[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by MikeD

Let me get this straight.......... Jim Olson is the ONLY builder in the entire world that builds a proper dovetail neck???????????? I love Jim and his guitars and actually have an adi/hog SJ in the same batch, but that's a mighty bold statement..... especially considering some of the company we are in here on this forum. And Kevin Ryan is some sort of all knowing/all seeing guitar prophet or something.... like Kevin has personally inspected enough dovetail neck joints of the top 50 builders to actually make this claim??? I'm honestly not trying to be argumentative, but I'm not drinking the kool-aid on this one. There are a lot of great builders in the same league as Jim that make fantastic instruments and I have a hard time believing none of them know how to make a proper dovetail neck joint.

Hi Mike…

Well I'm not sure about Kevin's claim (and yes, Kevin Ryan is some kind of guitar building guru actually…), but the neck joint on my Olson was done right and after 18 yrs is rock solid according to the luthier who sets up my guitars.

I'm not a 'dove-tail-only' guy and have two guitars with dovetails-done-right and two with fabulous-bolt-ons, and if you didn't know which was which by builders you couldn't tell the difference without an xray.

I'd prefer to say James Olsons work has been pretty immaculate since the 80s, and he sets standards in guitar building which many aspire to, and a few do match (Kevin Ryan being one of those who has reached that level).