Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi there,
today I had the second medical examination at a throat and ear specialist. He found a big hearing loss relative to my age (47). For sure the cause is noise. Router, band saw, drill and so on. I always wear ear protection, but the doctor said that this might not be sufficient. And he asked me, for the second time, "do you actually have to do this guitar building stuff?".
The first time he asked me the same question was a couple of years ago, when he examined my nose. I had constant bleeding as soon as I was in contact with some wood dust. The doctor was an enemy of exotic wood dust. He said that he had a lot of experience in examining wood workers that had trouble (even very serious) for exposure with wood dust. So he asked me "do you actually have to do this?"
Well, after today I am seriously asking myself why I am going into all this trouble. In other words: "do I actually have to do this?" I will let you know if i find an answer. Meanwhile, please protect your ears and your lungs.

Sorry to hear that, and I am getting better at protecting my ears, eyes, hands, general body parts and respiratory system in my shop (and at home generally), which I do religiously at work all the time.

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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.

Yes, that sucks.

Back in my younger and stupider days when I smoked, I went in for my physical (about age 30), and the doctor said "you know, I see smokers who are 70 years old and have the throat of a 30 year old. You have a 70 year old throat.") I stopped smoking a year or so later.

There is a long tradition of building instruments with sharp hand tools. Maybe that road is calling to you.

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

That's what you get for going to the doctor.

Now...what have you learned?

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I read Emerson on the can. A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds...true...but a consistent reading of Emerson has its uses nevertheless.

StuMusic

Agree. I started off this way, and aside from being limited in the rough wood processing stage (i.e. I buy pre-sawn guitar sets rather than boards to resaw myself), there aren't many things that I would want to use power tools on anyway.

Also not too dusty most of the time. The main things I need a mask for are thinning plates (planes and scrapers still make a lot of dust when you're making a huge wood chip pile in an hour) and heel shaping, when I finish the rough carving and switch to sanding blocks to refine the smooth curves.

Oh, and for shell cutting, use water to contain the dust.

Just switch to hand tools. A lot less noise, dust is much less if you use a scraper. The only power tool that I use is a Bandsaw and even that I could quite easily dispense with. I can do a Classical Guitar in around 80 to 100 hours actual work. Not super fast but quick enough for my needs.

I destroyed my ears many years ago, still smoking for past 34 years, I'm overweight, and my back always hurts.
I think I'll go make some sawdust to get my mind off of this subject.
DZ

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wah
Wah-wah-wah-wah
Wah

Do you actually have to keep seeing that particular physician? He should be advising you on how to minimize your health risks, not suggesting you give up activities that are important to your quality of life.

Even if you don't switch providers you might consider a consultation with a physician whose field of expertise is occupational health. The risks of lutherie are neither particularly great nor unusual in an occupational health context. He or she could probably offer you some helpful guidance on managing any health problems you may have developed while keeping them from getting worse--while still enjoying building guitars. This would be in addition to the excellent advice in this thread about using hand tools.

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Tim Allen
"Never hurry, never rest."

I think your doctor is not considering certain side effects.
Lack of lutherie has been known to cause depression, stress and in rare cases even suicide.

I would think twice before giving up guitar building

Sorry the message I gave you was like the doctor was trying to talk me away from lutherie. That's not what happened. When you have a problem you usually have two options. Either you quit doing what makes you sick or you try to minimize the problem. So it is natural for him to ask me as a first question if there is a chance for me to quit doing a dangerous habit. When I said I would like to keep build guitars he gave me some suggestions.