Official Luthiers Forum!

Not trying to be cute or be a troll. From my very junior position I'm thinking that a tapered pushed-in end pin doesn't make as much sense as a strap button held on by a sheet metal screw or a machine screw in a threaded insert. Taylor does it all the time. Is the continued use of tapered pressfit end pins a continuation of tradition or is there an advantage to their use when less invasive fasteners (screws) are available?

Thanks, folks.

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Peter Havriluk

It's tradition but tradition was often based on one other consideration - it's what they had available to them.... For example turning an ebony end pin would/could likely be done from scrap ebony that most Luthiers back in the day and in present times would have available to us as well.

G*bson is well known for many "bastardized" models that even to this very day may not appear in any books making them difficult to appraise and identify. Why did G*bson do this? Because they used what they had laying around instead of sourcing and spending on additional parts.

Taylor is not a good example of where and why a traditional end pin is not used. First Taylor makes a great deal of their guitars electrified and needing an input jack and the end pin is a great place to place this jack. Taylor also understands in advance that many folks who purchase unamplified Taylors may wish to add a pup in time. Instead of having to have two different tail blocks for many, many different models that come both amplified and not amplified a single, common end block is used with a rather clever implementation of a strap button that is also a joy to remove to install an input jack from a commercial, after market pup.

As such Taylor's end pin, the metal one, is not a simple screw into the tail block but instead a clever, Taylor designed plug that plugs an existing hole large enough for a pup install with no drilling required. Value add? You bet!

This is a subject dear to my own heart, why manufacturers and Luthiers did what they did back in the day. I'm finding that more often than not the reasons why one thing was done over another are often answered by the idea that it's what they had available to them.

Peter: I don't install tapered end pins anymore, rather I use pick-up jacks that have strap grooves.
Tom

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A person who has never made a mistake has never made anything!!!

Thanks for the replies. Hadn't thought of using a pickup jack with a strap groove whether or not there's a pickup in the instrument. I'm aware of Taylor's relationship to electricity; there's one of their screw-on strap buttons right on the back of my GS Mini (not electrified).

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Peter Havriluk

A pin in the bottom of a guitar is likely to get bumped sideways many times throughout its useful life. I think a well fit tapered pin is better able to stand up to this stress than a pin with a screw.

Since I use Baltic birch end blocks I have no problem using a tapered end pin but the majority of mine are built with pickups so have jacks.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

If a screw strap button gets a little loose, the screw will bend over and over until it work hardens and breaks with no warning. A traditional wood peg is less likely to ever dump the guitar on the floor.

One risk for damage to a guitar in its case is having the case dropped on its end. If the end pin is in the guitar it sticks out, and the impact is concentrated in that narrow area and may crack the end block and the end of the guitar. I was taught that you should take out the end pin when shipping the guitar or taking it on a long trip. A tapered end-pin is a easier to take out and put back in than a screwed-in pin.

Most of us now use a laminated end block, or at least a Martin-style cross grain reinforcement, making an easily-removable end pin less important. That said, I kind of like the traditional end pin that matches the bridge pins, but that's just personal taste.

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Tim Allen
"Never hurry, never rest."