Official Luthiers Forum!

As some of you will remember I gave my 10 year old grand niece a guitar. Well it turns out that she is left handed. I was thinking about making her a lefty and then it occurred to me that if she has started to learn on a right handed guitar, would if be problematic to then give her a lefty. Would she be able to do better with a left handed guitar or can someone who is left handed just as easily learn (and do well) on a right handed guitar?

So, then it occurred to me... What if I made a guitar with two saddle slots - one for right handed and another for left handed. That mean crisscrossing saddle slots. That way the guitar could easily be switched from right handed to left handed. Of course, that leaves what I should do about the orientation of the tone bars...

Is this a bonehead idea or something that could work? Any thoughts, comments, or suggestions are welcome.
Steve

_________________
Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

Build her a RH guitar ---- $.02 BTW I am a left hander and have/had "zero" problem learning and playing RH handed, my real problem is I have no musical talent!

_________________
Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

My wife is a lefty who plays righty.

When this topic comes up -- it usually goes to the point of which hand is really most dominant when playing a guitar --- I am a finger-picker and and would suggest neither.

Are there left handed pianos?

_________________
Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

Steve--

A few thoughts:

I am left handed, but I play guitar right handed. My personal belief is that both hands have a critical role to play when playing the guitar, so designating one function as more appropriate for the dominant hand doesn't make sense to me. If your grand niece has already started playing right handed, I would not change her up. It is not like handwriting or racquet sports. You might as well have a left handed piano as a left handed guitar, in my opinion as a lefty.

No offense to my fellow lefties who learned to play left handed. For you, the die is cast, and I would not recommend trying to change now. I'm just saying that, with a clean slate of no prior experience with either type of instrument, I don't see the point of steering left handed people to left handed guitars.

As to whether the asymmetrical bracing on a standard X braced guitar is somehow not ideal any more if you switch it to a lefty, I am not convinced that is a big issue. It's not like all the lower frequencies come off the side of the guitar that has the bass strings.

On the switchable saddle idea, I would be worried about the bridge being strong enough with two crisscrossing slots in it. What about one big slot (quarter inch thick), with one big saddle (and a mirror image one for switching from righty to lefty) that is big enough to intonate each string position the way it needs to be? Two nuts, too, of course.

Another idea that I actually implemented on a guitar once: individual saddle slots for each string that run parallel to the strings. Each saddle was 3/8" long and 1/8" wide. It works great! Lots of individual string definition. Maybe too much, but it is not bad.

I'll leave the which-hand-is-better discussion to those who know. Having built a couple of left handed guitars I just want to remind you that its more than the saddle slot - you will need different saddles (it will be compensated wrong). You'll need two nuts, the pickguard and neck marker dots will be on the wrong side. As you say the bracing will be backwards (that hasn't been a big issue on the ones I've built) - but you might consider a pattern that is symmetrical . Electronics (if any) will be backwards (I built a left handed ES-335 and we had a big discussion about which way the pots should turn).

One of the frustrating things for me when I build a leftie is that I can't play it to see how it sounds LOL.

Okay - maybe it wasn't such great idea... Freeman, You are exactly right about all the other things that would not lend themselves to switchable righty/lefty instrument (although, Don had a good idea about simply one big saddle slot). ...and with a lefty, it would be a little frustrating playing it to see how it sounds... It sounds like I should scrap the idea of making her a lefty, since I already gave her a righty... I kinda wish I had remembered that she was a lefty - on the other hand, maybe it really wouldn't have mattered...

_________________
Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

Harvey Leach builds switchable guitars using one big saddle slot, so you might drop him a line and ask about the details.

I was born right handed but I got over it.

Falcate bracing (which is symmetrical), nut and saddle compensation (which has no saddle slant). Then you're good to go either way, just by switching out the nut and saddle.

_________________
Trevor Gore, Luthier. Australian hand made acoustic guitars, classical guitars; custom guitar design and build; guitar design instruction.

http://www.goreguitars.com.au

What Trevor says. With a compensated nut you should need less saddle compensation, so it just becomes a matter of swapping out.

Brace symmetry is not really too important. The actual tension on the strings is not much different, so one side doesn't need to be stronger than the other to take the load. Asymmetrically braced tops do vibrate differently from symmetrically braced ones, but the sound is not worse, just different. There is no 'treble' or 'bass' side to the the top in terms of the way it puts out sound; for the low tones you get the whole lower bout working, while at higher frequencies the entire top breaks up into smaller vibrating areas. The sound is pretty good at finding it's way from the string to whatever part of the guitar will put it out.

There are several symmetric brace patterns that are in use, if you choose to go that way. I've been making 'double-X' braced tops for several years now. In spite of Gibson's problems with them there's nothing wrong with the system: I had luthiers compare a Double-X and a 'normal' guitar that were otherwise closely matched, and they actually preferred the double-X by 2:1. A lot of Canadian luthiers use a setup that has a single brace straight across the lower bout below the main X, and that works well too. Most Classical guitars are symmetrically braced, but that system seems not to work as well on steel strings.

Don't forget to put dots on both sides of the neck.

The 'lefty/righty' thing comes up frequently. Basically, as I understand it (and I'm a lefty who plays righty) there is far more difference in brain wiring between left handers than there is between right handers. Some lefties can learn to play right handed, and others simply can't. It's not a 'moral failing' that could be remedied by more practice, and it's not an artistic failing that will doom them to being lesser musicians because they're not drawing on the correct side of the brain. It's just the way it is. If your grand niece can learn to play righty, fine, and if not, that's great too. The important thing is that she learns to play music and enjoys it. It's great that she has a great-uncle who will support her in this.

Just to throw another into the mix. I know a very good player who is left handed and plays right handed guitars. No, not re-strung, just upside down. He said he didn't want to be limited to playing only leftys or having to fuss with changing rightys around.