Top Tips for Making your New Guitar Better

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Learn how to re-string your new guitar, adjust pickup heights and clean those oxidized frets with The Captain & Danish Pete's top guitar maintenance tips! Perfect for beginners and seasoned guitarists alike, get your brand new guitar playing perfectly with these easy-to-follow and inexpensive maintenance tips.

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⏰ Timestamps ⏰
» 0:00 Why You Should Adjust Your New Guitar?
» 2:09 How To Adjust The Neck
» 7:04 Re-String & Fretboard Maintenence
» 10:19 Cleaning Your Frets
» 12:10 Cleaning Your Fretboard
» 14:50 Adjusting the Nut
» 16:00 Changing Your Neck Plate
» 18:22 Re-string Tips
» 22:30 Adjusting Your Stratocaster Bridge & Tremolo System
» 28:16 Adjusting The Pickup Height
» 30:45 How Does It Sound Now?

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#Andertons #Guitarmaintenance #ElectricGuitar

[parksed]

Pete handling that camera like a dad on vacation 😂

[dubster]

First point. Get the old strings off, polish the frets and condition the board, then install new strings (stretched, see point 7 below). There is no point setting action, relief or intonation with old strings, ESPECIALLY if you're going to change the gauge of the strings. (Also, if you want to roughly know what your non bound fretboard will look like before you condition it, just look at the edge under the clear coat, because it's not going to get any darker than that, unless you artificially darken it, but then that bit under the clear coat will then be lighter, and will look silly.)

Second. If you want to float your trem, set it like you would a Floyd. Fit a packer under the back of the bridge plate (your rear cavity cover would do, or something thinner) using the trem arm to move the bridge. Tighten the springs to pull the bridge against the packer. Tune to pitch. Remove the packer again using the trem arm. The bridge will pull tight to the body and the guitar tuning will be pitched high. Loosen the springs until the guitar is in tune. The bridge should now be pretty much where it was with the packer, this is because you have equalised the tension of the springs with the tension of the strings at the position they were at when strings were tuned when the bridge was packed.

Third. Visually looking down the fret board really isn't good enough to set relief, fret the E strings at the first and last frets (use your left hand for the first fret, you right thumb for the last fret, then reach your right middle finger as far you can up the fretboard, around the 7-8th fret to check the gap between the string and the fret wire if there is one. No gap, it needs relief - loosen the truss rod, big gap it needs straightened - tighten the truss rod, righty tighty - lefty loosey (looking towards the bridge from headstock). Fine tune to set your playing. Some people will set this to a measurement but it's subjective, some will prefer a bigger gap, some less, but there should always be some gap, we're talking paper thickness here, but experiment. Just turn the truss rod ⅛ of a turn and check each time, it doesn't take a lot.

Fourth, once the trem is set and the relief is set THEN set the action BECAUSE - adjusting the angle of the bridge and changing the relief can affect the action, changing the action doesn't affect the angle of the trem or the relief.

Fifth, intonate the guitar. Without carrying out the intonation everything you fret may sound out if tune which will be frustrating. Intonation is the process of adjusting the length of each string at the saddle relative to its thickness. Thicker strings need to be longer than thinner strings. *Think "long Bass guitars have thick strings, short Ukulele's have thin strings". The process is essentially a calibration to ensure that each fret plays the correct note to pitch along the entire length of the board. This is generally done by tuning the open string, then play the 12th fret of that string. It should be the same note as the open string but it will probably be sharp or flat. Move the saddle to 'chase the needle' on the tuner i.e if the note is sharp, the needle on the tuner is to the right of centre. Move your saddle to the right from playing perspective (away from the neck) and vice versa. Once you adjust a saddle, the open string needs tuned again. Tune the open, then the check the 12th and continue to adjust until the open string and the 12th fret are both in tune. Do this for every string. It can be long and annoying to do but you don't have to do this every time you change strings (though you probably should), but definitely if you change string guage size.

Sixth, always tune your guitar in playing orientation, never on its back or on a cradle. Different forces are acting on the neck when the guitar is on its back which will affect the tuning.

Seventh. Stretch new strings. You don't really want to stretch just a bit at each end, you want to stretch the entire string. Now, you don't need to stretch strings, but it's recommended. They're going to stretch anyway and as they do they'll constantly need tuned. Stretching them just makes them more stable. If you take Danish Pete's point about getting dirt in the strings whilst you do it, well you can clean the strings after like you should after each time you play it. Unless you plan on never touching the strings, they're going to get dirty... But it's a point, always wash your hands before playing or working on your guitar strings. You can also buy a small plastic device that allows you to stretch strings without actually touching them, you'll see it in an old Rob Chapman video where he's restringing a bunch of guitars, but I've never used one. Alternatively, two ways to stretch the strings without actually touching them at all - if you've a floating trem, just pull up on the bar a bunch, that'll stretch them. If not you can also just tune them up a bit higher than you would normally initially, then loosen them back off again and tune to pitch. Voilà

[Broxty]

My boy is desperately wanting to play guitar... I got a great deal on a bundle with this guitar, I really want him to have the best experience while on my budget. With that said, thank you so much for this. Not everyone can afford a truly nice guitar, and these changes can help lower budget players. A+ boys.

[jcout]

Little tip for the Nut Sauce. It's actually recommended that you put it on after you restring it. Once fully strung, detune enough to pull the string out of the nut slot and apply (even less than you did). This is because if you apply before you restring, as you tighten the string, the string itself pulls the nut sauce out of the nut and leaves it on the string. I'm not saying it still wouldn't work, that's just what the manufacturer recommends.

[ebbablom]

Hot tip: if you don't have access to nut sauce, you can use pencil lead, since graphite is also a lubricant. Just "draw" across the nut lengthwise so the graphite dust falls into the slots. Of course this means you gotta clean up the nut afterwards, but that's easy enough.

[nero]

Used to be a time where Music Stores set up a guitar they were selling...

[nikeisagreekgoddess]

This video felt like a good old neighbor taking some time off his day to show a kid from next door how to get a job done. It was very endearing watching you do this. Somewhat fatherly.

[TenFalconsMusic]

"I'm not a guitar technician" Then proves it by putting the guitar face down on top of the tremolo bar. Genius😂👍

[jameslewis]

Cool little guide for the layman. Something that was missed here was that when you change a string guage you will often need to reset the intonation (the distance between the nut and the string saddle) for each string (this may be more noticeable on a bass). One other small thing that I would add is that when you change the bridge from flat to floating you do end up raising the string height and the intonation slightly so I would recommend doing intonation checks / adjustments and string height adjustments after sorting out the trem.

[DanielH]

Quick Tip with the full-frame Sony:
Close the aperture so you get a deeper field that's in focus.
(Owning the same lens and struggled with the focus in the beginning also)

[EarlMiller]

Should also warn people about fret dressing and metal shavings/dust from sandpaper near your pickups. Blue tape over the pickups and wipe everything down before removing it.

[bustercrack]

Decided to give this a go on my Kramer Night Swan. I bought it 18 months ago and have struggled to fall in love with it . I have restrung it with Super Slinky 9’s, polished the frets, oiled the fingerboard and even tweaked the truss rod. Much more happy with the guitar now. Polishing the frets is going to be something I do whenever I change strings going forward. Bought a kit for £6 and it will do at least two polishes minimum.

[SpecialReserve]

My £500 guitar was set up from the store before shipping, as part of the buying experience. I was highly delighted when I received it. New strings, in tune, frets polished and intonated. Going that extra mile makes for return sales.

[TurnDownForWork]

I am a firm believer in Big Bends Nut Sauce, that stuff saved my old Epiphone SG from awful tuning instability. Also, I've always used #0000 steel wool for polishing my frets because it's a lot easier to find than the polishing pads/erasers where I live.

[MrSongwriter]

@andertons one tip on most guitars is if the machine heads are the kind held on with a nut on the headstock always get the correct size spanner and tighten them up as often they are just finger tight and it helps eliminate tuning issues if they are tightened properly so they can’t move

[Judas_]

I alway find these guitar setup for beginners videos calming and relaxing. Now this one is my most favorite.

[daggercatz]

I like how even tho they are a company who want to sell their products they still talk about the problems of the products and even tell you how to fix it.

[david_cummings]

An extra tip. Use the sandpaper you used for the fret polish and polish the bridge saddles where the strings pass over. Add a dab of nut sauce there as well. The saddles are another critical friction point that should be addressed. Especially on a floating trem

[hellraizer]

A before and after demonstration through the amp would have been awesome!

[raleighdentcompany]

One important thing left out was intonation.