Handcrafted vs assembled?

[dnf777]

I have come to accept that there are now some mighty fine guitars coming into the US from far and near. My Dredjr from Mexico, Breedloves, and recently a PCH-3 Eastman.

I wonder how much of the build process is by hand, and how much (more and more) is machine assisted. I believe most all parts are cut by CAD/CAM and necks are CAM routed. I can see necks being finished by hand as well as set up matters, but not a heck of a lot more. Even much of the man-hours that went into fretwork and set up are plek’d now.

Any thoughts on what “handcrafted” means in 2020? Quality better, worse? Judging by my few examples, I think affordable quality is taking quantum leaps.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by dnf777

Any thoughts on what “handcrafted” means in 2020? Quality better, worse? Judging by my few examples, I think affordable quality is taking quantum leaps.

The meaning of "handmade" or "handcrafted" has been discussed in this forum numerous times. There isn't anything new or additional to say about it. The terms mean whatever one wants them to mean since, in modern times, very, very few things are truly made without some use of machinery and/or automation.

I think that the most relevant thing that can be said was said by David Pye in the 1960's in his identifying "workmanship or risk", and the irrelevance of the term "handmade".

Are modern manufacturing methods producing more consistent results in terms of fit, finish and playability? Absolutely. Are they producing more consistent results in terms of sound "quality"? Maybe, maybe not since variabilities in material properties - a large factor is sound quality - are not accounted for in the decreasing variability in geometry that can accompany the use of machinery and automation. Is automation reducing manufacturing costs? Generally, yes, but the biggest driver in reduced selling price remains manufacturing where there are lower labour costs.

[redir]

Yeah this one usually gets beaten to death. I just think about it as small shop versus assembly line. I saw a video of the Eastman factory last year and their were an awful lot of hands touching and working with tools to produce a guitar. So I guess you could call that hand made. But when parts come down an assembly line you are basically just constructing something. An individual luthier gives much more attention to the parts and the assembly then that.

[Bill Kraus]

I don't think it matters as much in a factory guitar. When the advantage of the hands on approach comes into play is more with a single luthier who is sensing the stiffness, weight, and sound of the woods during construction, and understanding its affect on the sound of the finished instrument.

[dnf777]

It has been discussed, but I also think its a moving target. Chinese made guitars are nowhere near the ones of 10 years ago. Im always appreciative of others perspectives, as a basement shop builder, myself. One aspect in particular, is CAD/CAM files being sent around the world, and to what degree quality is replicated, before and after human touch.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by dnf777

It has been discussed, but I also think its a moving target.

I'm not trying to be argumentative, but I don't think I understand what you are saying. In what way is it a moving target? What, specifically, is a moving target?

One aspect in particular, is CAD/CAM files being sent around the world, and to what degree quality is replicated, before and after human touch.

CAM ensures that repeated parts are all made to very close dimensional tolerances. CAM, generally, produces parts that are at closer tolerances than if someone made the same parts manually - with hand tools or traditional machinery. It doesn't matter, for the most part, in what country the person running the CAM job is in, the result will be the same: the parts will be the same - within tight tolerances - whether the person is remote or local.

As for what happens to the parts after they have been produced on a CNC machine, that'll depend on the processes of the individual manufacturers, which likely varies from one to the next.

[tadol]

Cad/Cam is about consistency - not quality. For many products, the two are interchangeable, especially with generic raw materials like plastics or metals, but there is a distinction. Cam is equally good at producing extremely consistent bad parts as good parts. But hand work, in and of itself, is no indication of quality - the training, and experience, and level of interest and degree of control in the process of the person involved is whats important, not just that someone used their hands.

Cam is desirable because consistency is far more important in large scale production and marketing than quality. Ideally you’d want 100% quality 100% of the time, but the unspoken rule is its easier to sell products 80% good 100% of the time, than ones 100% good only 80% of the time -

[merlin666]

"Handcrafted" is pretty much synonymous with a large number of unskilled labourers doing simple repetitive tasks in low wage environment that could be done with better consistency by automation. Interestingly for modern production environments it is the Ovation Adamas guitars that require the largest amount of skilled manual work which explains their high price.

[hermithollow]

As CNC machines have become more affordable, they are being adopted by individual builders and small shops to do much of the preliminary machining of parts. Material selection and assembly operations as well as the finer points of construction still remain in the hands of the builders. Handcrafted has always covered a wide spectrum of quality as a trip to any craft fair will attest.

[dnf777]

[QUOTE=charles Tauber;6549248]I'm not trying to be argumentative, but I don't think I understand what you are saying. In what way is it a moving target? What, specifically, is a moving target?

As technology improves, labor markets change, quality and price change. A discussion of the consistency (and therefore quality) of CAD/CAM 10 years ago is nothing like a discussion of today. “Made in China” isnt the same as 10 or even 5 years ago.

We couldnt even talk about the Bourgeois/Eastman collaboration until this year. How does that collaboration compare to the Martin/Sigma, or Gibson/Epiphone?

I think overseas guitar production has entered a whole new phase In terms of quality.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by dnf777

As technology improves, labor markets change, quality and price change. A discussion of the consistency (and therefore quality) of CAD/CAM 10 years ago is nothing like a discussion of today. “Made in China” isnt the same as 10 or even 5 years ago.

We couldnt even talk about the Bourgeois/Eastman collaboration until this year. How does that collaboration compare to the Martin/Sigma, or Gibson/Epiphone?

I think overseas guitar production has entered a whole new phase In terms of quality.

Thanks for the clarification.

The core technology of CAD and CAM hasn't changed all that much in the last decade. What has changed, and continues to change, is the adoption of that technology. I think that is what you are mostly identifying.

Pricing of the technology - hardware and software - has generally lowered making it more accessible to smaller businesses and individuals. Larger businesses are finding that it is a potential way to reduce labour costs and increase consistency and are adopting it in larger numbers, particularly in "developing" nations.

The transfer of technology - from "first" to "developing" nations - is an interesting topic, not just related to CAD or CAM. For example, when harvesters were first introduced to some developing nations - to replace oxen - the harvesters got stuck in the mud and were left there to rust, while they used oxen to harvest their crops. It isn't enough to just transplant the technology: there must also be "infrastructure" to support and implement it.

As far as I'm aware, much of Eastman's production is by hand and conventional machines - little to no CNC. Seemingly, then, the Bourgeois/Eastman collaboration isn't about adoption of technology (hardware or software) or Eastman's abilities in CAM. What, then, is its basis? Reduced labour costs leading to a reduced retail price aimed at a new-for-them market?

I agree that some geographical areas of "overseas" guitar production has improved their fit and finish, and, possibly, basic design. However, production from places like Japan has been quite high for decades - probably before their adoption of CNC. In China and Korea, in particular, in the last decade they have improved their fit and finish and generally refined their guitars.

Then there is the flip side of the coin: the quality of some American manufacturers has some consistency/quality issues, be they neck resets on new guitars, bindings that fall off, bridges off centre... Those things shouldn't be happening given American prowess in manufacturing. In some ways it seems like some American manufacturing was only so-so and never improved or has slid backwards.

[phavriluk]

And some American manufacturers are practitioners of high-precision design and manufacture and receive no end of criticism from worshipers of 'tradition'.

[printer2]

Then there are the jigs a lone builder would use to make more consistent parts. I plan on making a few different sized guitars and may make some jigs to produce consistent measurements without having to measure and adjust each guitar individually. Also thinking of making a jig to rough cut the neck shape. Carving the neck is one of my favorite operations but I have a couple of hand injuries that has reduced my abilities and I would have to recover after doing one carved neck.

It all depends what you are looking for. I have a friend that has one of my original guitars on his wall. He has worked in a furniture manufacturer and is familiar with the machinery and the manufacturing process. But picking up an instrument he knows a person created out of bits of wood makes it special to him. Maybe even more due to the 'flaws' given that he knows how a picture perfect product can be made. As people have said, the builder can pick and adjust the build as he goes along to create what they feel they can out of the bits. The builder tries to maximize the build to suit the customer or their own thoughts on what they want to end up with. Will they be better than a manufacturer with the resources to put into their product? Depends on the builder and manufacturer that you chose to compare.

I just took a POS guitar that I bought for $30 that came with a case. I bought it for the case but did not have the heart to toss the guitar yet. In the end I did a California neck reset on it, last week I hacked an arm bevel and belly cut on it. (In response for a physical condition, boy is my body ever beat up.) While I had easy access inside the guitar I hacked off a third from the height of the back braces in the lower bout. Before it was a dead instrument, tap the top and it is did a little thud, now it has a bit of a ring to it. The same guitar, looks less picture perfect but oh so comfortable and better sounding. Same raw materials but with some optimization to make it a better instrument.

If I walked into a store back in the day and we had the instruments we have now then, I think I may not have built my first guitar. Going forward will people value a handmade instrument more than a 'hand made' one? Good question. Heck, I have some radios from the 40-50's that were factory made. They have one quality to them, they are not something you can just walk into the store now and pick up. You can get better now but they are cool to have. Quality has improved where you can get a pretty good instrument for little money.

[ruby50]

I'm an amateur working on #10. Have been a long-term woodworker using hand tools as much as possible, and enjoy building instruments with hand tools. However, I rely on a table saw, a band saw, thickness sander and router for the basic prep. As an example, once the neck piece is thicknessed and shaped, everything from the angled cut for the head on I do by hand. Are my guitars hand made? I know others who even thickness by hand.

Seems like a moving target

Ed M

[Silly Moustache]

To my mind, the most important asect of build quality is the selecting of the top , the thicknessing and the bracing of the top.
Everything else is secondary and parts can be CNC shaped and assembled to what amounts to box building.

Bourgeois say that Dana does all the tops, Collings say Bruce Van wart does it, and Eastman have a chaop the call "Yoda" who does the business for the higer level pieces.

I'm sure that there are many other folks who may have learnt the craft in colleges, or with the larger factories,such as Martin, Gibson etc., or as apprentices to single luthiers before they go off to start their own brands.

Whilst I'm a great fan of what Martin have achieved over the years, I believe that they are largely "assembled" and their latest Marketing campaign "still Handmade" etc., is downright misleading and does nothing to further their fine reputation.