Official Luthiers Forum!

Anyone got this?
What do you you think?
Time saver?
I realize many will not use or want it, just looking to save some time, cutting a fair few new nuts from blanks these days.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I have one and I use it. I don't know that it's a time saver particularly, but I had used feeler gauges as a "stop" for filing nut slots in the past, and the StewMac gizmo holds the feeler gauges in place pretty well. I still use a flattened pencil to mark a line on the nut blank at fret top level, and saw the slots to just short of this line while holding the blank in a vise. I then use the Nut Guard to keep from cutting too deeply with files when I'm finishing up.

Dave

I don't use one and every once in a great while I will file a slot too deep so I can see their utility. In my case I just put in some dental filling, hit it with the UV light and refile. Doesn't happen often enough for me to worry about it.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Like all the cool stuff Stew Mac comes up with, I couldn't resist, so I made one from the picture, and it worked. Used it a few times and went back to feeler gauges and a couple of rubber bands.

Neat! already ordered some new feeler gauges, an acoustic wedge and I have plenty rubber bands.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Not necessary and an actual impediment to cutting the slots as low as is optimal.

It's training wheels for Luthiers and I maintain that Luthiers should not need training wheels.

I also don't want my expensive nut files hitting steel feeler gauges...... Some of the diamond nut files are $75 each, why would I want to prematurely dull that?

I love Stew Mac but there are a lot of things there that are solutions looking for a problem or, or someone who has not developed their own or traditional methods and is.... well..... no offense intended to anyone here in this thread..... Lutherie... needy.

Learning to cut nut slots low and properly is one of the single greatest things that you can do for a customer that they will notice and benefit from at once. Don't need no Stew Mac training wheels...

I'm channelling Rick Turner RIP this AM and also, of course, trying and likely failing to be funny.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

How did I know you were going to say that

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I tried using my feeler gauges, with rubber bands, one time. I went back to VFR, filing a little and then laying the edge of a smaller gauge file, from the nut to the 2nd fret, bridging over the first fret. When the bridged file almost contacts the first fret, slow down and proceed with caution. Using a smaller file helps to make sure the file is seated in the bottom of the nut slot and not binding on the sides of the slot.

Lots of ways to boil water... I bought one of these on the advice of my go-to consulting luthier, just so my nut slotting had a common reference structure. Like all tools, it takes some practice to get consistent results.

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Peter Havriluk

Because you know me well and know I can be an a-hole Didn't mean to be disrespectful Colin and I apologize if I came across like that.

There is a note of seriousness in what I offer here. Dave and I likely do more repair work than any other member of this forum and we go a couple of years at a time without purchasing anything from Stew Mac. I'm not recommending not enjoying what Stew Mac has to offer but we find that to get and use what we want which is superior to other solutions we are making our own stuff 90% or more of the time

The day I met Dave I went to his shop, took a brand new OM I had finished the set-up on the night before. We shook hands and he opened the case, took my OM out, put it on his bench and while grinning like an idiot I specifically thought to myself this guy knows what he is doing just relax Hesh and see what happens next.

He pulls out a nut files and cuts a slot and then another file and slot etc. He hands it back to me and the difference was incredible.

No training wheels, no feeler gauges and no supermarket of sharp, metal objects being attached via a jig to your brand new creation that may have soft finish still...

So even though I am an a-hole I am serious that this jig is an impediment to doing what all Luthiers should be able to do, cut a dang nut slot reasonably well. It is the single most bread and butter thing we do and essential to learn.

So being a solution oriented SOB... my recommendation is to take the money you save not purchasing this, this.... this jig (I make a lousy poker player....) and purchase Stew Mac nut files instead AND learn to use them. Learn to exploit the dull section when you achieve a dull section and learn to control your pressure, your break angle, scrape the slot sides and expand slots when strings are binding and make that "tink" noise while tuning and learn how to cut nut slots perfectly with NO back tracking ever required while at the same time taking all other variables out of play.

It's not hard it just takes practice and the will to develop skills over the will to spend money.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

Got the files, used them for years, probably around 80 times, nothing like you doing the shop, but I'm getting reasonable, often with the help of your advice.
Just looking for something to get me a touch high, quickly, without a danger of cutting too low.
Got it from there no worries, love to see the smile on a customer's face when he first plays his baby after a fret job and setup.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I use a 6" long feeler gauge as my straight edge, and measure the gap at the first fret with a progressively thinner gauges. A .001" gap gives you pretty low action at the first fret. The straightedge doesn't perfectly mimic a tensioned string (it doesn't bend up as it leaves the nut), but it comes very close, and is much more convenient than moving a string in and out of a slot. If you want to make some fine adjustments after the strings are on, that's not difficult to do. I don't use any sort of filler to build up nut slots.

Hess What do you mean by. "learn how to cut nut slots perfectly with NO back tracking ever required”.

What is back tracking?

What I mean is there is no need once one properly cuts nut slots to have to revisit them except for of course some day when they wear too low and need to be raised.

Or, in other words the very first thing I do in my set-ups is cut the nut slots. No matter what I do to the action, bridge, intonation, etc my nut slots remain very well cut and do not need to be revisited or, back tracking.

My approach is sequential where I tune to pitch or the pitch the client uses predominantly, sight down the neck, adjust the truss rod and cut the slots. Now I move on and I will never have to address the nut slots again because once cut properly other things we may change will not change the relationship of the nut slots to the first several positions on the neck.

The remark was made with a comment that someone else made here a few weeks about about how they set-up a guitar and they were going back and forth to this and that with seemingly no sequence at all and only crisis management chasing the next thing that rears it's ugly head. I am offering, suggesting and proclaiming.... that we do not need to chase our tails.

So I am trying to impress on those here who want to learn a systematic, sequential approach to high quality commercial set-ups that are repeatable all day and all night long that nut slots when properly cut... in proper sequence need never be revisited again until the wear out.

Make sense? If it doesn't let me know I want to make this point crystal clear that no one needs to be chasing their tail in a guitar set-up, there is a sequence to the festivities that works just fine for more than half of the revenue that our busy business earns.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

Do you folks think that nut slots, once cut can settle a couple of thousands during the constant tuning and retuning required if you make a new saddle and adjust the height and compensation?

I kind of do and have not gone to the absolute bottom until after I have gotten the action at 12 and the compensation finished. Then just a touch to final settings at the nut.

Is this nuts?

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Nuts?

I also cut the nut slots first and don't go back to them so I think you're doing a bit of extra work although only a few minutes more.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I've noticed that certainly the wound strings can settle in their slots noticeably during the process.
To help with this, I cut the slots close, sort out saddle stuff, then ease down to full depth.
And as the final touch I wind the string back and forwards though the slot, pressing down the string with the end on the nut file I'm using for the slot before fitting new strings.
Before I started doing this a couple of times I've got to "final" depth only to have the string settle too deep in the slot.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Long answer short is surprisingly no if the nut is of proper material. You won't have any settling in with bone or corian and even some of the denser plastics. Over time nut slots do wear down this is true but not at all to the degree that you cited of a couple thou.

We routinely (every day) cut high e's and b's very low, often less than one thou of clearance and when we service the same guitars three years later the slots are rarely the issue.

This was a question that I had of Dave too Terry so I can relate but our experience has not shown this to be what happens in the wild with nut slots.

We do at times cut too low and one may need to be raised only a year later and this does happen at our shop a couple of times a year. We do it at n/c of course to make everyone whole again. The argument remains that a guitar would be set-up to benefit the player the majority of the time and if this means that a nut may need to be serviced say every several years for a prolific player it's no different than getting your tennis racket restrung and for the same reasons, optimal performance.

Another analogy is would we intentionally over set a guitar neck including the resulting set-up issues and even minor playability issues to get a few more years out of it before neck reset time? I wouldn't.

A few thou off would not matter (much) to me but it's not-optimal and notes are being pulled needlessly sharp. Also a few thou high would be a huge improvement to what most people think they are doing when they still need to go much lower.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

Hesh, I certainly wasn't talking about medium to long term, merely just after cutting the slots, an initial settling in.
Any file leaves a slightly rough surface and the winds are unlikely to match the roughness, a string moving though the slot will smooth that off, and in my post I'm merely describing my way of quickly trying to do that.
Murmac used to sell a tool specifically for that with a section of string under tension. Mitchell Abrasive Cord may do the same thing.
Terence's post says a few thou, but I think that was an "exaggeration" to make a point.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

as an old machinist I know how to find files and make my own tooks for most of the nut tools I just have done it long enough I don't use them. If you are starting out I cannot stress this enough take your time. Train your eyes and hands they are your best tools.
I can free hand a nut in a few minutes just from repetition . So many of these little fixtures are solutions looking for a problem. I bought so much stuff when I started this and most we given away or just sits in the tool box.

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

Colin this is a problem we do not experience so I think you may be over thinking. I've never cut a nut slot and then found it to be too low shortly there after or even a month afterwards because of an additional settling in. Again quality, hard, dense materials and we have not had any problems with this.

We specifically do NOT like the flossing cords, abrasive cords because they are flexible there is a tendency to pull downward on the two edges where the slot ends in space. That takes that ledge and lowers it beyond the middle of the slot and can result in a sitar sound and it also messes with the scale length a slight amount too which is not good for intonation. We've avoided the abrasive cords because they cannot be controlled to the same degree as a straight, rigid file.

Now I have multiple files too, dull ones I save to "polish the slot" or sneak up on a level of lowness.... that I'm a bit paranoid to be using an aggressive file to achieve.

There are other uses for the dull files too such as polishing Nashville, ABR-1 saddles and others like them in the electric world or cutting saddle slots for Archies and mandolins. Additionally dull files are great when a client gets that "tink" tone when tuning and there is slot binding. A dull file can scrape the slot side on the way down without necessarily cutting the slot bottom any further if the depth is maxed out already. It's a pretty common thing for us to be presented with a guitar with binding nut slots but the depth is maxed out so scraping the sides is a good remedy so long as we do not mess with the depth too.

But back to your original question there is NO valid reason to not attempt to cut nut slots as low as possible beyond a few legitimate reasons such as slack tunings, slide guitar set-ups and the heavy metal vomit music crew who like to tune their low e to c.... and wonder why it rattles to beat the band.

And I will offer one more time.... for everyone else cutting nut slots very well is one of the very most immediately noticeable things that you can do to differentiate your guitars from the pack by making them super easy to play. Our clients notice this immediately and that results in satisfaction. It is the single most commented on thing that gets done in our shop. We often hear people exclaim that they can make a chord that was difficult for them prior. And that my friends, supporting and helping your clients is why I do this, it makes my day when someone tells me they are a better player because of my work.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

Very well said and if I may add please our eyes are amazingly accurate. We may not know exactly how many thou something is but we can tell usually at once if it is greater than, less than or equal to something else. I still measure but I let my eyes decide too and then compare the results.

I do this with my ears and intonation too. I listen, note what I think and then measure on the Peterson strobe and verify or not my thinking.

As for Stew Mac tools me too John . Bought many of them and through the years they all got sold at OLF swap meets because with a few exceptions we make nearly everything we use now.

We do like Stew Mac's nut files, Jaws II, some of the long reach clamps, bridge gluing caul, Dr*mell router base, brown tape that you can't get anymore, fret end file, diamond crowning files, tang nipper and a few more.

I just joined StewMax this year for the first time because of my amp building and all that shipping but this illustrates that we, our business goes years without a StewMac purchase.

Support them anyway, I do we need them as much as they need us and StewMac is a great, high quality company with lots of great people making them great.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

Not sure anyone in this thread has mentioned using a dial indicator jig to ensure precision in cutting slots as low as possible. I find my eyes can be fooled by the colour of the fingerboard and even the size of the fret. The Stewmac tool is the first thing I pick up when starting a setup, and I can record quantitative measurement when doing slots. My eyes aren’t getting any younger.

Personally, I prefer the older model with an analog dial — I don’t think a digital readout is as well suited to this task.
https://www.stewmac.com/luthier-tools-and-supplies/tools-by-job/tools-for-nuts-and-saddles/digital-nut-slotting-gauge/

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Martin gave me a nut slot gauge if you take a .009 feeler gauge and take .007 off that gives you a very precise gauge for slotting the neck with strings at tension.

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

Dave and I long ago worked so that we both would speak the same repair language. This means the tools we use were influenced by our need to communicate a client's wishes, etc.

We use Starrett 6" engineer's rules and more specifically the 1/64th" scale. There is no perfect way to measure action, all possibilities are subject to user error when the tool is manipulated incorrectly. We find a simple engineers scale, well marked gets us where we want to go.

For cutting slots it's not possible to measure how low we go easily and it would be a waste of time anyway because it is what it is. We have measured with great difficultly our low e's are below .001" at times and around .0005" if you need a number.

But for me it's looking for a sliver of light between the first fret crown and the bottom of the string while fretting and holding between the 2nd and the 3rd. I don't care what the actual number is I want it as low as I can go and still not be in contact with the fret (for the high e only). If it's very low, I see the sliver of light or even if I can't see it anymore if I hear the "tink" when I pulse the string I know it's not laying on the fret. If I get an open sitar sound I went too far.

Each string from the high e is progressively a bit higher and we don't use numbers here either because it's a function of the player, string gage, tunings, side or not, etc, etc. etc.

We have a special tool that Dave invented that measured precisely nut slot depth. Our students have seen and/or use this tool. It's flawed though with it's dial indicator in so much as if we lean it this way or that way it skews the number. This is a very difficult thing to measure consistently and accurately nut slot depth.

I use this tool to set up Floyd nuts in isolation with no strings present as I mill down the bottom of the nut to lower the slots. With string arc taken into account I mill for .001" for the high e and .005" for the low e if the player is doing standard tunings. When I put it all back together it's always killer and people rave about how low we took their nut slots even on Floyds.

I'm telling ya over and over and over again you can differentiate your work or wares by learning to cut nut slots low and accurately. So here's the water, it's up to you guys if you are thirsty.

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Ann Arbor Guitars