All Categories - Guitar Repairs, Restorations & Customisation by Lewis Durtnall

Offering Guitar Repairs, Restorations and Customisations, throughout Torquay, Paignton, Brixham, Torbay, Teignmouth, Newton Abbot, Totnes, Exeter, Plymouth & Devon!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

24/12/2019

A Huge thank you to all our customers this year, we couldn't do what we do without you.
We’ve been lucky enough to work on some amazing instruments this year. We’ve loved working on all the guitars, basses and occasional other stringed instrument that’s been through the workshop!
Bring it on 2020, already looking forward to catching up with familiar faces and meeting new ones too,
Wishing you all a great Christmas and New Years!

Xmas Giveaway!!

6/12/2019

It's that time of year where we like to have a give away!!!
To be in with a chance of winning 5 sets of standard Rotosound guitar strings or 1 set of bass strings, gauge and mixture of your choice!
All you need to do is like our Facebook page (if you haven't already) and then comment on our giveaway post which guitar/bass shape you like best! Please click here to enter

Winner will be picked at random on 30th, Good luck!

A busy month in the Workshop!

30/11/2019

This month has been another great month in the workshop, with some lovely guitars through that we've been lucky enough to work on.
Some of the guitars that just missed out on a blog post, a lovely 7 string Ibanez in for a setup for drop tuning, an ace Fender stratocaster along with some Gibson Les Pauls needing full setups along with some other TLC!
We've never too busy to work on your guitar/bass so please get in touch if you need any repairs, customisations or restoration work!

90's Gibson Les Paul New Pickups and Fret Recrown

29/11/2019

This stunning early 90’s Les Paul was recently in the workshop for a fret recrown and hand fret polish, along with a new set up pickups fitted!

The frets has started to wear down after years of use, although not as bad as some of the guitars that are brought in, but the earlier fret wear is sorted, the better the result. The customer decided to have the work done rather than leave it.

When there is fret wear, the string doesn't intonate as well on the fret, so the player then tends to press the string down harder to get a clear note. This causes the fret to wear even faster. Ideally the best thing is to catch the fret wear before the dips/dents in the frets become so deep, they affect the top level of the frets.

After the recrown, you can see the thin marker line that preserves the top level of the frets

After the hand fret polish, the shine and smoothness has returned to the frets!

With all the fretwork complete, the new uprated Gibson pickups were fitted before the guitar was ready for the customer!

USA '92 Fender Caribbean Mist Stratocaster Setup

27/11/2019

This lovely rare Caribbean Mist coloured Fender Stratocaster was recently in the workshop for a setup, and a small amount of work to the scratchplate, to allow the tremolo to function correctly!

The scratchplate was overlapping the edge of the tremolo, stopping the tremolo from freely moving. So the scratchplate was worked by hand until enough space was created to allow the tremolo to freely move!
Once the scratchplate was sorted the guitar was setup ready for the customer to enjoy!

Gibson SJ100 Acoustic new Bone Saddle

25/11/2019

This lovely Gibson SJ100 acoustic was in the workshop to have a new hand cut bone saddle fitted!
The original saddle had worn due to heavy gigging, the deep slots eventually had started snapping strings!

The bone saddle as it’s hand shaped to fit, matching the original shape. Once the new bone saddle was finished, the guitar was restrung and ready to go back out on the road!

Jackson Fret Recrown, hand polish and Setup

19/11/2019

This cool Jackson was recently in the workshop for a fret recrown and hand polish along with a setup!

The frets were worn due to heavy playing and had become flat topped due to a lot of string bending.

How the tremolo was sitting when the guitar was brought in, the customer had fitted a heavier gauge of strings, which had completely thrown the tension balance of the tremolo!

The frets marked up before the recrown, you can clearly see the wear. The tops of the frets were marked so the recrowning process left the tops untouched, preserving the level of the frets.

After the recrown, the majority of the fret wear has been removed. The next step was hand polishing the frets to a high smooth shine.

After the hand fret polish, the guitar was restrung and setup with the new string gauge before being ready for the customer to collect!

Fender Stratocaster New Bone Nut

15/11/2019

This ace Fender Stratocaster was recently in the workshop to have a new hand cut bone nut fitted, replacing the incorrect spaced one!
The customer had already positioned the nut to make the string spacing on the edges of the board correct, you can see from the gap on the treble side how much it was out.

The original nut spacing was slightly incorrect plus the string positioning on the fingerboard was incorrect. The correct string spacing was calculated and marked.

The new nut being test fitted during its shaping, the customer had also removed the lacquer edge when he moved the original nut, this too will be sorted as part of the repair.

During the slot cutting process, final slot depth is set once the nut has been glued in.
All finished with the strings on and some lacquer applied to blend it in

Gibson Les Paul Robot Guitar

14/11/2019

This cool Gibson Les Paul Robot Guitar was in the workshop for a setup!

The guitars were limited to a 4,000 worldwide production, with autotuners made by Tronical! This was one of the first two that were brought into the UK when they first went on sale!

80's Vester Restoration

11/11/2019

This cool 80’s Vester was in the workshop for a restoration!
The work included sorting the wiring, fitting new locking machineheads, hand making a custom trussrod cover along with recrowning and hand polishing the frets!

The trussrod cover was definitely not original, had our suspicions it was from an old Eko acoustic. It was a bit like Swiss cheese under the cover!
A template was cut for the new cover, hiding the unwanted holes plus in the style of an 80’s guitar. We used plastic from a used scratchplate to match in with the wear on the ages headstock.
The new hand cut cover made and fitted!

The wiring before and after, complete with unwanted out of phase pickups and a crossthread jacksocket. After sorting the pickup phasing, fitting a new switchcraft jacksocket and giving the wiring a bit of a tidy.

The old machineheads had worn through years of use and had become unreliable. The new machineheads were locking Hipshot tuners supplied by BTN Music

The new ones fitted, the great thing about theses machineheads is the unique mounting plate, which doesn’t involve drilling and more holes and actually hides most of the worn original ones!

The new machineheads finished the headstock!

The frets were worn for years of use and needed a recrown to give playablity back into the frets.
After the recrown, most of the fretwear was removed but the level of the frets remained untouched. After the hand polish the frets were restored to a high shine.

With all the work complete, the guitar was setup and ready to gig!

For guitar repairs and customisations by Lewis Durtnall, email TorbayGuitarRepairs@live.co.uk!