b'Made by Hand .That is the big bold statement made by nearly all guitarOk, Ill stop moaning. Im trying to establish what is makers.But it isnt true for any of us. Nobody makes byvaluable in the methods we use in making guitars. Have hand.a good look at the picture on the left. That is all the little We use tools.things we could find quickly while Mike English was setting up for the photograph, there are plenty more. All The tools are not made from stone, flint or bronze.the items are either made from scratch, or are serious Cutting tools are made from carbon steel, with thousandsmodifications of existing tools, tiny chisels made from of years of technological development behind them.old files, scrapers and knives made from discarded saw Some tools have moving parts, a pair of pliers, a Gblades and steel strapping. I have one large chisel forged clamp, Stradivari used small steel drilling spindles. Therefrom a car leaf spring, its my favourite. is no clear point at which a tool becomes a machine,Each of those tools has been made to tackle a problem, would it be electricity?How about electric light? Anone tiny part of the process of guitar making needed a electric drill? little help. What to do when you need to cut a tiny slot I am not talking about John Ruskin andin a small piece of exotic, rare, expensive, wood, or to the Wholesomeness of manual labourremove a sharp corner from long lengths of binding? Google? eBay? Guitar Makers supply Inc.?My answer is and Im not for one moment belittling theto invent and make it myself, and my assistants at work massive importance of machinery in ourare starting to do the same thing. Using each of these lives over centuries. Im an engineer, I lovelittle things is an extension of our own fingers and hands, machinery and technology. Computerthey are made with our own fingers and hands; in the aided design and machining has changedvery best sense of the words, if you are making your own every aspect of our lives, and I think largelytools, the guitars are indeed handmade.for the better. (Discuss- ten million words). In the following pages, I try to show the relationship between the tools, and the work that is being done. But machines can put a barrier between the human andSome of the tools have become more sophisticated, they his work. Its a little weird, I do feel a small sense of lossuse electric motors and engineering components , but and regret when I plug in an electric sander, I enjoy thethey are made, operated, guided, by hand and by human process and intimacy of touching the wood, of being soskill, and each of them is only a tool in the centre of a close to it. But I also experience massive relief, because Iparticular stage of the work, around which we constantly know that the results will be better, they will not be limitedmake our own choices and interpretations.by my strength or my endurance and I know I wont be inForty years ago, we were making about a thousand pain all night afterwards. The damage done to my handsguitars a year, with none of the tools that are shown here.and skin from a lifetime of being that close to the work isWe now make only about one hundred, but we have all permanent, there are now certain things that I cannot, orthese tools and devices, call them machines if you must not, do. I do wonder if the newer younger makerswish, and far more human skills and experience. The are damaging themselves in the same way. They havetools have not been made to increase production, making dust extraction and modern tools, but how many will stillthousands of identical instruments, they have been made be doing it after sixty years?I do hope and believe thatto use on one instrument at a time, on a huge variety of all that time and intensity, and the pain, has a value. different instruments, to the very highest standards that would otherwise be impossible.141'