Official Luthiers Forum!

Allied, without a doubt. They use a different thread pitch on opposite ends that give you a mechanical advantage. You get six turns of adjustment for just one of everyone elses equal movement. Much easier to get exactly what you need, much easier to turn!

Highly recommended..

Mikey

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The Biggest Little City, Nevada
www.hammondguitars.com
I love building guitars!

Yep yep. Love the Allied rods. Bonus that they're so cheap, especially if you order 6 or more.

+1 on the Allied. The difference between the two thread pitches simulates a much lower pitch, one that would otherwise result in such fine threads as to be too weak to stand up to the forces involved.

Pat

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formerly known around here as burbank
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http://www.patfosterguitars.com

For those of you who like the Allied rod, I'm now offering a "premium" version of that rod for sale directly from me. There is information about them on my web site:

http://www.blanchardguitars.com/guitarp ... _rods.html

Thanks,
Mark

I use Martin rods and the design is so robust , after having 2 way rods that were silver soldered fail i tested it and tried to break it . The design is very strong . Been using them since 2009 and love them .

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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

Another fan of the Allied rods

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My Facebook Guitar Page

"There's really no wrong way, as long as the results are what's desired." Charles Fox

"We have to constantly remind ourselves what we're doing....No Luthier is putting a man on the moon!" Harry Fleishman

"Generosity is always different in the eye of the person who didn't receive anything, but who wanted some." Waddy Thomson

Mark's truss-rods are definitely more expensive - but in my opinion, they are worth it. The truss-rod is such an integral part of the build and something you never want to ever need to replace. In that regard, an extra $30 seems negligible.

grizzly has a similar designed rod in electric length

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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

I use the allied rods for both electric and acoustic and have never considered anything else since useing them. I like the small footprint and the fact that they won't ever fail from corrosion. They are the best i've seen out there.

I also dumped the hot rod in favor of the Allied rods. They recommend a quick and easy test that you can do to check them before you install to stress them and make sure they aren't going to break.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

LOVE the Allied rods. But I sorely wish they had an option for a spoke wheel adjustment for electrics and basses, I really like having that adjustment between the end of the neck and the neck pickup.

Mark, if you could put spoke wheels on the end of your rods, I'd be all over that.

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The member formerly known as erikbojerik....

I use a version of the double-acting Hot Rod that Santa Cruz uses. I can get them in bulk, in custom sizes for the various baritones and fan frets I use. They're smooth, never had an issue with them whereas some of the welded rods from a common supplier actually failed. And they don't cost me much. They have stainless rods and brass blocks. I just seal them in with silicone so they cannot rattle and glue on the fret board. I've used them for 15 years without issue.

Filippo;
I think the breakage issue has been eliminated with the re-design of the Allied rod, several years ago.
The adjustment on the old rods used a left-hand / right-hand thread adjustment, which was quite coarse. The new rods use a fine-thread / coarse-thread arrangement which makes for a much finer adjustment. Less torque & less tendency to stress the rod at the welds.
Yup... I like 'em too. I believe they have the smallest profile of any of the double acting rods available.
Mark's all stainless & brass rods look great. Gonna have to try a couple of those, for sure!

Anybody have any info on silver soldering VS welding? Seems to me welding would be stronger.

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Old growth, shmold growth!

Both processes are capable of being stronger than you need in this application. The issue is process control. Silver soldering requires some cleaning of the metal, adequate fluxing, and a decent fit (a fit similar to a glued joint). Truss rods could be silver soldered in an oven, eliminating hand skills. TIG welding is more forgiving of fit, and it could be done by a machine, but the rods I've seen all looked hand welded. I'll be blunt. None of the welds I've seen would get a passing grade at the local community college. I worked for a company that installed hundreds of these rods, and when I started there, I was seriously alarmed by the weld quality. The most common flaw was cracks in the weld puddle where it was terminated, but there was also weld blow-through fouling the threads on many of them. I did the warranty repairs, so I got a chance to see most of the failures. My conclusion? I was worrying too much. In five years, I saw less than a hand full of failures. The welds I saw wouldn't have survived in a highly stressed product, but they usually worked just fine for a truss rod. The rods we were using were mostly of the reversed thread design, but I also did warrantees on some imported guitars that used the differing pitch design. I thought these were pretty clever when I saw them, but the adjustment nut was tucked up into the heel block, and I got tired of having to reengage the allen wrench several times to make an adjustment that was a simple quarter turn on the other rods. I met with one guitar that couldn't be adjusted by the different pitch rod--not enough range.

In the end, I was still a little bothered at the idea of putting a rod with what I considered poor workmanship into a finely built guitar--but they worked fine. It won't hurt to look closely at the rod before you install it. You can put some anti-seize compound on the threads, turn the adjustment in both directions, to make sure it works smoothly, and if you like, give it a stress test by putting it inside a pipe, and putting a little force on the adjuster. If you use silicone caulk in your installation, it's prudent to choose one that doesn't generate corrosive fumes as it cures (most do). Dow Corning 748 works well, and I'm sure there are others.

I really agree, Eric. What got me away from the welded rods was that when the weld on the rod I had to replace broke, it was evident that while it looked pretty, it wasn't so much of a weld as a fill. A good weld is a merging of the materials into one and in the best of the work, stronger than the surrounding metal. These welds weren't welds.

Properly configured welds by a skilled welder would be more than adequate for a truss rod. I think the problem is that truss rods tend to be manufactured by less than highly skilled labor.

I silver solder mine with high strength silver solder. I learned all about this when I was making rock climbing gear, soldering stainless wire rope to other stainless steel and brass parts. Strength and reliability are crucial with climbing gear. When done properly, it completely fills the joint between the two parts and is as strong as the metal itself .

Just to clarify again, the Allied rods are NOT 100% stainless steel. Only the threaded end blocks are. The round rod and the backbone are plain carbon steel and they will rust. I pushed to get those rods made all stainless but I couldn't get Allied or the manufacturer over the materials cost hurdle.

Mark

Just had an Allied rod fail a few weeks ago

I always test as instructed, but the weld just failed on this one

Had to remove fingerboard and replace - Not Fun!

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John Ressler

I have a freind of mine weld these up.



He was one of the few people in the area that was certified to do the vacuum welds for the Moffet field wind tunnel years ago. Plays a pretty decent saxaphone also. In testing done by Santa Cruz Guitar, with deliberate attempts to break these somewhere, the rod consistently failed before the weld



My experience is that a good weld will be stronger than a silver solder joint. One fuses the other attaches. The hardest part in silver soldering for me when I joined components for the electronics industry years ago was bringing pieces of different mass and thermal conductivity to flow temp at the same time and keeping the solder contained to the area without overflow. Either method is probably good enough for truss rods. One of the biggest problems I see is expecting something cheap to perform as well as something made by somebody who knows what they are doing. At some point if something is well made you have to be willing to pay for it.

Tim

Off topic. Deleted.

What were you doing when it failed?

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

Fillippo,

That's because you are only seeing one end of the rod. It works like any other double action rod only the anchors are embedded directly into the neck, rather than on a base. The only weld is on the hex nut.

Tim

"JRessler wrote:
Just had an Allied rod fail a few weeks ago

I always test as instructed, but the weld just failed on this one

Had to remove fingerboard and replace - Not Fun!


"What were you doing when it failed?"


I started tightening the truss rod to adjust it and suddenly it turned real hard and realized I was driving the "nut" into the square part on the end.

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John Ressler

Fillippo,

This type of truss rod is not new and has been used by several builders, at least in the Santa Cruz area, in the past and currently. There are also pictures of a similar rod on Frets.com. The best I can do right now to answer your question is this photo which shows the channel and rod next to a beam type. Hope that gives you an idea of what's going on. Once you back fill over the rod the anchors can't go anywhere and with properly cut slots they will press into place, no glue. Rod is the same size as on the beam type but without the shrink tubing which is not needed. Really kind of a minimalist double acting rod.



Tim