Inspired by the seemingly endless barrage of questions from newbie guitarists on Facebook groups such as pinoy Pedalboards, that I force myself to answer regularly.
Electrified guitar being a highly technology-driven field, it is often expected of any self-respecting guitar player, hobbyist or otherwise, to have basic servicing skills (restringing, action and intonation adjustment, neck relief, etc.) as well as a certain degree of comprehension as to what makes our beloved equipment "tick."
Very few people are willing to show such a "geeky" side to their personality for fear of rejection or alienation, even among other players. This thread, then, is your chance to do so freely.
Let me start.
If I were to rank myself on a scale from 0 to 10, I'd give myself a solid 8.
Reasons:
I am capable of the above-mentioned basic servicing skills, save for processes requiring the experience and tools of a proper guitar tech or luthier (refret, fret level, building from scratch, etc.). I have lost hours of my life reading and learning about the physics behind the guitar's pickups and controls, as well as analog effects and amplifier circuits, all in the name of penny pinching ("if you knew how to fix guitars and build effects yourself, you'd save a lot of money!" ...or so my parents think lol). I have yet to build my own amplifier from scratch, but time and budget permitting, I'd like to try it out soon enough (main issues are sourcing the correct transformers and chassis).
Thanks to the information I've accumulated over time, I've turned my hobby into an informal business, with some friends commissioning to build certain effects that otherwise would be inexistent, or priced too high to be accessible. As mentioned above, I also dedicate a bit of my personal time answering beginners' questions, always trying my best to communicate the fundamental principles of electric guitar operation in the simplest possible way.
My reason for not giving myself full marks is that I am still agnostic as to what makes a guitar sound good. At least according to Physics-oriented luthiers like Gelvin Guitars, wood species don't really change the sound of a guitar, because wood by nature is very inconsistent from sample to sample. On the other hand, so many musicians I respect are proponents of tone wood, so I am not keen on dismissing their opinions completely.
I'd love to hear your "guitar geek" story.