323 Potrero Ave. San Francisco, CA 94103
415.865.5424 - info@sfguitarworks.com
Tues-Fri 12pm-7pm, Sat 11am-5pm


Introducing IG-88

We have an exciting new addition to the shop: our very own bounty hunter droid.  Introducing our new drill press, nicknamed IG-88.

Our new Delta 18-900L drill press is super precise, high torque, and is equipped with lasers!  Drillin’ holes doesn’t get more exact (or fun) than this!  For you tool nerds out there, here’s a great video that gives the entire run down on this machine: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWE6xDUer-w

And for you non-Star Wars nerds out there, here’s what a real IG-88 looks like:

The resemblance is uncanny, no?

Presto change-o!

Here’s an interesting job we did for The Cuban Cowboys.  Jorge brought this 1973 Fender Tele Deluxe that had been through the ringer: it was covered in spray paint, stickers, and had some funky old Gibson pickups installed.  Jorge wanted to see what was under all the spray paint, damn the consequences.  We knew it was risky, but Jorge was willing to go for it, so we gave it a shot.

Here’s what the body looked like when it came in:

After several hours sanding, buffing, and polishing, we got down to the original black lacquer.  It had been pretty heavily scuffed before the spray paint had been applied, so we went with the more reliced, played in look rather than strip the finish and re-apply a whole new coat of lacquer.  Add in a couple of Rio Grande pickups (in green sparkle!), give it a proper Fret Level & Setup, and a new bone nut and this guitar has a new lease on life.  It sounds amazing, plays great, and looks awesome!  Check it out!

 

On A Plane…

We’ve been super busy at the shop lately, expanding our woodshop, learning new techniques, organizing our workflow, spending tons of money on new tools… and neglecting our website a little bit.  Well, we’re getting back on the ball and will be updating our Blog, Facebook, and Twitter pages regularly once again, now that the dust has settled around the shop.  If you haven’t “Liked” us or are “Following” us yet, now’s the time to hook it up!

So what’s the deal with our expansion, you ask?  Well, we are currently designing and building prototypes for our new line of custom electric guitars, and much of our focus has been on getting every last detail down.  Here’s a tiny little example of what we mean:

We needed a tool that simply didn’t exist… so we built one!  This is a hand plane that has a 25′ radius on the bottom, which we will be using to shape wood for classical guitar backs (yes, there are classical guitars in the works, but more on that later…).  Just to be fancy, we made the plane out of maple, and gave it a nice gunstock oil finish.  Sweet!

The best is yet to come… stay tuned.

Thursday January 5th

We will be closing two hours early at 5 PM on Thursday January the 5th.

Holiday Hours

We will be closed on Christmas Eve, Christmas, and New Year’s Day. We will be open from 11-3 on New Year’s Eve. Happy Holidays.