, the action matters, but remember -- right now my action is actually pretty darn good. A friend of mine has a brand new $2000 Taylor, and my Guild has better action on high frets.

I was thinking, the neck is moving for 36 years, and its only going to get worse. Bite the bullet. Fix it.

But now, I am rethinking it. If the bridge was filed down by the guy who fixed the side split -- that was over 20 years ago. And the action is still almost perfect? Doesn't sound so bad. if that guy didn't do it, then it shipped from Westerly that way, which means it hasn't really budged in 36 years. That sounds incredibly stable to me.

Stuart tells me that if I did the reset, that my guitar would be noticeably louder. Who doesn't want that, after all. But... let's think this through... I don't need it louder. If I am going to play with someone, I'm going to jack it in, and use the Matrix and the Aura. If I am just playing in the house, the Guild is plenty loud. (sometimes my wife will tell you it is too loud.)

Do I really need to do the neck reset?

Because I'm thinking that money is better put in a mason jar to start saving up for my next Guild.

What does everyone think?
 

Rayk

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When you say bridge are talking about the bridge saddle ? In another place you mention changing the bridge to bone that’s the saddle and that is a easy fix .it will definitely bring up your action .
Without the neck reset and doing a new saddle the Guitar might become harder to play .
It’s hard for us to see without pictures .

Your quacking issue is confusing , does it make this sound when playing normally or plugged in ?

If plugged in it’s your Fishman UST Pickup acwell known side effect of the UST ( under saddle pickup ) ,
If it happens during normal playing a audio sample would be good so we can hear it , that is if you want us to lol but most likely that would be a string or strings making contact on the fretboard somewhere above your fretting position. Since you had a new frets installed the normal buzz sound like the string hitting the next fret up is gone but because of the neck and saddle issue it “ could “ be what I mentioned above .

The fishman keeps calling out to me though lol
Did you not play the guitar for your Luthier to hear this quacking your talking about ?
 

richardp69

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I guess I'll just echo what I said before. IMHO it's time to move on. There are a lot of really good guitars out there (Guild and others) with no issues that are priced attractively.

That being said I too have fallen in love with specific guitars and have put a whole lot of money into getting them right. If it's a guitar that's part of you and you just can't see yourself living without well......swallow deep, put out the money and hope it becomes what you want it to become. If not, move on.

If you're looking at it from an investment standpoint or one of will I recoup my investment if I sell the answer is likely most assuredly not.

I don't think anybody can give you a crystal clear this is the right answer kind of answer. It all boils down to what do you want to do.
 

txbumper57

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The Quack you are referring to is an issue with the 9 volt Under Saddle Transducer pickups. When you really start strumming or picking hard the 9 Volt UST preamp will max out distorting the signal and producing what is know as Piezo Quack. Seymour Duncan and Rick Turner solved this problem with the introduction of their DTAR 18 Volt pickups which Guild used variations of from Tacoma Production through New Hartford Production (2005-2014).

Basically the DTAR pickups such as the Wavelength and Multisource (Now known as the Duncan Duo Wave) have 18 Volt preamps instead of 9 Volt preamps. The extra "Headroom" provided by the 18 volt preamp doesn't allow the pickup to Max out like the 9 volt systems when strummed or picked aggressively so there is no quack in your tone and the pickup reproduces the Natural tone of the guitar. Whether you Strumming it hard or finger picking it lightly the pickup performs the same every time picking up every nuance of the guitar. I had a Fishman Matrix in a guitar about 12-13 years ago and the only gripe I had out of it was that it would Quack like you are talking about.

Just some info and I hope it helps.

TX
 

PittPastor

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Here is what I am meaning by bridge; the White part that is so very very close to the bone here... But, Saddle, is the proper term.
Hqg5nI9.png


TBH, I'm not sure which way the neck is off. I am assuming that the head is too high, since I would think that would be what time would cause. If that is the case, then yes, every millimeter the bridge/saddle is raised will raise the action. It is already a touch higher at the 17th fret than it is at the 1st fret. That is always the way it has been -- meaning it has always seemed higher on the higher frets -- I have no idea if it has raised even more over time, tho.

The quack only happens when plugged in. The guitar sounds fine in pure acoustic mode. I guess it could be louder? IDK. It always seems loud enough.

I started this discussion (about the quack) on AGF, actually. I had a whole thread on the quacking of the Fishman pickup. Some guys jumped in the thread, and said: "Something's wrong, i use Fishman under-the-saddle and everything is great" and some say: "Welcome to the struggle, everyone wants their guitar but louder, and you never get it."

It could be the fret position. But, I'm hunching it is actually the saddle material. I just don't think it is generating the vibration the Fishman expects because its not bone. At this point it is just a hunch. But $450 for the neck reset, plus whatever for the bone saddle material (I'm guessing about $100) is a lot to pay on a hunch.

The Fishman + Aura Spectrum DI Preamp sounds great. Technically, I am not hearing "my guitar" but rather a digitally modeled guitar. Fishman Aura picks up the vibrations from the pickup, and converts it digitally into what the X guitar should sound like. I say "X" because you can go online and download any one of a hundred models. Want your guild to sound like an Olson? Just download the Olson model. Of course, there are some limitations. If you are playing some $99 acoustic and you plug in the Olson model, it's not going to sound quite right. But if your guitar isn't far off, the Aura closes the gap pretty convincingly.

I downloaded the Guild F50R and the Guild G37 (both recorded by the Shure SM57 mic, the models are very precise!) And, they sound pretty darn close to what I hear when I play in pure acoustic mode in my living room.

So, if I need it loud, with the Aura, I get a Guild Acoustic as loud as I want. If I just am playing for the enjoyment of me and my dog in the living room, the Guild is plenty good for that.

The Tonedexter is the same idea as the Fishman Aura, except you play samples of your guitar through a high quality mic (a Shure SM57 will do) and it models your sound from that. So you end up with the same idea, but it is exactly your guitar's sound but louder.

I guess it isn't exactly the same. It would probably be like the sound of a HI FI stero recording compared to a CD recording. Or, maybe like the difference between a digital guitar pedal and a tub guitar pedal. IDK. I don't use pedals, so I am only guessing. It is a digital representation of the sound. So it isn't exactly right. But I'm guessing maybe 2 people in 100 could tell the difference. I'm not one of the 2 TBH. My ear's not that good.

IDK. Seems like I am close enough to a solution to call it finished...

I will try to get some sound samples up. I did some songs about 17 years ago, but I didn't mic the guitar then. IIRC, I actually just put a soundhole pickup in and plugged into a borrowed interface. Things have changed a lot in the home digital world since then. I need to update it. It would be cool to compare the new sound with the old, but I don't think that's possible, unfortunately.
 
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PittPastor

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The Quack you are referring to is an issue with the 9 volt Under Saddle Transducer pickups. When you really start strumming or picking hard the 9 Volt UST preamp will max out distorting the signal and producing what is know as Piezo Quack.

Yep. Thx txbumper. But I hear it even when finger picking. I think mine is worst than most. I will get some sound samples up to let folks hear what we are talking about. When you hear it in your sound, it really starts irritating you to the point that is all you freakin' hear!
 

fronobulax

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As others have told you the "quack" may be a function of the PU design and swapping the PU may be the best solution. I have seen enough people tell of their quacking experience that I would replace the PU before I messed with the saddle.

There have been occasional stories of an instrument that left the factory with some work that made it playable or brought it into specs even though the correct solution might have been a bandsaw. At this point we will probably never know how the saddle got shaved but a factory "shortcut" seems feasible.

Why do you own the guitar? If it is to play it and it is playable without the neck reset then keep playing and save the reset for some time in the future when you, or the next owner, find it is no longer playable. If you own it because you think of yourself as a steward of something special and precious then get the reset. You will always feel you are shirking your duty because there is something that could be done that you are not doing.

In my case I had an acoustic bass that several people said was unplayable and it needed a neck reset. My luthier (and yes, he also builds his own guitars) said a neck reset would address the intonation issues but so might some saddle work. He ended up making and installing a new saddle and it is playable (past the fifth fret) again. I am fine with that solution, in part because I then gave the bass to my sister who knows it might need a reset but doesn't need it now.
 

PittPastor

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Why do you own the guitar? If it is to play it and it is playable without the neck reset then keep playing and save the reset for some time in the future when you, or the next owner, find it is no longer playable. If you own it because you think of yourself as a steward of something special and precious then get the reset.

This is a valid description.

And, for me, I think "Made to be Played" sort of sums it up. It is very playable as is. It was before. The fret job did add to its playability.

If I ever get to feeling that I can't get those 15th fret notes that I need, I'll probably pick up a Doyle Dykes signature Guild from someone on reverb!
 

adorshki

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. In fact, now that there is no buzz to distract you, the quack is more noticeable. I suspect the real problem is the Micarta bridge. I wonder if there is something about the way the vibrations are being transmitted to the Under Saddle Pickup that is the real issue.
I doubt it because one of the reason Guild used Micarta even with UST's was that the even consistency of the material guaranteed no "dead spots" with the UST. Bone can have voids in it that will create out-of balance volume between strings.
Most likely what you have is what Ray mentioned, a well-known by-product of passive UST output, as explained by TXbumper too.
Possibly "aggravated" by insufficient bridge mass.
But here's what's weird. I have never had my guitar worked on before. Not ever. I was the first and only owner of the Guild D40C. I had never had it in the shop. Not even to have strings put on it. The only person who ever worked on it was the tech who put in my Matrix pickup (not the Luthier guy, another one.) It seems HIGHLY unlikely that he filed the bridge down.
I agree, it'd be a lot of free labor at the very least. Also if anything he would have sanded the saddle to compensate for the thickness of the UST.
I mentioned the huge crack in the side of the guitar. There was a tech who worked on it to glue it together. Did he look at it, see the action was too high, and maybe figuring it was due to the split, filed down the bridge to compensate?. IDK. Maybe.
I doubt a guy who glued cracks with superglue would go to the trouble of sanding down a bridge for free.
It seems just as likely that it happened at the Westerly Guild factory. The theory being that the guy who built the guitar (maybe he was new?) set the neck wrong when he initially glued it up. Rather than reset the neck, they filed down the bridge and sent it out as is. IDK.
That is in fact very close to, if not "the" most likely explanation and in fact there's precedent for guitars having been built with insufficient neck angle and getting warranty resets for it.
Our member Twocorgiis has a D50 from the early '70's that was originally reset back in the day before it was even sold as new, and then even re-set under warranty again
only 4 or 5 years ago due to the first repair being deemed incorrect.
Besides that, their construction technique already allowed for varying neck angles: Guild actually kept stocks of bridges of different heights so they'd be able to have one ready that most closely matched the neck angle.
They were a little weird, installing the bridge after the neck was set, matching the bridge height to the neck angle.
So they may not even had to have sanded the bridge down, or at least only minimally, by just using one of the "short ones".

But does that account for the quack? Stuart (my luthier) doesn't think so. He doesn't have a good answer for it, either. He has installed the Matrix in some of his custom guitars, and he has never had an issue like this. Stuart, obviously, thinks I should do the neck reset and replace the bridge with bone. That might solve the quack, but even he won't guarantee it. My hunch tells me the quack comes from the "non-bone" bridge. I think replacing the bridge would fix the issue -- but there is no sense in doing it unless/until I get the neck reset.
You mean the saddle but I'm very sure the saddle's not the problem. And yes replacing the bridge before getting the neck reset would be pointless.
TBH, I'm not sure which way the neck is off. I am assuming that the head is too high, since I would think that would be what time would cause. If that is the case, then yes, every millimeter the bridge/saddle is raised will raise the action. It is already a touch higher at the 17th fret than it is at the 1st fret. That is always the way it has been -- meaning it has always seemed higher on the higher frets -- I have no idea if it has raised even more over time, tho.
It's supposed to be higher the closer you get to the soundhole. That allows for the arc of string travel (Which is greater towards the center of the string, or when fretting higher on the board) without buzzing on those higher frets
The thing is, I no longer care. There is no quack when I am full acoustic. And the sound I get thanks to the Aura Pedal is really close to my Guild's natural sound (I picked a Guild Dread image from their library). I think before I would bother with the neck reset + bridge and nut replacement (which is pretty pricey) I'd probably give tone dexter a try. It probably would give me the exact sound I am looking for. But what I have now is so close, that I'm pretty content to leave things as they are... and start saving up for my next guitar instead.
The neck reset, for me, wasn't just for the tone, or the quack. It was a longevity issue. If the neck keeps pulling up, it will put stress on the top of the guitar where neck meets body. My concern was that as time passes, it will pull more and more, eventually causing a crack in the guitar top.
That's a possibility, we've seen that kind of damage but it's usually an extreme case.
Sure, the action matters, but remember -- right now my action is actually pretty darn good. A friend of mine has a brand new $2000 Taylor, and my Guild has better action on high frets.
To be fair it sounds like that Taylor simply needs a set-up. It's typical to ship 'em out with action at the top of the specs range because it's a whole lot easier to lower it to an owner's taste that to raise it, which would require a new saddle at the very least.
But now, I am rethinking it. If the bridge was filed down by the guy who fixed the side split -- that was over 20 years ago. And the action is still almost perfect? Doesn't sound so bad. if that guy didn't do it, then it shipped from Westerly that way, which means it hasn't really budged in 36 years. That sounds incredibly stable to me.
Yes it does and there's precedent for that, too. I've seen at least 3 or 4 reports over the years of guitars in that age range that either never needed a reset or whose necks "adjusted" a slight bit and then stabilized.
Do I really need to do the neck reset?

Because I'm thinking that money is better put in a mason jar to start saving up for my next Guild.

What does everyone think?
It sounds like you don't actually NEED it right now.
Saving your shekels would simply give you a greater range of choices down the road.
That's what I'd do.
 
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PittPastor

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Thanks adorshki!

I'm just doing a final sanity check. Still tryin' to figure out what my next one will be. I think my D40C is going to stay as it is for now. I may go back and look at changing the fishman out for something else. But honestly, with the Aura, I'm pretty happy with the sound right now. At least with the guitar. The guitarist could use some work!
 

Rayk

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Thanks adorshki!

I'm just doing a final sanity check. Still tryin' to figure out what my next one will be. I think my D40C is going to stay as it is for now. I may go back and look at changing the fishman out for something else. But honestly, with the Aura, I'm pretty happy with the sound right now. At least with the guitar. The guitarist could use some work!

I sent you a Pm sir ;)
 
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