The Wolf Terminator History

The WOLF TERMINATOR is the creation of Hideo Kamimoto, a luthier in the San Francisco Bay Area (more specifically  San Jose-Silicon Valley, California). Hideo began his career in lutherie as an apprentice in both guitar and violin shops in the late 1950’s, established his string instrument shop in Oakland in 1967, and continued to repair string instruments in San Jose until his retirement in 2004. Along the way he has authored two books on guitar repair, instructed classes in guitar repair and consulted for guitar and violin companies in China.

Over the years as part of his work repairing string instruments, Hideo had always been intrigued (maybe frustrated?) by the problem of wolf notes and the difficulties of eliminating wolfs from cellos in a consistent and predictable manner. At the urging of one of his employees, he took on the challenge of developing a more effective wolf eliminator. The early prototypes were inconsistent – sometimes successful and sometimes not – and unreliable.  It took the freedom of retirement, together with a thorough reading of the available scientific literature on wolf notes, to allow him to devote sufficient time to develop and refine the WOLF TERMINATOR.

Looking for new challenges, Hideo turned his attention to the problem of the “dead spot” on many electric basses. By applying the technology behind the Wolf Terminator toward the unwanted neck resonance problems in the electric bass, he has designed an  effective and easy to use solution.  The Dead Spot Terminator (DST) will be coming soon!

When Hideo is not in his workshop crafting the WOLF TERMINATOR, he plays double bass with the Aurora Mandolin Orchestra and continues his research on controlling wolf notes in string instruments.