Cost of assembly

ms21

Just wondering if anyone knew what techs in the UK generally charged to assemble a partscaster?

Let's say I provided them with all parts - body, neck, hardware, electrics, the lot and just asked them to assemble it. Would anyone have a rough cost? I'm based in London if that would command a premium at all.

vanlooy1

If you can put together flat pack furniture then I’m pretty sure you could do it yourself (assuming you have a few basic tools). The real cost is when you factor in fret level and dress, nut cut and fettle and soldering electrics………in other words, I’ve no idea! (A couple of hundred or three….maybe?!?!)

GoldenEraGuitars

vanlooy1 said:

If you can put together flat pack furniture then I’m pretty sure you could do it yourself (assuming you have a few basic tools). The real skill and knowledge is when you factor in fret level and dress, nut cut and fettle and soldering electrics………in other words, I’ve no idea! (A couple of hundred or three….maybe?!?!)

ms21

vanlooy1 said:

If you can put together flat pack furniture then I’m pretty sure you could do it yourself (assuming you have a few basic tools). The real cost is when you factor in fret level and dress, nut cut and fettle and soldering electrics………in other words, I’ve no idea! (A couple of hundred or three….maybe?!?!)

Yeah I mean I guess I could screw on the machine heads, neck, scratchplate etc but even with string trees I've seen others have disasters. Would definitely rather a tech did the electrics. If anyone had even a rough estimate, that would be helpful as obviously it'll be a big factor in the build!

GoldenEraGuitars

Every tech and luthier will have their own price list. If you’re in London get in touch with @FelineGuitars ;

Funkfingers

On a Fender-inspired project, the self-assembly flat pack analogy holds good provided that everything goes right first time.

The skill and experience count when things go awry. A skilled tech should recognise issues as and when they arise. These issues can be resolved before advancing to the next stage.

OTOH, how did experienced guitar techs learn and refine these skills? By trial and error.

ms21

GoldenEraGuitars said:

Every tech and luthier will have their own price list. If you’re in London get in touch with @FelineGuitars ;

Thanks. Just had a look at their profile and they're based around the corner from me so will definitely give them a shout

ms21

Funkfingers said:

On a Fender-inspired project, the self-assembly flat pack analogy holds good provided that everything goes right first time.

The skill and experience count when things go awry. A skilled tech should recognise issues as and when they arise. These issues can be resolved before advancing to the next stage.

OTOH, how did experienced guitar techs learn and refine these skills? By trial and error.

This seems fair and one of the reasons it may just be best to give them all the parts and just let them crack on. I assume the "flat pack" stuff would probably be the quickest part of the assembly anyway?

Funkfingers

Consider purchasing guitar building books by the likes of Dan Erlewine or the late Melvyn Hiscock.

Jez6345789

 I put together my first parts caster a good few years ago 2006  and I am the guy who can never put flat pack furniture together and  a Strat or Tele is way easier. The main job is to check the neck size to the body pocket width and depth if parts are from different sources the rest is plain sailing. First time round I wired it up with a solderless loom to make it easy but even soldering and wiring gets easy after a few dock ups and dry joints.

I got a local tech to set it up as did not have much experience of those procedures back then.

BillDL

Although luthiers might not tell you so, I'm sure they generally don't like the idea of people giving them a selection of parts to assemble.  There is too much potential for separate parts not to match each other when it comes to assembly.  Take for example a simple aftermarket Stratocaster type tremolo bridge.  These can come with string spacings of 10.5mm (52.5mm spread between high and low E strings) or 11.3mm (56.5mm spread between high and low E strings).  Aftermarket single coil "strat" pickups can come with different spacings between the polepieces.  The bridge, pickups, and neck all need to be matched for it all to fit properly together, and it's too easy for an inexperienced person to buy mismatching parts.

Another issue is with the screw positions on bridges, necks and scratchplates.  It is especially problematic where the existing holes on parts are almost but not quite in line.  This means plugging the existing holes in the body and redrilling to match the other bits of hardware.  As mentioned previously, an experienced technician or luthier will spot these issues before beginning the assembly, but having to plug screw holes and relocate them rather than just screw them all together like a well matching flat pack will incur additional labour costs.

ms21

BillDL said:

Although luthiers might not tell you so, I'm sure they generally don't like the idea of people giving them a selection of parts to assemble.  There is too much potential for separate parts not to match each other when it comes to assembly.  Take for example a simple aftermarket Stratocaster type tremolo bridge.  These can come with string spacings of 10.5mm (52.5mm spread between high and low E strings) or 11.3mm (56.5mm spread between high and low E strings).  Aftermarket single coil "strat" pickups can come with different spacings between the polepieces.  The bridge, pickups, and neck all need to be matched for it all to fit properly together, and it's too easy for an inexperienced person to buy mismatching parts.

Another issue is with the screw positions on bridges, necks and scratchplates.  It is especially problematic where the existing holes on parts are almost but not quite in line.  This means plugging the existing holes in the body and redrilling to match the other bits of hardware.  As mentioned previously, an experienced technician or luthier will spot these issues before beginning the assembly, but having to plug screw holes and relocate them rather than just screw them all together like a well matching flat pack will incur additional labour costs.

The body is MJT, neck Allparts, pickups Seymour Duncan SSL-1s, bridge from a road worn, tuners from a road worn, scratchplate official Fender. I'm really not sure what the mismatch you're referring to would be here.

BillDL

As long as you have done your research I'm sure it will all be fine and there should be no mismatches.

GoldenEraGuitars

It means aftermarket parts, from various manufacturers, machining to different sizes with differing machining tolerances sometimes don’t fit straight out the box. 

Neck heels being too wide for the pocket is the main culprit. 

But the biggest issue can be the person who is assembling the parts and fitting the nut. How the neck is worked can make or break a build.

Anyway, these are issues for a tech/luthier to sort out.

maltingsaudio

Funkfingers said:

On a Fender-inspired project, the self-assembly flat pack analogy holds good provided that everything goes right first time.

The skill and experience count when things go awry. A skilled tech should recognise issues as and when they arise. These issues can be resolved before advancing to the next stage.

OTOH, how did experienced guitar techs learn and refine these skills? By trial and error.

This is so true, an experienced tech will handle and fettle more guitars in a year than most of us will in a lifetime. Once you’ve spent the kids inheritance on a guitar the idea of taking a tool to it is very frightening, when your doing it all day it no longer has that mystique. 

I would also add when your buying your kit, the more you spend on the bits, from a reputable source, generally the easier it all goes together. This doesn’t necessarily hold true for pickups but all the other stuff yes

Jalapeno

Always found that partscaster was MORE expensive than a good Squire - depends what you want out of the process. Not sure I see the point of a partscaster assembled by somebody else.

Checkout https://www.guitartechcourses.com/product/guitar-building-course - £999, including parts.

I did one of these before attemptimg my own builds

andy_k

I have built many partscasters, with varying degrees of success, I saw it as a learning experience and a way to try and get an idea of how different woods and parts affect the final 'tone' of the guitar.
My first attempts were simply trying to get different parts to fit, to build a complete instrument, there were many compromises, and usually the most simple step would involve more work than I would have imagined.
Eg, Fender Mexico, Fender Japan and Fender USA are not guaranteed to be compatible.
At this point I am only even talking about a body and a neck, sometimes I got lucky, other times neck pockets needed modifying, holes needed plugging and re-drilling, and shims needed fitting after the thing was strung up.
This all obviously took time, and I could either rush it, or take as long as I wanted.
My last few builds have been done over the space of a few days, probably taking 8 hours in total, which is allowing for things to settle in and get adjusted, and this has never gone as far as needing fret levelling, but my setup is probably less than perfect for somebody who wants a low action.
Anybody offering this kind of work as a paid endeavour, would probably be charging something like £30 an hour, so that would give you a ballpark figure to start with.