All The Tools!
This week I thought I’d give a quick rundown of some of my favorite tools, or at least the ones that I use most often. It really doesn’t take all that much to do most of this work, but there are a few things that make itĀ much easier and faster.
#1 A really really ridiculously good soldering iron. I use a Weller WES51 because it has a really accurate temperature control which comes in super handy when I don’t want to fry ancient capacitors, and I can also turn up the heat when I’m just placing grounds so that the solder melts pretty much instantly. It’s really satisfying. I can also get tip replacements from almost anywhere pretty cheaply.
#2 Silver solder. It looks nice, melts quickly, and is theoretically a better conductor. Totally worth it.
#3 Thin wire nippers! These babies changed my life. Trying to cleanly clip off the leftover ends of wire on pot/switch/jack lugs was nearly impossible. Now it’s simple. I use these guys on every wiring job.
#4 Good setup tools: I don’t usually recommend buying all the fancy Stewmac stuff, but in this case it’s worth it. The nut height gauge, relief gauge, and string action gauge will make setups foolproof. By knowing exactly how many thousandths of an inch of clearance each string has from the nut over the first fret, you will never have buzzy open strings again and all those first position chords will feel great. It’s also fun to keep a log of my favorite numbers alongside those of guitar players I like whose instrumentsĀ I have been fortunate enough to work on.
#5 A multimeter. This is the ultimate problem solver. I’m often able to figure out what’s wrong with a guitar without even opening up the control cavity. Touch one end to the output jack and then poke around at metal stuff. Anything that doesn’t beep in continuity mode isn’t grounded!
These are definitely the MVPs of my workshop, and I will probably continue to recommend them in future posts. If you ever get interested in doing a lot of custom wiring, this is the stuff!
OK that’s all for this week. Until next time!
