http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum This is the place to ask your questions about guitar maintenance and basic guitar repairs. en Sat, 21 Nov 2009 02:06:16 GMT vBulletin 60 http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/proweb/misc/rss.jpg http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24864-sad-sight/ Mon, 16 Nov 2009 19:53:55 GMT Last weekend I wandered into the local tender centre to see what guitars they had.
There in a case was an Admira classical which had been fitted with steel strings. The soundboard was badly buckled and the bridge is now held down by two bolts and nuts, which incidentally don't match. Apart from that it only showed signs of much playing.
Sad to see any instrument destroyed by ignorance.
And no, I don't think a restoration would ever happen for this one.
The case wasn't bad though ..... ]]> Guitar Tech karcey http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24864-sad-sight/ http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24815-wiring-question/ Tue, 10 Nov 2009 02:17:18 GMT I'm a Gibson sort of guy... If it's a problem on there, you can bet I can fix it. Lately, I've been using an off-brand Strat my uncle is letting me borrow. Now, all of a sudden, whenever I plug it into the preamp, then the amp, it emits a buzzing (tonal, however) sound, and I can't hear anything I play. It's like the pickups are not even there. I do the obligatory check of the cord and amp, and neither is the problem. I move around the switch, and all that gets me is a slightly different tone and a pause. Then I look into the output jack. It looks fine. I sigh at the thought of taking off my whole faceplate... -_-.
Anyway, once I get it all off, I check out the wiring. Bridge, middle, and neck pickups look soldered and connected to the pots just fine. No problem there. Just out of suspicion, I double check the OJ to see if I missed anything. Now that you understand my problem, here is my question.

Is there supposed to be only one wire going from the jack into the rest of the wiring? If so, can anyone tell me what's wrong? That doesn't seem right to me, but it is a different kind of setup than I'm used to and I don't want to mess up anything I didn't have to replace.

This is keeping me from getting that full-length out. :[ ]]> Guitar Tech NyarlathotepChris http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24815-wiring-question/ http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24800-dead-pickup-jackson-warrior/ Sun, 08 Nov 2009 19:31:52 GMT After replacing the volume pot, I noticed that the neck pickup lost nearly all output. I didn't touch any of the selector switch wiring, so what could be causing this? Could it be a bad selector switch that just happened to have gone bad exactly when I replaced the pot? That doesn't seem likely, so I'm confused.

Thanks ]]> Guitar Tech 6and12bothcool http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24800-dead-pickup-jackson-warrior/ http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24791-gibson-es-175-buzzing-problem/ Sat, 07 Nov 2009 03:52:31 GMT I recently purchased a new Gibson ES-175 from my local music store, Alto Music. It's a dual humbucker gold hardware beauty. When I took it home and plugged it in after playing it in the store for quite some time, I soon noticed a strange buzzing that appeared to be coming either from the bridge or inside the body near or in between the pickups, definitely not fret buzz. Somehow I didn't hear it in the store. Though slightly present with single note picking, chords, especially muddier ones that cause more vibration naturally made the buzzing louder and last longer (maybe 1.5-2.5 seconds). It also seemed to be present both amplified and acoustically, though I'm quite certain it's not the pickups themselves. My best guesses were either the pickup springs buzzing against their screws or simply a loose wire inside the body making contact with the top of the body. So I took it in and had them attempt to diagnose it while getting a setup done, moving up from the factory installed 10s to the Daddario jazz medium set (11-56). When I came to pick it up, I checked it out in the store before just walking off with it. It's a good thing I did. With the new setup, the guitar played like a dream, but the buzzing was the same as it had been when I dropped it off. I talked with the tech, and he said he'd taken out the pickups and checked them, checked the springs (I think he installed new springs, not sure though) yet he hadn't found the problem. However, he had to ask me if the buzzing was coming through the amplifier. Isn't that his job, to test it through an amp?? DUH. Then he told me that "It's a jazz box, they're gonna buzz," which I don't buy at all. We're talking about a $2600 guitar here. Do you think Joe Pass or Pat Metheny dealt with buzzing in their ES-175s? Listen for yourselves. So I left it there and both the head of the guitar department there and the tech said they'd look it over more. The guitar department guy gives me a call later that night with no solution. He said they'd swapped out the bridge, he'd played it for about and hour trying to figure it out, but no luck. He said that the Steve Howe ES-175 they had there (which I had played before making this purchase) also buzzes, and again insisted that it's simply the nature of the instrument. To get a new one shipped to Also Music, he said it would be around 60 days because they're on back order. That's way too long for me because I have multiple concerts and auditions coming up in a few weeks. So I'm going back possibly tomorrow to see what I want to do about this mess, but I want some more opinions on this matter before I do. Is it truly in the nature of archtops or ES-175s more specifically to buzz in the body, or is there simply a stupid wire just hanging loose vibrating against the top that got past Gibson quality control? (By the way, sorry for the long post, I appreciate your reading it.) ]]> Guitar Tech BillC15 http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/forum/guitar-tech/24791-gibson-es-175-buzzing-problem/