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Good Morning All:
I recently finished a OLF small jumbo (thank you Michael Payne). As I am not a good player I always have a local pro musician and instructor play my instruments before I deliver them to the customer. We have a working relationship and his honesty has helped me along this road a ton! It is a cedar and walnut fingerpicker, he loved the tone but hated the neck width and said it played "stiff". The customer picked the neck width so that's a given. He wasn't in a very good mood and when I asked for a definition of "stiff" he said "Oh you know, just stiff!!"

Well, I don't know.

I was wondering if any of you kind people could educate me as to the factors that go into playing "stiff" (insert jokes here). The instrument has a 25.5" scale, light strings, carbon fiber neck reinforcements, bone nut, pretty much straight string path. I can't think of anything else that might help. I will add some images just for more details that I might have missed.


There are some worm holes on the back that we left just for fun..



Have a good day folks, and thanks!!

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

Put some extra light strings on it and see if that fixes "his" problem. Nice looking guitar there.

He might have meant chunky. One of the downfalls of being a none playing builder I would think. It might be a little difficult to know what a nice feeling neck would feel like. If I were you I would make yourself a good set of patterns and shoot for a thickness that would work for most players. My 2 pesos.

BTW is that sapwood blending from the headstock to the FB? If so looks cool. What's the wood?

I'm much more of a player than a builder and I find some neck s play much stiffer than others. I read somewhere about apparent string tension which would more accurately describe my feeling.maple necks often feel stiffer or having greater strung tension, string Guage and scale length obviously considered.

Being a player, I would relate a wider neck to stiff playing perhaps. It's more of a mitt full and kind of restricts walking around the fret board sometimes. I play mostly steel string acoustic with an upbeat celtic/gypsy folk-rock band and I appreciate an easy playing neck that doesn't have too much string tension. I once borrowed a friends guitar for a gig and found it a bit 'stiff'. I had to really squeeze to hold chords. After (3) 1 hour sets, I thought my left arm was gonna fall off.

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High Mountain Tonewood Company
Bruce Andrews
Terrace, BC, Canada
http://www.highmountaintonewood.com

Let your customer play it. He is the one that you have to please. What is the neck width at the nut, 12th, etc.? What radius is the fingerboard? All these factors matter when it comes to playability. I have a customer that loves 1 7/8" at the nut and 2 3/8" string spacing at the bridge, not everyone likes this, although I myself don't mind it. He is a fingerpicker. Most flatpickers prefer narrower spacing and tighter radius and would find this uncomfortable to play.

Cal

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Remember, there are no stupid questions, only stupid answers!

Check your nut height. What does the action measure?

Also, fret crown height could be a consideration...

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

Beautiful guitar BTW

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

When people say a guitar feels "Stiff" they mean the strings feel like they have more tension in them than they're used top.
As meddlingfool says, check the nut height.
A tall nut will make any guitar feel stiff no matter how low the action is.
So does too much relief, or a tall saddle, or a combination of all these things.
Also, if h's used to short scale Gibson type instruments then a log scale will feel stiff to him too.

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Old growth, shmold growth!

First off, you are going to need a straight neck (a little relief is OK, but the neck should initially be straight). If your neck is not straight, you are wasting your time.
Next, the general action. Depending on the player and how hard he bangs on the instrument, a good general action for acoustics is 3/32" at the high E and 1/8" at the bass. A little higher is good at the start. Personally, I like mine at 1/16" and 3/32" but my hands are getting weak.
Fret the high E string on the 3rd fret. Now, push down on the second fret with the other hand. You should see just a tiny bit of movement of the string to the first fret. Just a bit more gap as you check each string and head toward the low E.
Only after you set the nut can you lower the saddle to final height. As you lower the saddle, check each note on the fretboard to make sure nothing is buzzing.
If the instrument is built for lights, you can't go to extra lights and expect the tone and volume to be the same. You will likely loose either or both.
It is good to have the player try it and work the action while he is there.
Good luck.

The action is perfect, its as low as I've ever been able to take it. This fretboard must be exactly level and flat, the relief is about .007". Plays (to me) like it has power steering!
I understood the phrase "stiff" was not exactly the same as how hard it is to fret the strings. It was rather some almost intangible "feel" thing having to do with playing rapidly, bending notes, the strings sliding through the nut slots, and stuff like that.
Anybody else interpret the phrase in that manner?

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

"Stiff" guitar...
My guitar came out feeling stiff to play. What did I do wrong?

The hand responds to minute differences in the fingerboard, neck shaft and string array. There is no real practical way to foresee with certainty what combination of neckshaft contour, fingerboard curvature, fret cross section, string separation, action height, string gauges and string length add up to optimum comfort for a particular individual. These are all the factors that contribute to the ease and feel of the guitar to the player. And each player's ergonomic requirements are unique.

And what complicates the matter even further, particularly on an acoustic guitar, is that changes in any given factor have consequences that may reduce the optimization of other factors (i.e., lowering the action quiets the guitar and reduces its dynamic range; shortening the scale makes the strings more pliable but sweetens the tone and reduces the pop of the strings).

So when you say the guitar feels "stiff" that's like telling a doctor you don't "feel well". It's a vague complaint that can be caused by many individual or interrelated factors. You may simply not be strong enough to find the action responsive at that particular height setting. Or perhaps at that exact setting it would not feel stiff if say, the frets were taller and the scale shorter.

But there are patterns that a thoughtful builder keeps in mind. The average hand prefers a slender neck shaft, but a large hand will find the same tiring. The more arch in the fingerboard, the easier an inexperienced hand will find barring it. But it makes the strum more difficult--since the string array must be curved at the saddle to conform to the fingerboard arch. Taller frets feel more "forgiving" to a sloppy technique because you don't have to press precisely behind each fret to get a clear tone. When a neck feels "stiff" in the middle, the stiffness can be reduced by tightening the rod--assuming it hasn't been recently adjusted already. Just a tiny excess of string height at the nut will stiffen the action dramatically. Lower action eases the perceived stiffness but limits the dynamic range of the instrument. Too much of a "shin" or crease down the centerline of the neckshaft is tiring to well-schooled players who keep their thumb close to this centerline. It's not a simple matter.

Mr. C

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Wake up and smell the rosewood!

Now, had you said that in the first place, maybe you wouldn't have had all these set-up responses.
Good luck with your intangible feel thing...

Michael, I notice in the 3rd picture that the amount of saddle above the bridge seems quite high to me. It's hard to tell as the focus is soft in that part of the image. also in image 1 it looks like you have a lot of break over the saddle, again to me, in that image. The amount of string break from the bridge to saddle will make a difference in the way a guitar feels as far as stiff or soft, etc.
Some more images of the neck from the side, and the action height, and bridge and nut may help, us pinpoint the problem and come up with a solution for you.

The guitar does look great btw.

Cal

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Remember, there are no stupid questions, only stupid answers!

Michael, you said that your pro-musician/ instructor who played it hated the neck width. I think that is your answer right there. He hated the neck width, which played too stiff for his preference. But the customer chose that neck width. Maybe your customer won't find it to be too stiff since, evidently that is what he wanted. Has he played it yet? Also, your pro was in a bad mood, at least that is what you said. Sometimes, if I'm not in the mood to play, even a guitar I play all the time does not feel good to me. The guitar looks beautiful by the way! Hope the customer is happy with it.
Wendy

I noticed the saddle too. Looks really high. How much is showing above the bridge?

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

The best thing is to ask your friend who said it was stiff to define exactly what he means by its stiff? I like a wide thin neck while I have friends that like a less width with a really fat profile. To me this makes a guitar unplayable. So be sure to get at least two different opinions about how well the guitar plays.
There is pretty much two versions of an opinion of a great playable guitar and there are both correct. ha

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