Pleking? Pros and Cons?

[OzziePete]

I have a number of guitars that need a range of work.....

There's a place in Sydney that has a Plek machine and also offering other repair work.

From what I understand, the Plek machine is used to level the frets at tension, and files them down flat while the guitar is hooked up to the machine. Trusting a machine to shave .001 off a fret is scary enough, but yeah, is this worth the extra expense?

I wouldn't like to take some of my guitars there and they go, oh this needs Pleking, just for the hell of it and end up with a ruined neck.....The shop in Sydney claims to have done work for some serious musos so I am sure they have a reasonable reputation, but I am wondering if one or two of my guitars be requiring Pleking, is it the good job it is supposed to be? I don't know anyone who has a guitar that has been Pleked.

 

[kboman]

Apparently Gibson do it on all their new Les Paul Standards. Make of that what you will...

 

[Miskatonic]

What will it cost you?

 

[stubhead]

The last thing I read, there were only 16 of these machines in the world, so it might not come cheap. It obviously makes sense to have fully decided on the string gauges you prefer. The only warning I can think of is the same I'd give to anybody considering a level, crown & polish. That is, a new guitar neck is going to be settling in and changing for at least six months, 18 months is a safer bet to let it go through at least one full weather cycle. The only thing I would do on a new neck is take care of the fret ends if they were bothersome unless it was seriously goinked, in which case I'd return it.  EVERY Warmoth & USA Custom neck I've ever had needed at least a bit of this sort of work, as I an very picky about fretwork.

In other words, I think a leveling on a brand new guitar is somewhat wasteful of cash, unless you're going to be playing gigs with this guitar immediately,  AND if there's a blatant problem with the fret heights. I've only had ONE Warmoth that needed that kind of immediate attention, and it was one high 23rd fret on a seven string neck that took all of 20 minutes to level and polish. I don't see any way possible that a machine can do a "better-than-perfect" job*, and the really good guys working in L.A., Austin, New York and Nashville will charge about $300 for an immaculate job (just for comparison). I don't know, how much is a Plek job?

The kid down the street might be able to doing just as good a job for the usual low-ball figure of $100 - $125, there's no telling he can't - but Brent Mason & Steve Vai & John McLaughlin will be going to the $300 guy. I've seen some of that grade of work; in fact it's my opinion that a very large percentage of what makes the difference between a Fender or Gibson Custom Shop instrument and the mundane tweedlethumpers is a really good fret job - which given that they're brand new, is probably going to settle out-of-true soon anyway. Any time you can charge $3,000 more for $200 worth of labor, that's "good business" in the American sense of "good." (which is why Schecter & Ibanez are cleaning up in the $300 - $800 range. Dam furriners) Another point is, unless you play with super-low shreddy type action, the very best of the best fret leveling isn't even going to matter. I can drop the action way down on a guitar I've done myself - but I don't even like it that low.

*(there is no such thing, etymologically, as "better-than-perfect." :hello2: )

 

[OzziePete]

What will it cost you?

Better to link their webpage...
http://www.sydneyguitarsetups.com/acatalog/Plek_setups.html

 

[OzziePete]

The last thing I read, there were only 16 of these machines in the world, so it might not come cheap. It obviously makes sense to have fully decided on the string gauges you prefer. The only warning I can think of is the same I'd give to anybody considering a level, crown & polish. That is, a new guitar neck is going to be settling in and changing for at least six months, 18 months is a safer bet to let it go through at least one full weather cycle. The only thing I would do on a new neck is take care of the fret ends if they were bothersome unless it was seriously goinked, in which case I'd return it.  EVERY Warmoth & USA Custom neck I've ever had needed at least a bit of this sort of work, as I an very picky about fretwork.

In other words, I think a leveling on a brand new guitar is somewhat wasteful of cash, unless you're going to be playing gigs with this guitar immediately,  AND if there's a blatant problem with the fret heights. I've only had ONE Warmoth that needed that kind of immediate attention, and it was one high 23rd fret on a seven string neck that took all of 20 minutes to level and polish. I don't see any way possible that a machine can do a "better-than-perfect" job*, and the really good guys working in L.A., Austin, New York and Nashville will charge about $300 for an immaculate job (just for comparison). I don't know, how much is a Plek job?

The kid down the street might be able to doing just as good a job for the usual low-ball figure of $100 - $125, there's no telling he can't - but Brent Mason & Steve Vai & John McLaughlin will be going to the $300 guy. I've seen some of that grade of work; in fact it's my opinion that a very large percentage of what makes the difference between a Fender or Gibson Custom Shop instrument and the mundane tweedlethumpers is a really good fret job - which given that they're brand new, is probably going to settle out-of-true soon anyway. Any time you can charge $3,000 more for $200 worth of labor, that's "good business" in the American sense of "good." (which is why Schecter & Ibanez are cleaning up in the $300 - $800 range. Dam furriners) Another point is, unless you play with super-low shreddy type action, the very best of the best fret leveling isn't even going to matter. I can drop the action way down on a guitar I've done myself - but I don't even like it that low.

*(there is no such thing, etymologically, as "better-than-perfect." :hello2: )

My main problem with many of my guitars is intonation.......

One guitar needs a new nut cut and a setup, two Teles need a setup, another guitar has horrible action that I would like lowered if at all possible, another has the horrid G string rattle, my Maton Custom Acoustic needs a neck truss rod tweak and I ain't letting anyone near that who isn't well credentialled. Of the guitars I have, maybe one might need a pleking and that's the one that needs the action lowered if at all possible. But that's a beater that is much loved and abused.....

I have tried doing the intonation setups myself but with the Wilky trems and the experience you need to know how close is good enough in intonation, I'm forever chasing circles as the Peterson tuner keeps reading sharp, then flat, then sharp again.....

But I don't wanna put these guitars into the hands of someone who then upsells me into Pleking for the hell of it. I think most of my fretboards don't have issues with raised frets etc. but I wanna know if there's a need for it to be done, if Pleking is the right way to go......

 

[llmtelecaster]

I deal with quite a few mills, lathes, and CNC machines in my line of work and I have a lot faith in these types of machines. Sure it's not as romantic as imagining a master luthier doing it by hand, but if the machines are calibrated correctly I think they would do a fantastic job and I'd give it a try very easily. Just out of curiosity I'd give it a try.

 

[Disco Scottie]

I haven't had any of my guitars done yet, but my Suhr came with a Plek job from the factory. It's by far my most favorite feeling neck of over 50 guitars. I can't begin to describe how nice it plays.

 

[jay4321]

I'm all over this with one of my new guitars. I've read everything I could on them. It's pretty clearly not a magic machine - it needs to be operated by a person who knows their way around a doing these things by hand - it's just a really precise (and expensive) tool in the right hands. It's stainless steel fret-friendly, compound radius-friendly.

Dan Erlewine has one and Peekamoose in NY does also, it'll be one or the other. 

 

[jay4321]

And I'm sure someone will make the point that it's probably very expensive and unnecessary, which might be true. But I've got lots of guitars and have wasted a fair amount of money on shoddy local work. I'll ship the black Warmoth LP and see how it turns out. Only live once bitches

 

[Cagey]

If your main problem is intonation, it's unlikely Pleking the thing is going to help. That's for optimizing your fingerboard. From what you describe, it sounds like your Strobotuner's getting flaky, or perhaps you're applying inconsistent pressure to the 12th fret when you measure that point.

Oddly enough, it could also be the truss rod. I had a guitar here not long ago that didn't want to hold tune and wouldn't intonate. The intonation problem was obvious - it had a fixed bridge - and the inconsistent tuning was blamed on the junk Kluson tuners that were barely good enough to use for shrapnel. Changed the bridge and tuners both and installed a new TUSQ nut, but the problem persisted. I noticed that even for a LP Jr. with a mahogany neck, it seemed to be a bit rubbery. That is, you could hear it change pitch just while handling it. Checked the truss rod, and it was loose. Nothing holding the neck firm, so it was flopping in the wind, so to speak. Nothing to be done about that but steam and re-stress the neck so the truss could be brought back into play, but it's a finished neck so that operation is unlikely to succeed, at least not for long. Thing's not worth stripping and refinishing, so I don't know what's going to happen to it now.

 

[OzziePete]

If your main problem is intonation, it's unlikely Pleking the thing is going to help. That's for optimizing your fingerboard. From what you describe, it sounds like your Strobotuner's getting flaky, or perhaps you're applying inconsistent pressure to the 12th fret when you measure that point.

Oddly enough, it could also be the truss rod. I had a guitar here not long ago that didn't want to hold tune and wouldn't intonate. The intonation problem was obvious - it had a fixed bridge - and the inconsistent tuning was blamed on the junk Kluson tuners that were barely good enough to use for shrapnel. Changed the bridge and tuners both and installed a new TUSQ nut, but the problem persisted. I noticed that even for a LP Jr. with a mahogany neck, it seemed to be a bit rubbery. That is, you could hear it change pitch just while handling it. Checked the truss rod, and it was loose. Nothing holding the neck firm, so it was flopping in the wind, so to speak. Nothing to be done about that but steam and re-stress the neck so the truss could be brought back into play, but it's a finished neck so that operation is unlikely to succeed, at least not for long. Thing's not worth stripping and refinishing, so I don't know what's going to happen to it now.

Thanx for all this Cagey - I think!

I realised after I had posted my first questions that a Pleking was not going to fix intonation issues with a guitar. You are right, that's for an uneven fretboard situation. I really hope the Strobotuner is not the issue. I'm thinking maybe the idiot trying to use it with heavy fingers on the 12th fret and maybe not properly using the Sweetener programs within the Strobotuner is the issue!

I really think things like shot truss rods are not the issue here. My guess is on the ones with the Wilky trems, there might be a need to check the spring tension. Also the necks are mostly Warmoth ones and near new...

But I'm kinda thinking that if these guys have the training to do the Plek machine work then they'd know a lot about the other issues so they don't just whack a guitar into the Plek and waste machine time, when it could be the bridge intonation that is the real problem.

Finding a good repairer is difficult, although I did find a good one a few years back in Sydney who did a great job setting up my #1 Tele with the Earvana nut. But Colin crossed the line with me when he just casually mentioned (when I collected it) that he sweetened up the Tele bridge pickup with a different cap & changed around the switching wiring by adding a resistor, when I did not ask him to look at the electrics - at all. I wished that if he had noticed things that could have been improved, that he would mention them to me rather than firing up the solder iron and doing the work before I knew about it.

After nearly having a good Gibson Firebird ruined by people doing what they please to MY guitars, that sort of extra work is no longer appreciated by me.

 

[stubhead]

I don't want to get into a labored discussion of this, but the "equal-tempered" tuning introduced around Bach's time (so that music could modulate to any and all keys) has a deviation of over 17 cents on certain notes from natural or "just intonation." You can hear it very clearly when you ping a 3rd harmonic, them compare it to a fretted note. When I got really serious about pedal steel I spent a long time working on playing in tune, and it actually became hard for me to listen to some music played with instruments that were essentially tuned to different scales. There are constant debates on this over on the steel guitar forum, and any orchestra that plays with a guest pianist or guitarist has to accommodate the "ET" (equal tempered) tuning for them, as orchestras tend to play in a modifed just intonation - "JI" - for each different key.

The point is - to play western music on a piano or guitar, you are always slightly out of tune, up to 17.49 cents on a tritone. The killer is the major thirds, 15 cents out of tune! Anybody who's spent time training their ear can detect a 4 or 5 cent deviation. Even if the fretwork is perfect, if you adjust a guitar to play perfectly (JI) in the key of G, it'll be way off in E major, and vice-versa. And you may be able to hear this to the point of being bothered by it.

If you're adjusting the bridge by the harmonic at the 12th fret, try also checking the harmonics and notes at the 19th fret, and tempering the difference in the bridge saddles locations. Also - and I've gotten into profound disputes over this - I think it makes the most sense to set your intonation using strings that have been played in a bit. Some people insist that you can only set intonation on brand new strings and anything else is "wrong." But the intonation changes a hell of a lot as the strings age, and if you're playing a number of different guitars and you're not a millionaire, and you don't want to spent two hours every morning putting new strings on all your guitars, in real life you will be playing with strings that intonate differently than brand new ones. Most of the changes are done after 5 or six hours of playing, so I usually just wait a bit, 3 or 4 days, to re-intonate if it's needed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_temperament

This is a huge subject; there are whole philosophies of piano tuning, orchestral conducting, record producing having to do with the ET vs. JI thing. Studio guitarists often re-intonate their guitar for specific keys on one single song, and change strings for every single song too. Rich rock star guys have their tech change strings every day not so much for breakage, but because the guitars are adjusted to be in tune with brand new strings.

EDIT: Also, besides making sure that you're setting intonation using the same amount of finger pressure as your regular playing, make sure you're holding the guitar upright in playing position! Both the weight of the neck, and more so the whammy bar, will cause it to be off if you're pressing down the string upright, but pinging the harmonic with it held flat. Don't sit in front of the air conditioner, or out in the hot sun... check the phases of the moon for full tides, make a burnt offering to the Tuning God etc.

 

[Super Turbo Deluxe Custom]

All that aside, Pleking just has to do with fret leveling, not the placement of frets or tuning of the instrument.  I would think it is worth it, because the few I know that have had it done post instrument purchase swear by it.  Of course they were the types that would swear by it before it was done, and certainly wouldn't say it did nothing after dropping that kind of cash.  The highest praise I've heard was from a player of a 7-string Conklin bass, saying now it has the action of a well setup guitar.

Yes, Gibson does it.  However, that doesn't make me think more of Gibson or less of the Plek machine.  It is a tool afterall and one has to know how to use it.  It still requires adjustment, setup, clamping, and a person must do all of this.  Combining the Plek with the assembly line style of mass producing doesn't seem like it should work in Gibson's case.  Now if the Plek did finishing, fret dressing, volute placement, destroyed the Firebird X, didn't try to pass a Strat off as a Gibson, maybe it would help Gibson.

 

[Cagey]

... I really hope the Strobotuner is not the issue. I'm thinking maybe the idiot trying to use it with heavy fingers on the 12th fret and maybe not properly using the Sweetener programs within the Strobotuner is the issue!

Unless it's one of the old electro-mechanical units, it's probably not the tuner. Those old strobes were great because they locked to the power line with a synchonous motor, and the gummint has always been quite anal about regulating power line frequency here so they were always a good standard. But, they did suffer from frictional losses and so forth, so they weren't as good as some think. At least not compared to what you can do today. Modern strobos often don't even have strobes, and they're locked to very high crystal frequencies, so they're actually better units, although they use "retro" displays to satisfy some people's need for an obsolete user interface. In either case, the typical failure mode was "doesn't work at all".

Heavy-handedness is pretty common, though. I'd jump on that first.

I really think things like shot truss rods are not the issue here. My guess is on the ones with the Wilky trems, there might be a need to check the spring tension. Also the necks are mostly Warmoth ones and near new...

Spring tension on the vibrato shouldn't change much unless there are wild temperature fluctations, and even then I don't think there'd be a lot of movement. The amount of temperature change you'd have to have would be uncomfortably wide, and would undoubtedly cause all sorts of other damage. Plus, relatively new Warmoth are almost like a gold standard, especially if the problem exists on more than one guitar.

But I'm kinda thinking that if these guys have the training to do the Plek machine work then they'd know a lot about the other issues so they don't just whack a guitar into the Plek and waste machine time, when it could be the bridge intonation that is the real problem.

I don't know. Been to a hospital lately? They'll jam people into MRI machines for stubbed toes any more so they can keep the thing employed. It's a wickedly expensive machine and if it isn't running, it isn't paying its way. The Plek is the same way, albeit on a different scale (we're talking a few hundred thousand dollars vs. a couple million dollars). Anyway, the Plek machine doesn't check tuning; it checks/corrects geometry. You don't need to know much about tuning/playing to use the thing. You need to know more about workpiece positioning and tool setup than anything else.

 

[jay4321]

All that aside, Pleking just has to do with fret leveling, not the placement of frets or tuning of the instrument.  I would think it is worth it, because the few I know that have had it done post instrument purchase swear by it.  Of course they were the types that would swear by it before it was done, and certainly wouldn't say it did nothing after dropping that kind of cash.  The highest praise I've heard was from a player of a 7-string Conklin bass, saying now it has the action of a well setup guitar.

Yes, Gibson does it.  However, that doesn't make me think more of Gibson or less of the Plek machine.  It is a tool afterall and one has to know how to use it.  It still requires adjustment, setup, clamping, and a person must do all of this.  Combining the Plek with the assembly line style of mass producing doesn't seem like it should work in Gibson's case.  Now if the Plek did finishing, fret dressing, volute placement, destroyed the Firebird X, didn't try to pass a Strat off as a Gibson, maybe it would help Gibson.

There's a video on YouTube of Gibson working on them, and it's earlier in the production process. My line of thinking might be way off but I'd much rather have this work done on a completed guitar.

 

[Disco Scottie]

There's a video on YouTube of Gibson working on them, and it's earlier in the production process. My line of thinking might be way off but I'd much rather have this work done on a completed guitar.

Of course it should be done on a completed guitar. But this is Gibson we're talking about, so I'm not surprised they would be doing in wrong.

 

[bagman67]

If your main problem is intonation, it's unlikely Pleking the thing is going to help. That's for optimizing your fingerboard. From what you describe, it sounds like your Strobotuner's getting flaky, or perhaps you're applying inconsistent pressure to the 12th fret when you measure that point.

Oddly enough, it could also be the truss rod. I had a guitar here not long ago that didn't want to hold tune and wouldn't intonate. The intonation problem was obvious - it had a fixed bridge - and the inconsistent tuning was blamed on the junk Kluson tuners that were barely good enough to use for shrapnel. Changed the bridge and tuners both and installed a new TUSQ nut, but the problem persisted. I noticed that even for a LP Jr. with a mahogany neck, it seemed to be a bit rubbery. That is, you could hear it change pitch just while handling it. Checked the truss rod, and it was loose. Nothing holding the neck firm, so it was flopping in the wind, so to speak. Nothing to be done about that but steam and re-stress the neck so the truss could be brought back into play, but it's a finished neck so that operation is unlikely to succeed, at least not for long. Thing's not worth stripping and refinishing, so I don't know what's going to happen to it now.

Jack up the action.  You are the proud owner of a dedicated slide guitar.
:icon_thumright:

 

[Cagey]

Jack up the action.  You are the proud owner of a dedicated slide guitar.
:icon_thumright:

Perfect! That's an excellent idea! It's not my guitar, but I'll pass along the advice. Good thinking!

 

[Steve_Karl]

I have tried doing the intonation setups myself but with the Wilky trems and the experience you need to know how close is good enough in intonation, I'm forever chasing circles as the Peterson tuner keeps reading sharp, then flat, then sharp again.....

A good Peterson ( I have a VS-1 ) will read the difference in how your sitting, i.e. the slant of the body, forward or back, in your lap, even with a hard tail, because of the pull of the weight of the wood of the neck, flexing to gravity and thus changing the tension on the strings.
You'll never get it to stand still with a Peterson. Moving really slow, like less that 1 mark per second, is plenty close enough and better than most all other tuners could even see.