How often do you check and/or adjust the relief of your guitar's neck?
It seems with the constant changing temperature, barometric pressure and humidity, I could adjust the necks on my guitars daily at times.
How often do you check and/or adjust the relief of your guitar's neck?
It seems with the constant changing temperature, barometric pressure and humidity, I could adjust the necks on my guitars daily at times.
I hate necks that move so much. My guitars are stable enough to last 6 mos., so twice a year. That seems reasonable enough to me, once when everything dries out in the winter, and once after the humidity hits late spring or early summer. Some hardly need anything even at that. I have guitars that show little change over the course of a year. Sometimes I find one that seems to need setting up everytime I pick it up. When I get one, I sell it.
A friend in need is a good reason to screen your calls.
Winter and summer I have to adjust my necks. They get straighter in the winter.
I check them all the time, but don't have to adjust them more than twice a year.
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When I change strings seems to be a good time. at least check it over.
I check them when the guitar just doesn't seem to play right. Usually twice a year. Some guitars need truss rod adjustments a lot less often though.
My MIM Jazz Bass needed a truss rod adjustment for the first time ever this summer. I've had it for 4 or 5 years!
When I first built my USACG T-Style it needed large adjustments often. It worried me a bit. Not that it's 2 years old I hardly ever need to touch it.
Really depends on the instrument and where you are in the wide world of temp/humidity fluctuation. Interestingly, however, my old 73 Strat never needed touching in all the years I owned it, same with my 89 PRS bolt on; my LP Standard, on the other hand, was a pig of a guitar in weather, needing a lot of attention....maybe there is something about bolt-ons compared to set necks when dealing with temp/humidity....I couldn't say for sure as my "population" of instruments is too small to draw any conclusions from. At the moment, I'm dealing with a Korean made PRS that behaves a little like my old LP.... it tends to change in weather, though ever so slightly. It's a strange, weathery world....Originally Posted by DoobieK
Tenebrae
The difference is more maple (less movement) versus mahogany (more movement). Open grained woods tend to move more than tight grained woods.
Although, I had a special run Strat that was absolutley the worst I've ever owned. Seems like I had to tweak it every time I changed strings, which was quite often at the time, like every 2 shows. Out it went.
A friend in need is a good reason to screen your calls.
Hmm, interesting. My Gibsons dont seem to change. I've had my ES345 about 13 years and only adjusted the truss rod when I changed string guages. My Strats move just a bit in winter, more this year, but we had more rain than usual. Overall the humidity levels in So Cal are pretty consistent so guitars here probably dont need as much seasonal tweaking.
Yeah, there's no real accounting. MY LP moved a lot, and several times when the weather changed this year. I was about ready to put it on the market but it's settled in now, so we'll see what happens this fall. On the other hand, my ES 135 is as solid as the Rock of Gibralter.
A friend in need is a good reason to screen your calls.
Maybe I'm lucky, but very few of my guitars require even seasonal adjustment.
Several guitars in different colors
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I don't check them at all.
If I notice a problem while playing, I look into it.
Mostly, my guitars are well behaved. So when one needs some tweaking, I take it to an expert.
I had one guitar whose neck moved a lot. In addition to an inital setup, I found myself messing with that one all the time, to no avail.
My Guild Bluesbird is getting its first service in 3 or 4 years. A wee bit of fret-out around the 12th.
My Schecter hasn't needed any attention since I reassembled it 4 years ago.
Basically, I don't look for things to fix.
(FWIW-I live about 100 yds from Long Island Sound.)
"Well, I used to be disgusted, now I try to be amused..."
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The Strat I mentioned was a problem. Fretting out or a sudden high action always indicated a problem. The LP went from smooth and beautiful to BzzzBzzzBzzz. I will check neck relief twice a year. If it's still in an acceptable range, then I do nothing else.
If you like a higher action, odds are you'll not notice it as much or the guitar won't give the indications as readily with nominal movement. My LP is set at slighty under 2/64ths at the 1st string/12th fret, so it doesn't take a lot of moving to make it buzz.
A friend in need is a good reason to screen your calls.
Less than .8mm! Fantastic....that' so low, it's underground, man! :)
Tenebrae
2/64ths at the 12th fret?!?!?!
I like my action almost that high at the 1st fret!:)
I set all my guitars action at .020-.024 @ th 1st fret, 5/64 to 6/64 at the 12th fret with .010-.012 relief.
I had my Les Paul's frets dressed. It came back with the neck dead straight an the action way down low. It played like a dream until I tried to bend and my fingertips went skating across the strings!
I learned to be careful what I wish for and set the action back up high and put the bow back in the neck.
2/64ths isn't that bad considering gibson recomends 3/64ths for the 1st string 12th fret. Infact i think im gona try lowering mine to that !
Well I had a '95 PRS Bolt on that needed an adjustment once in 5 years of owning it. I guess I was spoiled. I have 2 maple neck Teles, 2 McCarty's and a Gibson ES-135. The ES-135 rarely needs adjustment. The rest all change about the same. All but one of the Teles are 1998 or older, so they SHOULD have settled in by now. Maybe I just expect too little movement in my guitar necks.
Thanks for all of your comments.
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