Frequently Asked Questions

Yes they do. The damage from low humidity is more rapid and more apparent on acoustic guitars, but all guitars need to be kept at or near 50% relative humidity year round. If you’ve ever felt sharp fret wire ends on the neck of your electric guitar in the winter, that is a sign that it’s too dry.

There are locations that don’t need humidity control. They are constantly close enough to 50% relative humidity that guitars will have no issues, but that’s not the case in most locations. To find out what the humidity range is like in your area, click . Most locations in the U.S. need humidification at some point during the year. States, such as Florida, along with other Southern states may need dehumidification due to the high levels of relative humidity. Northern states may also need it if in the summer you live with the windows open, or are near large bodies of water like the ocean or Great Lakes.
In addition, your air conditioning and heating will impact the humidity level in your home.  The best way to check is to get a humidistat and check your relative humidity at home.  They are inexpensive and small enough to fit in a guitar case. 

Whole house humidifiers are great at making you comfortable, but unless you’re installing a commercial humidification system, they don’t get anywhere near 50% relative humidity in the winter.

No, your guitars and other instruments will be safe in any of our cabinets( i.e. Guitar Habitat^® Nashville™,Guitar Habitat^®, Guitar Estates™, String Habitat™, etc.). The exterior and interior wood finish of each of our cabinets is finished with a nitrocellulose lacquer, similar to the finish used by top luthiers. Any of the materials that will come into contact with you guitar or other instruments are either solid wood, cork, or leather, none of which will harm the finish. In addition, alll materials, including the leather and cork in our cabinets, have been tested and approved by the Quality Control Department at C.F. Martin & Co. Martin Tested and Martin Approved.

We’d be happy to ship a cabinet to you outside the “lower 48” in the U.S. including Canada. Our experience is that international shipping can be expensive, and you’ll typically have to pay fees (duty, sales taxes, brokers fees, etc.) when the cabinet arrives in your country. Most of the cabinets too large to ship via DHL, FedEx or UPS. If you are interested in buying a cabinet and shipping it overseas, please contact us and we’ll get a shipping quote, and typically a Web site where you can check on your home country fees for clearing customs.

It depends on your location, the size of the cabinet, and the level of delivery service you’d like to have. Cabinets are too big to ship via UPS, DHL or FedEx. We crate all cabinets that are shipped via a freight company. We’ve had damaged cabinets from those that only blanket wrap the cabinets, and have had no problems with our crated cabinets getting to you. We charge for the crate and pallet construction, and we custom build them ourselves specifically for your cabinet. Crating charges run from $125 to $250, but may be more for some custom cabinets. The freight company typically charges from $850‑1250 per cabinet in the lower 48 states in the US, around major metropolitan areas, but if you live in a remote area delivery charges may go up.
We can’t get a firm quote on shipping until we’re with 30 days of scheduling the shipment. At the time you order, we’ll do the best we can to give you an estimate that is roughly what it will cost.
All that said, if you live to our shop in Perkasie, Pennsylvania, you are more than welcome to swing by and pick it up when it is ready. All we ask is that you provide your own transportation that is adequate to fit the size of your cabinet.

Yes, we love custom! While we’ve developed standard cabinet sizes, we also understand that not houses are created equal. If you’d like to have something designer, please contact us. All custom cabinets include a modest design fee that will be applied against your order if you move forward with your purchase.

Building a cabinet any larger than 63″ wide creates some serious challenges for delivery and installation. Even at 63″ wide, it’s not always possible to put one of our big cabinets on a second floor or in a basement due to clearance issues around staircases. We have a modular cabinets that hold approximately 5 guitars per section and we can build as many sections as you need. Please contact us if this is you!

It depends on the size of the cabinet, the size of the humidifier, and the ambient humidity in your home. The Nashville and Small cabinets with smaller humidifiers need to be refilled about once every two to three weeks. The larger cabinets (or small cabinet with 1 gallon humidifier upgrade) will need to be refilled about every six to eight weeks.

The only maintenance required is to empty the water in the reservoir in the spring and replace the wick if needed (they often go for several years between replacements). It should take about five minutes a year to keep your humidifier maintained properly.

Distilled water is recommended, or with auto-fill humidifiers use a reverse osmosis water filter on your water line. Other than that, simply put in a few drops of bacteriostat in the water and it will remain clean and clear and prolong the life of your humidification wick. Need a new wick? Buy one here!

Generally guitars are comfortable at the same temperatures you are, so from 60 degrees to 80 degrees you don’t need to worry.  The “ideal setting” is 45% relative humidity at 70 degrees.  Cold air holds less water suspended in the air than warm air, so if your room is at 60 degrees, you might want to increase the relative humidity to around 48%, and if you’re at 80 degrees, drop it to around 42%.
We strongly recommend that you do not keep your guitars, or your Guitar Habitat® in a hot room without air conditioning in the summer, or a cold room with no heat in the winter.

No, our equipment is designed specifically to fit in the available space in our cabinet, and we don’t sell them separately. We also highly advise against converting normal furniture or building your own cabinet. We’ve taken the time to research and develop our Guitar Habitats® to withstand the changes in relative humidity inside and outside of the cabinet. Each of our cabinets employs our patented Horneff non-warp door(s) and takes into account the expansion and contraction that naturally occurs in solid wood construction.

The lead-time between when you place your order to when you receive your cabinet will vary based on the size of your cabinet, our current backlog, etc. That being said, we typically see lead times between 4 to 6 months from when your order is placed. If you require something a little sooner, please don’t hesitate to call us.