American Toolbox

Juzek Luthier Tools

Posted on September 17, 2017

LITTLE DEER ISLE, MAINE  Generational downsizing had Jeff moving fiddles.  In the right place, I acquired a Johann Baptist Schweitzer Copy of 1813 in rare good condition.  Down the Eastern Seaboard the Baptist (bap•TEEST) was shipped.  To Pennsylvania for mild refurbishment, strings, set-up, then further south to William in Georgia.  Its stop-over proved to be more than a quick pat on the back.  The pegbox was wonky.  

While this instrument may have been made for 1:20 taper pegs, someone had later used modern 1:30 taper pegs.  The new standard has provided superior tuning performance and pegbox health since its inception about 1900.  This narrower peg, however, will not fit simply by “shoving it in as hard as you can”.

In a fog, flummoxed by ratios and angles, we turn to two of the best luthiers and mathematicians in the world for answers.  The question, “What’s the difference?”

From Ontario: Basic trigonometry gives tan(angle)=rise/run. The angle is then inverse tan(rise/run), which gives an angle of 87.14 degrees. The compliment is 2.86 degrees. Thus, your 1:20 reamer is 2.86 degrees. – Charles Tauber

Not to be outdone, we’re gifted the link to a “Taper & Angle Calculation” program from a reader in Tatamagouche, the village in Nova Scotia.  A 1:30 taper is scarcely larger, 3.33%

Closer examination reveals it is no big deal.  With existing peg hole damage, it’s not even six-of-one, half-a-dozen of the other.   We’re saved the expense, for now, of an imported Old World specialty reamer.  Bill is still waiting in Georgia; lead time leaps forward.  My domestic Juzek 1:30 tapered reamer with three straight cutting flutes works perfectly.  The Juzek peg shaver (USA production with some imported parts) produces both blisters and perfect pegs.  A little pool cue chalk on the peg surfaces, along with D’Addario Kaplan Amo strings, completes the job.

Steve Fields played the finished restoration at Woodside Creamery Farm yesterday.  He pronounces the effort, “Perfect!”  Another All-Smiles-Day!