9 Powerful Reasons to Use Templates for Building Cigar Box Guitars

Wouldn't it be great to remove mistakes from building cigar box guitars?

Mistakes are frustrating, and no matter how hard you try, you'll eventually drill an errant hole, or cut a fret slot in the wrong location.

Stop struggling with measurements and the need to double or triple check them for every build. Instead, use a template to transfer the marks you want and dramatically improve your workshop efficiency.

Templates are vital to producing consistent and satisfying results on your cigar box guitars (CBGs).

And those consistent results are critical to long, fulfilling building experiences.

If that's not motivation enough, here are 9 powerful reasons why you should use templates for building cigar box guitars.

1. Ensure playable, well-designed CBGs

Templates produce hassle-free results. Consider mapping fret lines on your necks; as opposed to measuring fret positions by hand, templates ensure you efficiently mark the right locations. There's nothing more frustrating than playing sour notes with misplaced frets on a guitar you've built. Templates ensure playable, well-designed CBGs.

2. Focus on what's really important

Don't waste your time with tedious measurements, struggling with fret lines, or the mundane task of marking the box for neck-notching. Use templates to focus on the core elements of a well-built CBG.

3. Most productive methods

Templates give you known, desired results. You don't have to make your own mistakes and hope you learn from them. C. B. Gitty templates are created through years of trial and error and plenty of feedback, providing you with the tools necessary to see your vision through.

4. Speed up design creation

It's easy to visualize what you want on your CBG. It's much more challenging to bring that vision to life. Imagine having a set of soundhole templates on hand that you can mix and match on the box top, determining what looks and fits best. Templates remove the "What if?" and reveal what's possible.

5. Reduce work time

Finding a design you like with templates is easy enough. Modifying your design is made a breeze, too. For example, a series of custom headstock templates in various eye-catching styles allow you to change the look and feel of your guitars on the fly, without painful trial and error.

6. Provide consistency and uniformity

Especially if you're building to sell a standard model guitar, templates are essential. Say you hit on a design you love and want to produce again and again. Templates remove the pain of producing the same impressive results every time you build.

7. Ignite creativity

Seeing what you can accomplish by using templates opens the door to more excellent designs. By removing the fuss over details, your creative juices flow and new ideas will come to mind. Inspired by proven template designs, you'll have "A-ha!" moments that trigger new ideas, new guitars, and better experiences.

8. Easy to use

What could be easier than lining-up your template on a box or neck and transferring the lines? There's no fuss when using C. B. Gitty templates. Take, for instance, our pickup routing templates. There's no need to struggle with getting the right measurements and ensuring they are centered on your box. Instead, use a template to get the perfect pickup cut-out in the exact spot you want, every time.

9. Small cost / Huge results

Templates are inexpensive upfront investments with enormous returns. Each template can last a lifetime, making the templates overall value skyrocket after only a couple of uses.

With all those reasons, it's hard to justify not having templates in your workshop.