Thread: A new source for wedges.

I just had a great discovery. Having played guitars and other stringed instruments for over 40 years, I have amassed a huge collection of guitar picks in every thickness, material and color imaginable. These things make great wedges. I found many that were real tortoise, bone, ebony, kevlar, nylon, plastic, you name it and it is probably in my box. If not, they are cheap to acquire and often free. Just thought I would share my enlightenment.

Kind of thin for a wedge aren't they ? Great idea though.

Some picks are actually quite thick. For playing bass I had a 3 mm thick pick.

Actually, you can get them in some rather thick guages. Many of mine are thicker than any wedge that I have encountered and most are about the same thickness as the Dovo wedges purchased online for 2.98 plus shipping for one. A comparable sized pick would run around .35 cents each.

Just wondering what tools you use to cut the material. I use clayton 1.2 mms and just started messing around with a worn one, so far I am finding a single edged DE blade to give me the best/easiest results, that is less cutting and no sanding smooth, just clean it up around the edges with the blade.

So far I have used a small file to shape the pick. I'm sure that some of the medium gauge nylon picks be shaped with a blade or exacto knife. I believe the one I used was a ProPlec, brown and very stiff and hard.

And now I am asking myself why in the heck did I not think to pull out the files? Just read your response and tried it, the file is working even better! lol. Thanks for coming up with this idea to use picks, its really awsome.

I had no idea they were available is such a range of materials. I'll have to investigate now, as it sounds like a great idea for some exotic wedges!

It does not take long to shape a pick either. I did three or four while watching TV last night just using a metal finger nail file. I've pulled out some blues, yellows, gold, red, purple, green and light browns for the next set. I'm just bringing them down to match the shape and profile of the Dovo wedges I purchased on line. I'll save the fine tuning for when I decide whats going where. I have a few worn thick picks in camel bone, buffalo horn, ebony and real tortoise. I think they will be the cat's meow! My next project is a faux straight razor to be used as a trainer. The blade and scales will be cut from some thin bass wood then sealed. It won't cut a hair but you could get a lot of safe practice in scrapping lather off and build some muscle memory before you put the steel to the skin. It's amasing what you can come up with as you get older and have nothing else to do!

A wooden razor will give you a bit of a feel for handling a blade, but won't help much with learning pressure & effective angles & it'd be hilarious if you ended up with a nasty case of splinters!