Tortoloid Pickguard from Stew-Mac. I like it!

[Wade Hampton]

StewMac used to carry Tor-Tis pickguards, which like the Tortiloid pickguards are made of epoxy blended with pigment. The luthier John Greven invented the technique and his Tor-Tis pickguards have been sought after by custom builders and players who wanted to dress up their guitars a little bit.

But delivery of inventory to the various retailers who ordered them was ridiculously erratic. I remember Roy McAlister ordered a pickguard directly from John for one of the guitars he built for me. But when it hadn't arrived after eight months with no word on when it would be coming, we gave up and went another route.

Eventually, I guess, John got so tired of being yammered at by customers who wanted their pickguards that he sold the brand name and process to a woman who started making them. For a while the ordering went much more quickly. But then she started lagging behind, too, which is when everyone kind of threw up their hands and competitors started making their own.

I don't know how it stands at the moment. I have two or three Tor-Tis pickguards on guitars and a couple in reserve, should I ever want to put them on another instrument, but I honestly prefer celluloid pickguards, myself. Those have become available again, so they would be my first choice, should I need one.

Kevin Kopp, who's in the process of building a koa K-185 for me (his version of the J-185,) is cutting out a J-45-style Gibson teardrop pickguard for the guitar from a sheet of firestripe celluloid he has.

I'm delighted. One nice thing about ordering custom guitars is you can get the details the way you want them. I'm not a fan of Gibson's bigger pickguards, but like their version of the teardrop pickguard shape.

I don't CARE if style purists think I should put a big ole honkin' J-185 pickguard on the guitar - I don't need all that extra acreage of pickguard that I won't be hitting with my pick, so we're using the pickguard style I like a lot better.


Wade Hampton Miller

[asilker]

I want to add a Tortoloid pickguard to my blonde Adi D28. How do you folks create the bevel? Anybody want to give me a sense of what that process looks like?

[Allen Shadd]

Mario Proulx is the Canadian luthier that makes those pick guards for Stew Mac. Mario sent me several to try when I had Ken Hooper build my Tree guitar with the Smokies top from John Arnold. He also sent me a video at the time of him making these, but asked me not to show it so I can't share it. I still have a couple of the guards left for a later build. Here's the one I put on my Hooper.