The Life of Some Sort of Hippie Cowboy

I'm loving this summer. I've really tackled some big jobs in the yard, learned a lot about ways to be more sustainable, and even started growing food INSIDE of my house!

These are the first of my sprouts that I've pulled out of the sprouting jar setup I've got going. I've noticed some of them went a little brown in the "bean" part, and that freaks me out a little. I'm going to eat them anyway, and hopefully it's not mold or something that will put me out of commission for a while. Being sick off food is seriously uncool.

In other news, I ran downtown in the van earlier today to drop off some Etsy sales at the post office. When I stopped to grab coffee afterwards, I walked into a nearby soap shop called Spirit Goat. I scored a tub of all natural dish washing soap AND a bar of soap to try out for shaving. Go see Becky at Spirit Goat on Federal Ave in Logan if you haven't already. They carry tons of soap, obviously, but they also carry shaving stuff for all the real men out there!

Bad String Sunday

Today I had a REAL problem- or so I thought. Restrung a sweet Gibson Songwriter (with strings the owner brought- made of copper), and after cleaning everything up, the D string had a very strange buzz. Checking for everything I thought could be the culprit - loose wires, loose bracing, bad saddle crowning, loose hardware, etc, I started to question my sanity. There was nothing loose! The saddle I'd made for this guy last year was still just fine, too- it wasn't that "sitar" sound you get from a janky saddle. Once my back started to hurt from hunching over and stressing, I took a break and sat down.
Some people sit down and figure out exactly what the problem is, because they're relaxed. I just sat down and went blank. I still had no idea what to try, so on a whim I went through my drawer of strings and just picked out a D string of a different brand (it was D'addario- I always have them on hand). I walked back over to the guitar and replaced only the D string, thinking it wouldn't do anything- I was just looking for anything to try.
Wow. The problem was a bad string. Straight out of the package. I've never had that problem before, but apparently a bad string happens once in a while!


In other news, here's the latest pickup design I've cranked out. It'll be going in the next Parlectric I build. It's made of real bone, wound hot, and wrapped in gold hemp. I love the raw look of it, but I'd love to hear your opinion on the looks of this little guy as well! And please visit my company website www.stahmanguitarco.com!

Reopening the Etsy Store

I don't know exactly what it is - maybe it's just that I spent a huge portion of my life at my great-grandmother's place - but I am totally in love with the things of the past. Whether it's old guitars, old cars, old jewelry, or whatever, don't be surprised if some old stuff grabs my attention.
Frequently I see stuff in thrift stores, antique stores, yard sales, etc. and just can't resist picking it up. Since I know there are other people like me out there in the world, I've decided to reopen my etsy.com store. It's not amazing at this point, but take a look and let me know what you think. I'd be SO stoked if I ran into some people out there on the interwebs that are into the same kind of stuff that I am.
A link to my etsy store: The Nathaniel James on etsy

I Wanna Ride!

So my old SR250 has come a long way since this picture was taken:

It's definitely not that I dislike riding with my girlfriend; it's just that I wanted a sweet-lookin' bike! Threw some new drag bars on the little guy today. Still have some more things to do before I can take it out on the road, but hopefully I'll have it all buttoned up soon!

The Parlectric

I've been making some progress on the parlor-shaped electric I'm building. Here are some pics.

I inlaid some brass into the underside of the top (maple - I changed my original plan), and soldered a ground wire to it. This will hopefully increase sustain, while also resisting tearout from the ball ends of the strings and acting as a ground.

I used every clamp I have to get this thing glued together. The redwood looks really awesome, but it's even softer than I originally thought. You have to be really careful with this stuff, as it'll dent from just about anything that might be on the bench if you set it down in the wrong place.

The body, while clamped up around the edges, is balancing on a mesquite block to keep pressure in the center section of the top. Hopefully I'll have some more pictures up soon. Can't wait for this thing to be done!

Shimming a Gypsy Guitar's Bridge

This guitar came into my shop with very low action (1/32" on the bass and treble) and, of course, some fret buzz.

The only way to get this guitar's action up to where it needed to be was to pop the bridge off and put some shims underneath. I masked off the top so as not to scratch the finish, and tapped the bridge out of the center with a couple of light taps with a mallet.

Luckily, I had some ebony around and was able to make shims of the proper sizes. I labelled them and marked the fronts, to avoid confusion in the future during string changes, etc. This was a job where I didn't want to glue the shims in place, because there were some obvious humidity issues with the guitar. It could still move some more, so we might be re-visiting this job in the future (hopefully not).

This bridge's edges were not completely square, so that the center section could be pressure-fitted. To add to this weirdness, the width of the center and the edges were different. These shims aren't going to be invisible due to these factors, but at least they're ebony and aren't an eyesore. The action's where it should be now, with no buzzing!

Bringing a '68 Fender Bronco Back to Life: Part One

I picked up a '68 Fender Bronco a while ago, and started working on it yesterday after putting it off for a few months.

I really like the tremolos on these guitars- one of the reasons I bought it- but this one's got a busted-off mounting screw. That's gonna be a fun one.

Somebody sprayed some cheap-o clear coat (I'm thinking it's polyurethane) over the fretboard and neck, so the fretboard was the first thing I decided to attack. I measured this stuff at being nearly 1/16" thick in some places - gross.

Getting the clear coat out of the spaces between the frets wasn't too bad, just a pretty time-consuming process.

 What I found to be most difficult here was to get the nasty buildup next to the frets.

I noticed when I bought it the pickup wasn't adjustable. Think I found the problem there (in the picture, the springs are just hangin' out on the bottom of the pickup). I put 'em where they should be.

There was a shim in the neck pocket that looks like it could be as old as the guitar. Fixing an oopsy at the factory maybe? I'm not sure, but that was interesting. Here's a picture of the electronics, just 'cause I always like to look at those in different guitars. .05 tone cap? Weird.

Continuing my Lutherie Education

About a month ago, I started working with one of the most awesome guitar builders in the nation, Ryan Thorell. Although it's only been a short time, I can already see some of my skills improving. Watching and learning at Thorell's shop has been a huge help to me, and I hope to be here for a while. I can only imagine how much I'll learn in the future.

I recently built a set of custom pickups for a Thorell guitar, which has 3 bass strings and 4 guitar strings. The pickups are in sort of a P-Bass configuration, and are RWRP in respect to neck and bridge positions. You can see the pickups here:

I'm pretty excited to see how they sound, and what the customer thinks!

On my own time, I'm working on building a pretty interesting guitar - I'd call it a mostly hollow (instead of semi hollow). It's got a redwood body with a douglas fir top plate, mesquite bridge and fretboard, redwood neck with carbon fiber reinforcements, a pickup I designed in the neck position, and will have an under saddle piezo pickup. The pickups will be run through a blend pot, volume, and tone. Can't wait to get it done and play it!