Re: LIVE NOW - Guest Luthier Series - Peter Crossley (Crossley Guitars)
Re: LIVE NOW - Guest Luthier Series - Peter Crossley (Crossley Guitars)
Morning Peter! (Or is it good evening?)
1. How much consideration do you give to the pups that go in your guitars? do you really try to match pups/sets to the particular guitar or style, or do you have a go to set that works for most of your guitars?
2. How much do you think the pup contributes to the guitar?
3. Talk to me a little about that purple wood you put in the neck sometimes. Aesthetic or strength or both?
4. What's YOUR number one guitar? Is it a Crossley or something else?
5. What or where, in general, do you think most big manufacturers miss the point? No names please....
6. What does the semi hollow / sound cavity generally do to your guitars tonally?
7. What guitar construction would you recommend for a set of P-Rails? Have you considered building a guitar for that very special pup?
8. What's your favorite Duncan pup?
9. Tell us a little about your philosophy to headstock angle/string to tuner angle/tuner post height.
10. I don't see a lot of Crossleys with trems - no love for the bar?
11. How is my Crossley Ace Frehley model with smoke generator coming?
Hi Ace,
its 12.35AM Tomorrow (Wednesday 2nd September)
So I guess I'm time travelling...
1. Yes I pretty much have the 7.5k a2 12k a5 combo that seems to do the trick for a lot of styles across the board.
The thing is, when you build for other people, you have to set the pups to an acceptable middle ground. Not too heavy or too jazzy. but a good working set of pups. Of course the customer can (and does) select their own brand/style of pups for the guitar.
2. I reckon the pups contribute the larger part of the tone to the guitar.
This question usually elicits a lot of heated response. Wood V Pups.
Both is the correct answer.................
3. the wood is Purple Heart. a Native of North and South America. Its quite a dense heavy timber, and I have used it as fretboard material. it polishes up to a nice sheen.
Its very strong, so its a welcome and colourful addition to a neck lamination.
4. My number one guitar is my Rybeena burst. yep its a Crossley !!!
Although I do have a signature series G&L Asat tucked away that is a very nice guitar. I bought it new in 1988. It forms part of my kids inheritance!!
5. I think the problem with large manufaturers is that they are run by talented business people who are neither musicians or luthiers.
They are very good at marketing, profit margins, expansion, buying competitors, etc etc.
But the bottom line is they dont really CARE about the product, in fact that is what guitars are called within these corporate structures, "product".
They would be just as proficient selling beds or refrgerators.
Not a lot of LOVE there........................................
6. it adds Mellow. I really like the hollows, they are sort of like a grown up guitar. The P series are all Rawk, but the H has this split personality where they can still rock it out, but also be very gentle and persuasive..
7. To be honest I havent given it much thought, but I would go the solid body route.
8. Pearly Gates in the neck SH5 in the bridge. Lovely combination.. Brilliant pickups.
9. When I was younger (long time ago) I played a LP, I loved that guitar.. then one day the headstock broke off !!!
I repaired it, very well, but it never sounded the same. I then looked into why this happened.
1st reason -12 degree headstock angle
2nd reason- mahogany neck
Mahogany makes a good neck timber, but it is not a "structural" timber. Maple is a structural timber.
Increase this natural instability by putting a large headstock angle there, and really its just a matter of time......
I use a 10 degree headstock angle. this allows the strings to have a nice but not severe break angle to the machine heads.
I use Sperzel locking heads, they have a fairly low profile above the headstock. again helping with string break angle
10. Ahh yes, the tremolo........ I do build guitars with trems, I try to recommend to my clients that they use a Wilkinson contemporary unit 5+1
These are probably the best trem I have come across.
A tremolo though is a flawed design on first principles, and has not really changed over the years.
Having the strings in counterpoint to a set of springs is really not a good design. But they are loved by a lot of people, and as such I will put them on my guitars if pushed hard enough !!!
11. The smoke has escaped from the machine mate, I just need to get some more....................
