Jerzy Drozd CAD program

[thatbassist863]

What's going on everyone? I've seen that the luthier Jerzy Drozd has a CAD program that helps with designing bass guitars. Does anyone have any experiences with the program? I've been very interested in building basses but my drawing skills are lackluster at best, lol. I wanted to get opinions on the program. I want to get some designs together and maybe present them to some luthiers about possible construction cause I don't have the equipment to build it myself. Unless anyone has ways of getting started that might help.

Thanks in advance for any help or ideas.

[Macrocosmcwh]

Hey there... Just thought I would chime in. I am having a bass made by Andy Zoldos from here at TalkBass.com myself. Just thought I would share some of what I have experienced.

The Luthiers here on TalkBass are not only great guys, they are EXTREMELY GIFTED. My suggestion is to search around on here and find a builder that you like their work and TALK WITH THEM. They are all artists and all building from their hearts. I just don't think that you need a CAD program to go to them and have your dream bass built. It is a collaboration between you and them.

With Andy, he asked me many questions about me, who I was, what kind of style I played. I sent him pictures of what I thought was beautiful in basses. He came up with an initial design and we went back and forth a few times and came up with a good design that we were both happy with. Truly, at the end of the day, the core of my bass is Andy... I respect his design and work and him as a person.

Best of luck to you!
So IMHO.... find a builder you respect, like, trust and get going. I just don't think you need CAD to get it done and be thrilled!

On a side note, Andy is a self-proclaimed tech-dinosaur, he did not use any CAD to build my bass.

[roberthabraken]

If you mean the Bass Guitar Designer's Toolkit: it's not a CAD program, but a library of reusable shapes for all parts one needs to design a bass.

You need to have (or obtain) at least some skill in one of the supported CAD programs to use the library.

The outcome would be a collage of ready made parts, that you can call your own design. If you are a more advanced user you can reshape certain parts to indeed create a new design.

You can also restrict yourself to only using things like string spacing and nuts to help designing the rest of the bass yourself, without having to figure out everything yourself.

Originally Posted by Macrocosmcwh

(..)

So IMHO.... find a builder you respect, like, trust and get going. I just don't think you need CAD to get it done and be thrilled!

(...)

I may have misread, but I think the OP wants to build basses himself and needs a design to start with, rather than wanting to design a bass that will be build by another luthier.

[HaMMerHeD]

^ Rob, the way it is written suggests that he wants to design it himself and then hand it off to a luthier to have it built.

Having a library of pre-drawn parts is convenient, at any rate, to help make sure headstocks properly occlude the backside of the tuners, pickup routes are properly sized, and bridges don't hang off the end.

I use eMachineShop to start all my designs, and then Dassault Systeme's DraftSight for finalizing the drawings of anything I need to have machined.

Both are free. eMachineShop is very crashy and buggy, but is so easy to use and design with, I have a hard time putting it down. It can also import and export DXF drawings. DraftSight is a much better program, but is more like a traditional CAD program, and so is more complicated to use. It isn't as much fun, to me.

[thatbassist863]

I'd like to be able to build the bass that want to design myself but don't have the equipment to do so. That's why I was going to present it to a luthier that already has the equipment and, well, the experience too. Unless someone knows of a luthier that is willing to take on an apprentice or take a chance with someone that has the desire to learn the craft so that I can gain the experience.

I'll checkout the programs that were mentioned as well.

[pilotjones]

There's a thread about the Jersey Drozd program that you should be able to search up.