Official Luthiers Forum!

It sounds a bit brazen to complain about a free service but the new fret-calculator on the Stewmac website no longer includes saddle location or instrument selection. I have used it often for various scale lengths on ukuleles, mandolas and guitars. The results have been really good.
This week I found that a concert ukulele that I am building needed a 400 mm scale instead of the regular 383 mm to place the bridge properly but the new calculator left me with an un-compensated scale length.
That is my rant for the day.

Bob

Hmm, yes, liked it how it was.

Don't feel bad I literally called and complained about it.

I just emailed and *itched a *it a*out it - I used it several times and found it OK.

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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.

There are other free fret calculators out there. This is a very good one: http://www.ekips.org/tools/guitar/fretfind2d/

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"I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it."
Pablo Picasso

https://www.facebook.com/FenskeGuitars

I can be brazen...

Boo! @$_(&_&(^&$$(&%_&_)

Indeed, I'll never understand the practice of software developers to always remove features, increase resource usage, and rearrange interface to be less usable with every "upgrade"

Ding, ding, ding...$$$$
Cost you more and gives less.

I reviewed a series of calculations done on the old calculator for roughly the same scale-length. The difference between the nominal scale length and the saddle placement, divided by the nominal scale length yielded a constant 0.00588. That constant times the new nominal scale length should give the difference to the new saddle placement.
I expect that this will work for me.

Bob

I contacted StewMac and they said:

Thank you for contacting us. We appreciate your patience as we work to restore the full features to our fret scale calculator.
If you have any other questions or comments, please contact us.

So looks like they plan on fixing it.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

If it isn't broke why fix it.

Bob

The old one is GONE?? It was such a nice resource for a quick check and reassurance.

Not gone, just missing some pieces which it looks like they are planning to fix.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I can't blame Stew-Mac for deleting the saddle placement. Compensation is a function of scale length, reference pitch, tuning, string gauge, string design, string composition, fretboard profile, nut profile, and action height (and that ignores the guitar's own resonances). It should be possible to factor all of this in, and come up with some sort of average value that would get you close. Still, you'd have some angry feedback. As I recall, their old numbers ignored several variables--much easier to not commit. A better solution would be to give a range and discuss the variables. Better yet, would be a program that factored in all the factors.

I know I wouldn't want to take that on. When you start to look at it, even naming the pitch of an individual note gets difficult. No, there's not an "app" for that.

Like most of us, I have my "thumb rules". They work for me, and I expect them to go on working, as long as I stick to what I know.

I also enjoy projects where I have the chance to try out my own ideas. I wouldn't rely on Stew-Mac (or any formulaic source) for those.

Before jumping on them for removing a free service, it may be worth considering some reasonable motives as to why they may have done this.

First, what do they get from providing this? Web traffic, name recognition, and good will perhaps, but not much more. They're not collecting any fees directly for their research (factoring in mounting point to break point dimensions for a wide variety of bridge hardware) and service. What els e do they get with this?

Liability, and lots of it.

I guarantee you that there have been plenty of folks who have royally screwed up their projects and drilled a lot of holes in the wrong places with these free measurements, either by applying prescribed locations for one bridge type to another similar piece of hardware but with a slightly different layout, or simply by not understanding what the prescribed dimensions really represent. You can lay out instructions and clarifications for use of tables and spreadsheets like this as clear as day, in a way that it seems no one could possibly mess it up. People will still mess it up, more often than you would think. I know I've seen a rant or two to this effect on other forums.

Then what does StewMac get? Some really pissed off people who often times may have not even bought anything from them, but simply screwed up their projects by misusing information SM provided as an intended courtesy. I think it's pretty much inevitable that they've received a fair amount of complaints from this sort.

People who understand how bridge layout and compensation work should be able to locate a bridge just fine on their own with little hassle. People who don't understand will be able to screw it up no matter how well you try to lay it out for them. Why risk taking blame and spite for trying to help when there is so little direct benefit from doing so?

I can't testify for sure why they pulled this function, but this seems like a reasonable guess. I know I would never put such information out there where you assume some level of liability for it's use, with no assurance of the level of skill or competency of those trying to use it. Offer to hold someone's hand, and they can still trip over their own shoelaces, but then you get the blame.

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Eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation.

Where,how,do you start if your a total beginner. Who do you ask? There has to be a formula that perhaps someone without years of experience can use. Just saying:0(


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When I started building in the days before the internet we read books, used measurements and observations from existing guitars, and experimented with trial and error. Before books it would have been the latter two options, and before existing guitars mostly the last alone.

Seems with every level of more information coming easily available, the less many seem to truly learn.

Don't get me wrong - I've nothing against the convenience of being able to easily look something up. I just find it a bit despairing how often it seems to derail people's motive or ambition to truly learn and understand.

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Eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation.

David I understand your feelings. I want to build a clone Martin L2. With a 23 3/4 scale. I don't have one with that scale to copy. I hope I can find this information on the internet somewhere. You can see my predicament being a novice. So any help I can find anywhere would be greatly appreciated.
At the present I'm building a baritone Uke. I just happened to have an old one to get the fret position,sound hole,saddle placement. So I was lucky there.


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There is a fret spacing-neck dimension calculator on my website http://www.mullinguitars.com. The version 2 of the calculator includes saddle compensation measurements that are really close to those produced by the old Stewmac calculator for acoustic steel-string, as well as a few other tweaks. Give me 24 hours I'll get the link updated to the new version.

Thanks Tim I appreciate your help. I love this forum.


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Tim I'm sitting in a Dr 'a waiting room waiting to see him while I'm doing this. Just read your adventure. The move to Nairobi. Getting a little closer to that exotic wood. You might have some fantastic tonewoods growing in your own back yard. Good luck over there.


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make your own spread sheet. it's not actually that hard. using a free online calculator that provides a free online answer really doesn't teach one anything. just because sm mod's it doesn't mean that they are keeping knowledge away from you.

OK, I've uploaded Version 2 of my neck calculator to my website at:
http://www.mullinguitars.com/calculating-guitar-fret-spacing-fingerboard-dimensions-and-string-setback.html

This version will accept user specs for uniform nut compensation and will calculate high and low E-string lengths to a compensated saddle on a steel-string acoustic. The compensation as calculated to mimic that given by the old Stewmac calculator.

Use at your own risk -- modify as you like, but don't republish.

Thanks Tim


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nm