Instrument Repairs & Servicing

Jan 2024 Update: Due to job volume, repair shop turnarounds are currently a little longer than normal. Please contact us for up-to-date estimates.

With in-house luthiers & technicians with over four decades of experience between them in our workshop from Monday to Saturday, we’re able to offer comprehensive instrument servicing, restoration, repair & custom builds. With outstanding attention to detail, fair pricing and the right advice, we’ve got you covered. Be it the precious vintage piece or the hard-worn workhorse, we’ve seen them all.

How long will it take?

Standard servicing turn-around is generally within 5 business days (excludes instruments requiring structural repairs, re-frets, finish work etc.) but this can and does vary. Our friendly team will give you an estimate at the time your job is booked. We pride ourselves on quick, musician-friendly turn-around times and we'll do our best to get your instrument(s) back to you ASAP!

No need to book ahead, come in and have a chin wag to Rick, Ben or Matt today! (Unless it’s Sunday)

We are Melbourne’s north-side Fender authorised repairer, if your strat don’t strat, tele us about it!

We are also a Maton authorised repairer.


SERVICES OFFERED & PRICING

Basic Re-string — Starts at $40* + price of strings

  • $40 for acoustic, electric, classical and bass guitars
  • $50 for 12 string guitars
  • $60 for Floyd Rose equipped instruments

Service includes:

  • Installation of strings and tuning the instrument
  • We’ll sight the neck relief and perform basic adjustments as needed

For more than this, you'll need a ...


Standard Service / Setup — $120* + cost of preferred strings

  • $120 for acoustic & electric guitars and basses, classical guitars, dobros etc.
  • $140 for instruments requiring a setup with a floating vibrato
  • $160 for 12-string guitars

Deep cleaning fee ($20) applies to instruments with heavily soiled fingerboards

Our Standard Service includes:

  • Fingerboard clean and condition
  • Spot level, re-seat and polish frets
  • Instrument clean and polish
  • Nut action set to Dan Erlewine specifications
  • Tuning machine tighten and lubrication
  • Bridge/saddle radius cut/adjust
  • Clean and lubricate electronics/reflow dry solder points
  • Re-string with your preferred strings, to your desired tuning
  • Action height adjustment to player's preference (if given, otherwise best practice is used)
  • Intonation adjustment

Guitars MUST be re-strung to be set up properly — we do not re-use or retain your strings. In the case of bass guitars, sure - we will keep your 50 year old vintage flats if you insist - but only if they've been strung correctly to begin with and can be safely re-used.



A note on "string buzz" — It is a factor in a setup, particularly with lighter strings - if you’re running 9 gauge strings, the wound strings will more than likely buzz when fretted. We will not let a guitar leave the workshop that is choking notes. Excess buzzing can be minimized but usually not eliminated entirely without action a mile high and a less playable instrument.

Priority Servicing — Add 50% of the charge for a given service as a rush fee for on the spot, urgent servicing (weekdays only!). Please allow a minimum of 2 hours turnaround. A re-fret will generally be 24 hours at best when booked in as priority. Our techs take coffee in the morning and red wine in the evening. Grazie.


Guitar Service, Setup and Fret Dress — $250* plus strings

Details:

  • Includes all above standard setup & services
  • Frets seated, levelled, crowned and polished


Full Re-fret — Starting from $450*

$450 — Unbound bolt-on, rosewood fingerboard
$550 — Unbound bolt-on, maple fingerboard (Includes nitrocellulose refinish on fingerboard)
$550 — Unbound set neck
$650 — Bound set neck


OTHERS / EXTRAS

* Prices may vary slightly depending on age and condition of your instrument. If your request isn't listed, ask us about it (i.e. if your guitar is fretless and you want frets in it, that’s annoying for us but we can do it, I guess)

Nut Replacement - $180

  • Removal of old nut
  • Carving of new bone nut
  • Fitting of new nut
  • Includes standard setup & service

A new nut cannot be correctly installed without also adjusting neck relief and saddle radius/height to match. If you just want a nut cut without this, it is $80 but we strongly advise against this.


Electronic work — quote upon inspection, starting from $50

Services include:

  • Pickup installation (Acoustic & Electric)
  • Pickup re-winding
  • Custom pickup winding
  • Wax potting
  • Wiring modifications & customisations
  • Pot, switch and output jack replacement
  • Pickup cavity shielding and grounding
  • General electronic diagnostics

NOTE: We do not repair amplifiers and pedals in house (although some of us have been known to in past lives). We will instead recommend a technician for the job.


Neck Reset — Starting From $700

Service Details:

  1. Re-setting the neck angle by heating out the dovetail or tenon jointed neck.
  2. Removing a small amount of material from the heel and correcting the joint.

In some cases we need to glue in a wedge underneath the fingerboard extension so there isn’t excessive fall away. Once the mechanical fit is good and the neck angle is correct, we glue the neck back in with the same adhesive used by the manufacturer at the time the instrument was built.

A new saddle and setup is always required on flat top acoustic guitars after a reset which is included in the price. In some cases a re-fret is also highly recommended...

* We use bone saddle blanks in the workshop - if you’d like an alternate material there will be an extra charge.

* Generally we will only take on neck resets for major brand guitars - Martin, Gibson, Guild, Gretsch, etc. Due to the manufacturing process of lower end instruments this process is very difficult and often not possible due to the use of poxy to set the neck which does not respond to heat. Polyurethane is also generally used to finish the instrument which will break away when the neck is heated off, leaving us with an instrument that needs a refinish. We will not be happy with the result and therefore will not take it on.


Structural Repair — Starting at $200

Services include:

  • Broken headstock repair **
  • Neck re-sets
  • Bracing repairs
  • Bridge Replacement, etc.


Finish Work — Starting at $300

  • Nitrocellulose refinishing
  • French Polishing
  • Relic-ing existing finishes & hardware


** Guitars always sound better after the headstock has been broken and repaired. We’ll happily provide the full experience if you’re chasing that unobtainable sonic quality from your guitar.