Some wonderful thoughts from your Friendly Sasquatch

[Sasquatch]

I bought a guitar in November.

"Tell us of your guitar, O Sasquatch"

Understand that I've played guitar for about 30 years here now. I'm not good at it, never really will be because I don't work hard at it. I'm not terrible. I can play a guitar.

I've played on a serviceable but uninspired guitar for 30 years. And I bought a Great guitar, a Martin. A D-28. Now this is as plain as you could buy, and about as perfect. Never mind it's a "factory" guitar and not "artisan built". The damn thing was singing while it hung in the guitar store - it asked me to take it down and play it. Any artisan should be happy to make such an instrument.

Having dipped back into the acoustic guitar scene, I have found it rife with custom builders, luthiers of varying skill and reputation. And cost. It's surprisingly similar to the pipe making scene, actually - a small group of like-minded artisans slaving away at something they love, for returns that range from negligible to transcendent.

This little write-up made a lot of sense to me, and I hope it offers not criticism but a plea for patience:
http://www.cumpiano.com/Home/Articles/A ... edagog.htm

This is the "no shortcuts" routine that has been preached around here before, but with a slightly different focus (same intent I think). Anyway, I think it's a nice summation of the process of going from beginner to pro.

I have a lot of thoughts about the musical instrument vs pipe analogy, but they are still a little spongey. Too much toe fungus perhaps. But we can talk of this later.

[RadDavis]

Congratulations, Mr. Squatch!

My take from this is that you have slaved away, lo these many years, making and selling pipes in order to afford the guitar of your dreams.

Well done, Sir.

Rad

[Tyler]

I like it.

So get some fungal cream and work out your issues. I want to hear more.

[LatakiaLover]

Here's Sas playing his new guitar while wearing an Andy McKee disguise.

Not bad for an amateur:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj_MhQ_x8Ao

[Alden]

"It rewards only the pure in heart, the ones that give themselves completely to it, and ask nothing from it, except the privilege to be allowed to continue."

Damn Sas, the most useful info you ever posted about making Pipes was written by a Guitar Maker.
Interesting analysis by the author, and I think its a fair comparison you've made.

[WCannoy]

"A master is someone who has made more mistakes than you, has made mistakes you haven’t made yet..."

Attention everyone, from here on, please address me as "Master Cannoy"

Thank you.

[pipedreamer]

I'm writing it down right now Walt.

[Joe Hinkle Pipes]

this article somewhat confirms my slow progress and reluctance to sell imperfect pipes. All the hours and money spent on briar and ebonite that, once finished, will most likely end up sitting in my library unsold is discouraging but someday I think I will be glad I did it the hard way. Thanks for sharing Todd!

[Sasquatch]

Here's what I look like with a little make-up:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvBb8oUd_hE



So, here's the rest of this story. I was shopping for guitars, just starting to think "Yeah, you know, I'd like a nicer acoustic. That buzzing g string, the worn frets.... my guitar has kinda had it." So when my wife and kids go to the mall or where-ever, I get dumped at the guitar shop and play things for an hour or two. Found some winners, some losers, was starting to think I was going to buy a particular guitar... A week or two later my dad phones and says "Hey I heard you are guitar shopping, I didn't realize you still played much." I told him I played daily, found it a real nice way to unwind. He drops a bomb: "Well we have some money put away for you, and we'd rather you had it now while we can enjoy giving it to you then when we're dead and it doesn't mean anything. So here's the deal; you go buy whatever guitar you want. Go get a lifetime guitar."

That was a bit of a game changer. I had played the 28 and LOVED it, best guitar I'd played and I had tried 30-50 different instruments at this point. But the price tag was pretty fat for a pipe making carpenter with a kid in college. I had put it back ont he rack thinking "Well, that's a wonderful guitar but I can't justify that kind of dough." I went back and played it again, it was still a magic sounding thing, and I got that sucker. So that's a pretty nice present out of the blue.

So the guitar has no frills, dots for inlays, black pickguard. No herringbone, no nothing. Just a voice. A killer voice. That's enough for me.

Interestingly, it is NOT enough for lots of people. Looking around, most guitars are fancier, have more inlays, more exotic woods, more silver brass gold whatevers.... so people still like their bling.

1) As a pipe maker, myself, I want to make the D-28 of pipes. A pipe that someone says "Sure, that's fine." about the looks, and "Oh my god I think I'll sell my other pipes." about how it smokes. That's not everyone's goal here, although probably most of us have pretty similar ambitions that way.

2) As an artisan, I appreciate artisan stuff, which this guitar ISN'T. Not really. Martin makes like 100,000 instruments a year. This is one of their better ones, and obviously got care from a master during construction. But the inlay on the back seam was done by a machine and ... damn, that's why it's so straight I guess!

3) There's a major difference between most 2000 dollar guitars and most 200 dollar guitars. Tone and responsiveness, a fine-ness of how the instrument reacts to the player. Little touches of construction, again coming down to finesses that a cheaper product can't undergo. Materials are better. The top on the 28 is utterly clear and the growth rings are about hair-fine.

4) Unlike a pipe, I got to actually try the guitars in actual conditions. You don't get to smoke 10 pipes and pick the one you like best.

5) Like a pipe, the guitar I thought was best by a mile... some other buy might not like that much. Can't please everyone with what you are building.


Ryan and Walt picked out the 2 quotes that I thought were most outstanding in the article. Luthiers are pipemakers who don't smoke, it seems to me. Same basic cut.

[Sasquatch]

this article somewhat confirms my slow progress and reluctance to sell imperfect pipes. All the hours and money spent on briar and ebonite that, once finished, will most likely end up sitting in my library unsold is discouraging but someday I think I will be glad I did it the hard way. Thanks for sharing Todd!

See, this is the one part of the article I'm not so sure about. 1st pipe? No don't sell. Second? Same.

But somewhere you have to let one into the wild.

I am now, a few hundred pipes in, to the point where I hate everything I make and I have to stop fiddling and box up and ship each pipe knowing how imperfect and shitty they are. And what my customers say is "Oh my GAWD what a nice pipe I can't believe I only paid you x for it, you're the greatest pipe maker and probably the greatest man alive." And I still miss stuff. Dibos sent me a picture of a crooked button a few months ago. So now I tinker them for an extra half hour and look at them from 70 different angles and go to bed mad because I suck at this shit.

So you have to balance out a little reality (you need to pay for tools and briar and NO pipe goes out perfect) with your judgment of your skillset and your product.

[Ocelot55]

this article somewhat confirms my slow progress and reluctance to sell imperfect pipes. All the hours and money spent on briar and ebonite that, once finished, will most likely end up sitting in my library unsold is discouraging but someday I think I will be glad I did it the hard way. Thanks for sharing Todd!

See, this is the one part of the article I'm not so sure about. 1st pipe? No don't sell. Second? Same.

But somewhere you have to let one into the wild.

I am now, a few hundred pipes in, to the point where I hate everything I make and I have to stop fiddling and box up and ship each pipe knowing how imperfect and shitty they are. And what my customers say is "Oh my GAWD what a nice pipe I can't believe I only paid you x for it, you're the greatest pipe maker and probably the greatest man alive." And I still miss stuff. Dibos sent me a picture of a crooked button a few months ago. So now I tinker them for an extra half hour and look at them from 70 different angles and go to bed mad because I suck at this shit.

So you have to balance out a little reality (you need to pay for tools and briar and NO pipe goes out perfect) with your judgment of your skillset and your product.

We are kindred spirits, Sas. When I finish a pipe I usually, in a moment of pride, price it. The next day, after a night of torment tossing and turning about all the little mistakes I made, I'll look at it and think, "There is no way this POS is worth x." I usually wind up slowly cutting the price until my wife notices and tells me to stop undervaluing my work. She should really do all the sales for me, because I wind up practically giving my pipes away.

[Joe Hinkle Pipes]

Ok, you have convinced me. I could still make 100 more pipes over the next 2 years, and possibly hate them just as much, possibly more, but as you said you have to let some go. The next pipe i post weather on the forums or instagram will have a price. A totally undervalued and shockingly low price as Jesse pointed out.

[d.huber]

I am now, a few hundred pipes in, to the point where I hate everything I make and I have to stop fiddling and box up and ship each pipe knowing how imperfect and shitty they are. And what my customers say is "Oh my GAWD what a nice pipe I can't believe I only paid you x for it, you're the greatest pipe maker and probably the greatest man alive." And I still miss stuff. Dibos sent me a picture of a crooked button a few months ago. So now I tinker them for an extra half hour and look at them from 70 different angles and go to bed mad because I suck at this shit.

We are kindred spirits, Sas. When I finish a pipe I usually, in a moment of pride, price it. The next day, after a night of torment tossing and turning about all the little mistakes I made, I'll look at it and think, "There is no way this POS is worth x." I usually wind up slowly cutting the price until my wife notices and tells me to stop undervaluing my work. She should really do all the sales for me, because I wind up practically giving my pipes away.

I haven't made as many pipes as either of you, but I feel the same way. However, I find that if I put something down for 24 hours and look at it again, it's not nearly as heinous.

A little story:

I'm determined to make a nice billiard completely freehand which is an enormous task that I didn't understand when I started.

So not long ago I found myself working on my second billiard. I'd rough shaped the pipe, drilled it, fit the stem and was dialing in the shank to make sure everything was all symmetrical, had the correct taper, "felt" good, etc. In the moment as I slowly refined the shape on the wheel, the pipe continued to get worse and worse and worse until I finally ruined the pipe intentionally. I dug the edge of the sanding disk straight into the bottom of the bowl because of how frustrated I'd gotten. I threw the pipe across the room (first time I'd ever done that) and roared, "Fuck billiards!"

So that was a bad moment.

After a few breaths, I walked across the room, picked up the ruined pipe and tossed it in the garbage heap, stem and all. Three days later, I pulled it out just to have a look at how bad it was and... it wasn't. When I was working on it, I thought that I had completely ruined the symmetry of the shank from all angles but instead the lines were quite good. Not great, but good. If I hadn't intentionally ruined the pipe, it would've been a perfectly fine second billiard.

That pipe taught me a crucial lesson: if you can feel the heat rising while you're working on something, you've GOT to put it to the side and work on something else until you can see with clearer eyes. In the throws of creating something, you may fail to see the item in your hands truthfully.

At the end of the day, no one is an excellent judge of their own work because we know our work better than anyone. Every piece will always be flawed in some way. Hell, that's one critical reason for feedback. We need to be shown the things we can't see until the things that we can see are invisible to others, and that is a long journey.

[d.huber]

Fantastic article, btw.

[Yak]

I wind up practically giving my pipes away.

Fortunately for me !

http://s1234.photobucket.com/user/Ocelo ... 8.jpg.html

[Yak]

1) You DON'T WANT "hand craftsmanship" in stuff like fret slotting. You want accurate intonation.

2) According to Richard Hoover, there pretty much is one set of ideal proportions, dimensions, thicknesses, brace contours &c. &c. for a dreadnought. But wood isn't ideal. So the whole art (Performance art) difference is in the tap-toning, brace shaving &c. that goes into the spendy, statusy ones like Santa Cruzes.

BUT. Maybe one out of 20 good guitars (Martins, Collings, Taylors &c.) ends up being close enough to ideal that it's a great guitar at a factory good guitar price. Luck of the draw.

Sounds like you lucked out ! Enjoy !!

[BigCasino]

your a lucky guy Sas! I fell in love with a Gibson J200, the damn thing seems like it plays itself effortlessly... $2500.... I ended up with the Epihone EJ200 $400, My Dad has a Martin, that he tells me will be mine some day... I tell him, it's a great guitar, but to stick around and keep it

Enjoy that Martin!

When I saw this guy play it made me want to sell my guitars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4BOSZQw-TY

[Yak]

BC : what you're talking about is its set-up. Which is a point-of-sale job that's often halfassed even with high end stuff, depending on the retailer. Take it to a competent repair/set-up guy, get it set up properly & be amazed in how easily it plays -- like driving a sports car when you've been used to a truck.

[Joe Hinkle Pipes]

This is true. I took my acoustic to an incompetent guy for adjustment. It plays worse tha it ever did new.

[andrew]

Good article.

andrew