Monday, April 28, 2014

How to add veneer to a guitar?




Joshua


I have two solid blocks of wood for the body (which is what I'll begin tomorrow) and I don't know if I should apply the veneer at the very beginning. I still need to cut the body's shape out of the blocks and the route the holes for the pickups and wires, etc. so it seems like it would be a lot easier to just glue the veneer first. If I do, then I can treat the veneer and the wood blocks as one single entity and cut each hole a single time. If I don't, then I'll have to cut the holes out of the body and then replicate these holes on the veneer sheets. All the guitar making videos apply the veneer second, but it seems like this might be more efficient?


Answer
I've done a lot of work with veneers in the furniture industry, and in my opinion, it would be too easy to damage when doing the bulk of the work on the body. I would build the body, do the necessary work on it, including any large holes/cavities, then apply the veneer, trim it out around the body and any pockets already installed.... then at the very last, I'd do any tiny hole drilling, being very careful not to gouge the veneer.

Good Luck



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Sunday, April 13, 2014

Can I fix a stripped volume knob on a guitar?




fredgarvin


The knob turns and turns but it's not catching, hence I cant turn the guitar up. Its got no volume at all. Can I take off the back of the guitar and fix it myself or should I take it to a pro?


Answer
The knob is stripped on the inside. I doubt it's the spindle that goes from the inside to fit the on the knob it is connected to. They are made of steel. The plastic knob has been stripped and just turns so you need to find out what the spindle looks like. Slide the knob off by pulling straight out. Usually the spindle looks like a half round with a flat side. You need to find a knob that will fit it. There are a lot on ebay. They are pretty standard. There are two types. One fits into the hole and one stays outside the hole. Get the one that matches the knob you have. It does not need to be exactly the same it just needs to have the same notch for the knob. They are pretty standard.
P.S. I have used a trick that sometimes works. Take a wooden match and break it off to fit into the hole in the knob and break it so it won't stick out. then slide the knob on with the match in it and it may take up the extra space so the know will turn again. Also you could take the knob off and use needle nose pliers to turn the spindle instead of a knob.



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Friday, April 11, 2014

What Guitar Lessons Video (maybe for beginners) would you recommend?




gunsnrocke





Answer
I would recommend Rock Guitar steps 1 and 2 distributed by Warner Brothers home video. The teacher is a guy named Nick Nolan. I believe these two videos will teach you more than months worth of lessons from an instructor. I've seen a good bit of videos and I thought the Rock Guitar series were some of the best. Just go to amazon.com and you can find them there on DVD or VHS. GOOD LUCK !



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Thursday, April 10, 2014

Is there more than one guitar for Guitar Hero?




Jackie


My son purchased a GH guitar at a garage sale (w/o the game) and then purchased the game at Game Stop, but the guitar doesn't work (lights are on). I'm just wondering if the guitar is broken or if this guitar only works work certain version of Guitar Hero? Any suggestions?


Answer
if i remember right,rockband guitars dont work for guitar hero so that might be the problem



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Friday, April 4, 2014

What kind of electric guitar pickups are best for me?




Z


The second paragraph is my question, the first will be the situation; you can disregard the first half of this question if you don't need that much information.

I've played guitar a little over a year. Though I'm by no means great, I plan on starting lessons in the next few weeks (I've learned everything from time signatures to vibratos to scales to chords to hammer-ons/pull-offs, the circle of fifths, even a few licks on my own). I hope my lessons will take me a little higher in my guitar as I'd like to perform in front of family and friends before 2015. I have 5 guitars; 1 acoustic, 1 acoustic-electric, and 3 electrics. All my guitars have been used and bought rather cheaply, and I have taken them to stores for repairs and putting together some different things. There is a used guitar I would like to get soon, it's a Warbeast electric. Being concerned about spending a few hundred dollars online, I have taken the liberty of reading some reviews on the guitar. Most of which are positive, but have honest feedback about the pickups being terrible, and the headstock being a little weighted, making it no good to play sitting down. I plan on having the guitar shipped to Guitar Center and picking it up there.

Since the pickups are no good on the guitar I am buying, I would like to get pickups for the guitar that will, more or less, be my type. I enjoy a more thrash metal type of sound (my favorite band is Anthrax), but I want a little bit of versatility--not a lot, mind you, but just enough to where I can play it without distortion as well as with a pedal or two. I've never purchased pickups, nor do I know the first thing about them. I want to be able to play some really speedy licks, but also be able to tone down to, say, a nice slow opening like Metallica's "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)". What kind of pickups should I look for?

I will call ahead to a local guitar shop to get the pickups and some new strings put on the guitar the first day of having it, so I'm not too worried about price as long as it's between $1 - $200, I have time to save up and get the right option. What would you recommend?

PS. I would also like to change tunings on my guitar for things like "Walk" by Pantera (Drop D), though I will not go lower than a whole step down on all strings (DGCFAF)

If needed, the specifics of the guitar are (as provided by the website:)
"Construction: bolt on
Body wood: basswood
Top style: beveled
Headstock style: SOB 3 to a side
Headstock color: black
Tuners: sealed die cast
Neck wood: maple
Neck radius: 12"
Back of neck: satin
Neck binding: none
Nut width: 43mm
Fretboard: rosewood
Inlay: none
Frets: 22 jumbo 2.7mm
Factory strings: 9-42
Scale: 25-1/2"
Bridge type: tune-o-matic
Tailpiece type: string-through-body
Pickups: 2 black plastic covered BC Rich humbuckers
Controls: 1 volume, 1 tone and 1 three-way toggle
Hardware: chrome
Finish: glossy"
EDIT: Yes, I need to get the really good ones. But what pickups ARE really good for thrash metal type of music?
EDIT: Guitar is $500. All my other guitars are actually pretty nice, They've just been used (all of them are $300 or more brand new, but I saved about $50 by just buying them off friends and hooking them up with some new strings and a new nutstock etc.) I just want to add a Warbeast for design and to have some fun. It's not a bad guitar, just that it's not an extravagant $2000 one. I'm getting a $1300 Floyd Rose with a whammy soon. That's why I said I'd pay up to 200 in pick-ups. Because some nice pickups in a semi-nice guitar would be awesome to me.
EDIT: It says it's got 2 humbuckers, though I'm not exactly sure what those mean. I appreciate the help, I really do, I hope I don't come across as a bit of an ass, I've just been looking at the guitar and customer reviews are all very positive but mention that the pickups are a bit muddy and that the headstock is weighted (which isn't surprising because the guitar is a Warbeast so it has one of the ridiculously huge headstocks)
EDIT: Cnewshadow: 1) No, I'm not fluent in specifics of guitars, which is why I'm asking about different things first.
2) I'm bothering with this one because I'm not great with adjusting the tension of the bridge on a Floyd Rose. Yes, I know, the brand is not Floyd Rose, I've had one before, almost bought a second one and changed my mind because I was going to wait until I was better with swapping the strings on it. It's a Synyster Gates signature Schecter guitar, brand new could be upwards of $1300, I'm sure if you looked around you could get it for about $700 used, which is still more than I'm paying for it (friend likes drop tunings, was not smart when he bought the guitar for $1300, he wants to get rid of it and nobody wants to pay $500 for it).
3) I'm not dead set on the Warbeast, mainly because there's a few Explorer guitars I've been wanting, but I am still seriously considering the Warbeast simply because it'll be nice to have it,



Answer
You don't know much about guitars do you?

1) The Warbeast is a piece of junk. I wouldn't buy one at all if I were you. Low end BC Rich guitars are marketed toward people that don't know much about guitars and get them because they look cool. Getting better pickups will not help that guitar much.

Keep in mind that since it is marketed to people who don't know much about guitars, it is reviewed by people who don't know much about guitars. The reports you're reading about the pickups being bad are most likely being caused by the fact that the reviewers are playing through a little 15 watt practice amp and blame the thin, tinny sound on the guitar instead of the amp. Those same people probably have several guitars that have "terrible pickups" and it never dawns on them that maybe the amp they are playing through is the problem.

And in most cases, the people doing the review are comparing them to their first guitar, which was likely a Squier or a First Act or something similar. Naturally, it will be awesome compared to those guitars. If you can find even one professional musician who plays a Warbeast, I will be very surprised.

2) If you're getting a $1300 guitar soon, why are you bothering with this one? For the record, Floyd Rose is the name of the type of bridge the guitar has, most likely NOT the name of the company that made the guitar.

3 If you're dead set on buying the Warbeast despite my warning, look into the following brands and models of pickup:

Seymour Duncan: Duncan Distortion, Invader, Dimebucker, JB. The Invader and Dimebucker are a little thin sounding for my taste, but you might like them.

DiMarzio: Dominion, Crunch Lab, X2N, D-Activator, Super Distortion, Breed, Evolution. Of that group, I like the Dominion and D-Activator the best.

Bare Knuckle: Warpig, Aftermath, Painkiller, Cold Sweat (these are very expensive, I'm just including them for completeness)

All of those pickups are humbuckers, which is 2 pickups placed side by side so the magnetic fields cancel each other out and eliminate unwanted noise from the pickups.

4) You really should wait until you actually have the guitar and know what it sounds like before you plan to change the pickups. Doing it the way you are is like buying a car and getting a new engine for it before you've ever driven it.

EDIT:

I'd opt for something like this over the Warbeast: http://www.guitarcenter.com/In-Store-Used-USED-LTD-MH1000-DELUXE-TRANS-BLACK-QUILT-108832711-i3123533.gc

Goes for $800 new, Guitar Center has a used one for $549. And it already has an EMG 81/85 pickup set, so no changing of pickups will be necessary. So, you could buy the Warbeast for $500 and spend an additional $200 changing the pickups, or you could just buy the ESP for $549 and be set.

I actually kind of like the Synyster Gates signature model. It's not a bad guitar. I think it looks a little goofy, but it's a quality axe underneath the gaudiness. I have a Schecter Avenger myself, which is the body style his signature model is. It's surprisingly comfortable to play, even with the upper horn sticking out like that.

String swapping on a Floyd Rose isn't hard, but I can see how string tension would be a pain in the butt.

If you got one of these you wouldn't have to worry about that anymore, basically turns a Floyd Rose into a fixed bridge, and you can unlock it if you want to use the tremolo again: http://www.guitarcenter.com/Allparts-Tremol-No-Tremolo-Locking-Device---Pin-Type-H71947-i1820306.gc

Here's a video that might help: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzBLysvmPy0

I change my strings one at a time so I don't have to block anything off, but the way he's doing it works just fine.

Note: If your friend is selling his Schecter cheap because he doesn't understand how to adjust the bridge on it.....JUMP ON IT NOW BEFORE HE FINDS ONE OF THESE VIDEOS!

You can drop tune just fine with a Floyd, you just have to make sure you adjust your spring tension to counteract the change in string tension and gauge.

Watch the video I linked you to, and when your friends are idiots and buy expensive guitars they don't know how to work on, you can get them cheap because you'll know what they don't :P

If you have questions about how to change tunings with a Floyd, ask here and either I'll try and walk you through it or someone else who knows about them will (Ask in Performing Arts, that's where the serious musicians hang out)

(I wasn't trying to be a jerk about my answer, I was just having a bad day so I was a little more sarcastic than usual)



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Thursday, April 3, 2014

What should I do for a kill switch on guitar?




futbolboy2


I want to install a kill switch on my guitar, but at the same time, I am nervous about messing with all the electronics, because I don't really know what I'm doing with it. Currently, I imitate a kill switch by turning the bass tone knob on the guitar to 0, and the treble tone knob to 10. In order to kill the tone, I toggle back and forth between the pickup selectors. It works pretty well, but it doesn't completely cut out the bass tone, so I want a more effective solution.

Thanks



Answer
I did this to my guitar a while ago. The nice thing is it's incredibly easy to do and you don't need to mess with what's already there - you're just tacking something on to the end.

You can get the parts from any electronics supplier, like Radio Shack. You'll need a switch. This can be a toggle switch, but I much prefer a pushbutton. If you get a pushbutton, get a momentary push-to-make switch. You'll also need some 24 guage wire.

Solder two bits of wire (maybe like 10cm each) onto two legs of the switch (middle leg and one of the outside legs if it's a toggle switch). Drill a hole in your scratchplate and mount the switch in it. Now solder one of the switch wires to your signal wire, and the other to ground. The signal wire is the one that connects to the tip of the output jack.

Now when the switch is closed, you ground the signal, causing the output to fall silent.



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Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Guitar Recording Gear?




Robert


Ok i wanna know if theres any cheap device that i can record my music and singing on and if there is can you send the link to me and it needs to be simple please thanks


Answer
I highly recommend the Olympus WS-100 digital voice recorder. For personal recording it's fantastic. Sounds great, small, easy to use, plenty of capacity, and connects to your computer via USB as a flash drive.

I got this for my daughter to record her composition ideas. She loves it.

(This device probably wouldn't work too well for recording high volume levels, like a full band.)

Although Amazon sells it for $63, you can pick one up for a little over $30 from Amazon Marketplace sellers or eBay.

Hope this helps. Good luck!



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