
Here’s how our fret cutting tool works. A laser-cut acrylic template with fret position slots aligns with a 3mm pin. The fret slots are cut on a small rotary saw with a titanium coated circular saw blade with a cutting width of 0.5mm.
Here’s how our fret cutting tool works. A laser-cut acrylic template with fret position slots aligns with a 3mm pin. The fret slots are cut on a small rotary saw with a titanium coated circular saw blade with a cutting width of 0.5mm.
After posting Manufacturing about Thor’s Compound Radius Fretboard, I was pointed to an article by Mottola stating that compound radius fretboards are not worth the extra effort and that cylindrical fretboards and normal fret dressing techniques yield the same results. I went on to analyze this claim.
Thor’s fretboard has a compound radius, with a nut radius of 304 mm (12′′) and a 24th fret radius of 456 mm (18′′). Compound radius fretboards have a conical surface that allows for low action and no string buzz.
Manufacturing Thor Part 5: The Neck Duplicator: How do you quickly produce repeatably precise necks without using a CNC? We made our own wood carving duplicator for just this purpose. It works like a charm. It enables us to copy a master pattern in amazing detail using a compact router on one side and a stylus on the other.
Part 4: The Nut: OK, So… Your frets are metal. Your tuning machines are metal. Your bridge is metal. And your nut is… eh… plastic? Bone? Or some kind of synthetic material resembling bone? The nut we use for Thor is made of laser-cut stainless steel, buffed to perfection. It matches the sonic and mechanical properties of Thor’s stainless-steel frets.
Part 3: Manufacturing The Middle Section Previously, I wrote about the design of the Thor’s middle section. This time, we’ll look at how the middle section is
Part 2: Designing The Middle Section This post describes the design of Thor’s body’s middle section. The design incorporates both traditional and innovative design elements.
I promised to keep you all updated on Thor while we are producing the first batch. There’s just so much on my plate these days that
Allow me to present Infinity — the electronics inside Thor that handle polysustain (infinite multichannel sustain). Three modules, including power conditioning, signal conditioning, microcontroller, and
If I were to re-learn the guitar, I’d learn touch guitar. I learned the keyboard before the guitar, and it just makes sense. The two-handed
This is one of the most unusual Nu Multi pickup we’ve done. It’s for a Klein Harp, designed and built by Klein Guitars. I love
https://drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1zBXlicaqDD4ef4eHy2kbLra59SKLW-zpThis batch took a long time to finish. Logistics were a mess, plagued by delays. Apart from that, I have to admit that we had
What’s Inside: The XR-Spectra Coil Assembly
Previously, I posted some pictures of the modular XR-Spectra coil. Two of those coils are held in place by a base printed circuit board (PCB)
What’s Inside: The Lo-Z XR-Spectra Coil
The Lo-Z XR-Spectra coil: 1000 Turns 250Ω DCR (for 3.3″ version) 76mH AWG38 self-bonding magnet wire 2mm Type 430 ferritic stainless steel rail 1mm printed
Easter 2022. We’re rolling back prices to pre-Covid rates and beyond. An Easter gift to everyone. We’ve streamlined our operations for 2022. And by doing
If we can do 4, of course, we can also do 10! Here’s a custom Nu Multi 10. All-black matte finish.
This custom single-coil Precision Bass Nu Multi 4 is looking good! For the baseplate, this time we went for “brushed” acrylic with a unidirectional satin
XR Spectra v2: Redesigning the Preamp
I love designing stuff! It’s an obsession! The picture above is the Modula preamplifier I designed in 2017. I decided to go back to this
Here’s a rare peek into the insides of a thousand Nu Capsules in various stages of completion before epoxy encapsulation. The Nu Capsules are small hacker
It seems we’re making more custom Nu Multi pickups for bass these days. This one is for a single-coil Precision Bass format. It probably makes