Picky-Picky

We are Eastern Ontario's original Custom Mod and Custom Setup Shop for: Godin, Dean, Seagull, Aria, Schecter, Godin, BC Rich, Epiphone, Norman, Spector, Fender, Yamaha, Gibson, Vintage, etc...

What does “shop customized” mean? We use that term when referring to any guitars sold by us,as well as to emphasize that we don't sell a “stock” guitar that’s straight out of box, like you get from just about every other music store.

All our guitars are shop customized by us to play considerably better than similar looking instruments. Still, some folks think it’s voodoo or marketing hype. The end result is a guitar that will outplay the same or higher priced versions sold elsewhere.

Over the years we've built up a highly regarded reputation for our Custom Shop Set-up for guitars to the point where guitarists far and wide are travelling to Rainbow Music Shop to get their favorite guitars shop adjusted / customized to play Better Than Factory Specified. Many years of experience have yielded a process & methodology for getting the most out of an instrument, optimizing it to the point where it surprises even seasoned players who have assumed they already had a properly adjusted guitar.

Most stores pull a guitar out of a box, tune it, and stick it on the rack, claiming that “yep-it’s set-up”. Not even close-no cigar. When we set-up your guitar we first do a visual inspection check to see what we’re dealing with. We then set the truss rod to set the neck as straight as possible. We can then identify any high/low spots in the frets themselves as well as any uneveness in the fingerboard. We then remove the strings & tape up the fingerboard to protect it during the fret levelling process (this step is sometimes called fret dressing or fret milling or grinding (ouch!)). The frets are “blacked off”, allowing easier identification of fret innacuracies during the levelling process. The frets are levelled using a combination of filing blocks, abrasives and good old-fashioned experience. After the frets are assured to be level, their remaining flat tops are re-profiled (also called crowning or countouring) using “horse-shoe” and three-point files specifically modified for this step giving them a rounded over look (what we call school-bus profile). The next step involves removing the coarse scratches left from levelling by using several grades of abrasives, each one finer than the one before it. As a final step, each fret is hand polished with finer grade metal cleaner & polish to leave frets shining like slick mirrors. After the protective tape is removed, the fingerboard is oil-cleaned and buffed to give the neck a fast, sleek, feel. But wait-we’re not done yet!

Over the past 50+ years we’ve picked up on what each brand model’s quirks are. We know what needs to be done to bring these guitars and basses up to a greatly improved level of performance & reliability, often surpassing much higher priced “stock” counterparts from other stores.

This is especially apparent when comparing instruments from the bigbox discount dudes (or is that duds?).