Shims debate?

[JSett]

Came across this interesting argument against full-pocket shims. I'm not a fan of them and find a piece of playing card or slice of guitar pick has been absolutely fine for me for decades and I too noticed a difference in sound when trying out a full shim but put it down to my ears playing tricks on me.

Nice to see someone else with real-world experience experiencing the same thing and is mildly thought-provoking. I'm not saying I agree with him, or it all, but if it's something that's being noticed by other (unrelated) people then maybe there's something to it. Who knows.

You tube video

(Actual playing to compare at 15:50 and 22:50)

[Soopnotch]

Hmm, interesting. I just bought the Stewmac shim 3 pack too. Partly for my new JM. But I also have a Tele with kinda bottomed out saddles that I want to try these on.

I've never used shims like this before though, and I didn't realize there was any debate over their effect on tone.

[Larry Mal]

Does this guy make a point? I kind of droned out after he talked about the old wood and how the guitar lost its "mojo". What's the thinking here?

I've never used shims like this before though, and I didn't realize there was any debate over their effect on tone.

There isn't.

[seenoevil II]

I absolutely refuse to call them the shims after he fired the whole band in 2012. Wait...

[alexpigment]

Haha ^^^

[timtam]

It's undermined by the common science-challenged failure to understand what the acoustic sound of a solid-body guitar does and doesn't mean.

[smjenkins]

I absolutely refuse to call them the shims after he fired the whole band in 2012. Wait...

OK, that's good stuff

[JSett]

Does this guy make a point? I kind of droned out after he talked about the old wood and how the guitar lost its "mojo". What's the thinking here?

I've never used shims like this before though, and I didn't realize there was any debate over their effect on tone.

There isn't.

Oh, there was a lot of rambling and I had to skip a bit to find the meaty part of what he's saying. I think his conclusion was that the difference in density between older, drier wood and its resonance (which is actually a thing with resonance) and the newer, wetter, different density shim.

I mean, if you skip and find the part where he plays it unplugged before and after, it is noticable even on a laptop speaker. It's subtle, but it's there. It's at 15:50 and 22:50 if anyone wants to cut the waffling.

I do wish there was less fluff to the video, it could have been <10 mins without losing anything

Like I said I'd not given it much thought apart from when I tried one and thought I heard a difference but I forgot about it very quickly (until seeing this video) so it can't have been massive.

I absolutely refuse to call them the shims after he fired the whole band in 2012. Wait...

I love how niché this joke is.

[JVG]

Strewth, he really stretched that out. 27 minutes!

[GilmourD]

I haven't had the opportunity to watch the video Johnny shared (I will, but I'm taking my son to see Venom 3 tonight after my pre-surgery bloodwork after work... Stacked schedules suck!) but I have had many a conversation with Totally Wired (actually, he's the reason I started carrying the 7.25" version of the 52mm bridge). Given what he posted on IG yesterday I think part of his issue might be the cost of the StewMac shims, so I sent him the link to the $10 shims I (and others here) get off Amazon.

Before I was an offsetter (is that an appropriate term for us?) I've definitely done the "shim with a random piece of something" deal. I think one of my Floyd-equipped Strats even has a piece of Happy Meal box in it (yes, I said box, cuz it was the late '90s).

However, I've come to prefer the angled shims because there's significantly less guesswork in how much shim I need (I probably have used the 0.5° shims more than any others, so I'm glad you can buy three packs of the same angle from Amazon), I don't have to worry about them shifting out of place, and they don't compress like paperboard does after a while. There's a couple times where I've shimmed a neck, gotten it down nice and tight, and then found at some point I had to add a bit more shim because what I used squished.

[alexpigment]

I think the effect on tone has a lot to do with the “sponginess” of the shim. I used to make shims out of gradually smaller cuts of printer paper (neck heel template or printed out many times and cut down to various lengths). My only guitar still with that method has the *perfect* neck angle and no unnecessary height compared to shims that don’t go down to full “zero” thickness. That guitar sounds dead/dull acoustically but I like the sound plugged in.


I suspect that if the shims are hard and can transfer vibrations as well as the neck pocket wood itself, it probably won’t make much difference. What are stewmac and Amazon shims made of wood-wise?

PS I haven’t watched the video yet.

[longtortoise]

I used a cereal box to shim my Jag. I intended this to be temporary while I waited for a full pocket shim to arrive, but it really set the neck angle so perfectly I'm not sure I'll use the full pocket shim. Regardless...I don't believe a more "resonant" unplugged sound has much effect on the plugged-in sound. If the body of the instrument is vibrating that's just energy bring taken out of the strings. Is there any evidence that that produces "better" tone?

[Dr Tony Balls]

I think the concept of the different resonance and tone between two different types of shim is probably a silly thing to be micro-focused on. There's a zillion other things that will affect those factors that are probably more important.

[alexpigment]

Regardless...I don't believe a more "resonant" unplugged sound has much effect on the plugged-in sound. If the body of the instrument is vibrating that's just energy bring taken out of the strings. Is there any evidence that that produces "better" tone?

Oh no You just accidentally opened up the pandora's box of Fleischer, Zollner and Pate. May god have mercy on us all...

[JSett]

I don't believe a more "resonant" unplugged sound has much effect on the plugged-in sound. If the body of the instrument is vibrating that's just energy bring taken out of the strings. Is there any evidence that that produces "better" tone?

I don't think it affects the amplified sound much but I'm sure a lot of us here, myself included, spend a lot of time playing our guitars unplugged, in which case you would enjoy it less if it was more 'dead' than it used to be pre-shim.

I think the concept of the different resonance and tone between two different types of shim is probably a silly thing to be micro-focused on. There's a zillion other things that will affect those factors that are probably more important.

I agree, it's a minor thing, but if it affects ones enjoyment of their instrument then it can feel like a big issue. People care what their nut is carved from, and if the saddles in their Tele are brass or steel, etc.

Like I said, I just hadn't heard anyone talk about this before so I thought it would be worth sharing and discussing. I'll forever use a slice of playing card or a pick to do it if I ever need to, it's done me fine for a few decades.