Looking for good guitar tech in SoCal

[beatbyrd]

Hi all,

Not sure whether to post this here or under the Guitars section. I'm looking for a qualified, reasonably priced (another oxymoron?) tech to setup the action on an acoustic/electric 6 string. My technique admittedly isn't the greatest, but all I'm getting pretty much sounds like a sitar with all the buzzing. I'm asking here in order to avoid paying an arm and a leg to some hacker.

The guitar is practically new, but was bought with some known issues. I would rather not deal with the tech at the store.

Thanks for any help.

Tom

[paologregorio]

These guys are all in Orange County

Steve Soest at Soest Guitar: (714) 538-0272

Danny Ott at Guitar Doctor West: http://www.guitardoctorwest.com/

Pavel Maslowiec at Pavel Custom Guitars: http://www.myspace.com/japuk

[collin]

Pavel Maslowiec at Pavel Custom Guitars: http://www.myspace.com/japuk

I'm gonna give an extra special vote to Pavel.

He's an incredibly talented luthier, and great guy (and he's yet another talented Polish luthier too )

[beatbyrd]

Thanks for the tips. I should have mentioned north Orange County in my original post. Has anyone here had a setup done on an acoustic with any of these guys? Mine's a Takamine (Korea) jumbo acoustic/electric. The tech where I bought it did a truss rod adjustment and I believe that might be the cause of all the fret buzzing.

Thanks again for the names.

Tom

[collin]

Tom,

Danny Ott (Guitar Doctor West) is in Garden Grove, off the 22 and Goldenwest.

That's probably the closest place I can reccomend---where in North OC are you?
Both Paul A. and myself are in the Los Alamitos/Eldorado LBC area......there's a few locals around here.

[paologregorio]

Oh, and since you're a North OC So Cal member, make sure to PM me with your email so I can put you on the local member email list and make sure to remind you of our next local miniconfluence. Start putting together a list of songs you'd like to play.We try to do these things every couple of months at Backline Studios in Garden Grove, It's an all day event that's lots of fun, and gives all of the locals a chance to meet and chat in person, as well as play a bunch of different songs together.

[beatbyrd]

Paul:
PM sent. Sounds like a good time.

Collin:
I'm in the Fullerton/Buena Park area, 'bout 18 miles from RIC and $2.5 million away from Newport Beach.

To the rest of the board:
Sorry for the geography discussion. We now return you to your regularly scheduled program.

Tom

[jingle_jangle]

The tech where I bought it did a truss rod adjustment and I believe that might be the cause of all the fret buzzing.

That's because he tightened the rod and gave the guitar back to you too soon, or without checking on the adjustment...

It takes anywhere from a few hours to a few weeks for the neck to settle in its final curvature following any kind of truss rod adjustment. Sounds like yours settled in a bit after you got it back.

[beatbyrd]

The tech where I bought it did a truss rod adjustment and I believe that might be the cause of all the fret buzzing.

That's because he tightened the rod and gave the guitar back to you too soon, or without checking on the adjustment...

It takes anywhere from a few hours to a few weeks for the neck to settle in its final curvature following any kind of truss rod adjustment. Sounds like yours settled in a bit after you got it back.

Interesting. The whole 'I can make that action a bit better' process took all of 10 minutes. In his defense though, I may have been in a hurry to get somewhere and just banged out a few open chords, noticed an improvement, and left.

So Paul, does a tech usually need to keep the guitar for a lengthy period of time on a setup? Is it completely unreasonable to try and get a 'while you wait' neck/truss rod adjustment? Would it be a trial and error exercise that I could safely attempt?

Thanks. Tom

[jingle_jangle]

I should think that the tech would point out that necks don't adjust instantaneously.

I think it's prudent to do about a 1-week turnaround on truss rod adjustments, but the vast majority of techs would shudder at such a warning. Throughput rules!