Action and basic guitar set ups (Guitar Lesson BC-164) Guitar for beginners Stage 6

This is Stage 6, Lesson 4 of Justin's Beginner Guitar Course.

This video discusses the guitar "action" and a very basic set up guide. This is not designed to teach you how to do a full guitar set up - but will explain the basics so you know what a tech is doing when you take your guitar in. And if you are brave you might try some of it yourself!

The Justinguitar Beginners Guitar Course, a series of over 100 lessons on guitar for beginners. Text support is on the web site and also in a proper old skool paper book which can be ordered from the web site of your local music store :)

Taught by Justin Sandercoe.

Full support at the justinguitar web site where you will find hundreds of lessons on a wide range of subjects, and all the scales and chords that you will ever need! There is a great forum too to get help, no matter what the problem.

And it is all totally free, no bull. No sample lessons, no memberships, no free ebook. Just tons of great lessons :)

To get help with this lesson (and for further info and tabs), find the Lesson ID in the video title (like ST-667 or whatever) and then look it up on the Lesson Index page of justinguitar.com

http://www.justinguitar.com

Have fun :)

.

How are you doing? Justin here again,

and in this lesson I'm just
going to be talking about

some really basic things
about setting up your guitar.

Common problems that people have, easy fixes

and things that you can and cannot fix by yourself.

And the reason that I've kind of
brought this into the beginners lesson

is we're gradually starting to move up the neck a little bit,
away from the open position.

And even if you've got a thing called a high action,

which I'm going to explain further in a second,

it doesn't really affect you when you're playing down that end and you're working on the chords.

But it does make a difference,
the further up the neck you get.

So, let me first of all explain what
the action is and what you can do about it.

So the action of a guitar is the distance
between the string and the fingerboard.

So, we're just going to go to a really quick
little close-up now for a second

and I'll just show exactly what I mean by the action.

So the distance here, the amount that you can
press the string down is referred to as the action.

So exactly, you can get little measuring tools that measure

from the top of the fret to the bottom of the string.

Now, of course, if I just lift the string up a bit like that,
you would have -

maybe even higher than that - you might have a guitar
that looks like that with a really high action,

which would be too high and probably not very easy to play.

If the action is too low, when you play
it tends to buzz against the fret,

so if it looks really low, you end up having
a really buzzy sound which is not good either.

So if you've discovered that your acoustic
guitar has a really, really high action

and you're having trouble playing further up the neck

when it comes to doing your barre chords and your scales

and stuff later when you're playing up around
the fifth fret or higher,

what can you do about it?

Well, on acoustic guitar, unfortunately, not very much.

But it does make a huge difference
and I'd really recommend

taking your guitar to a guitar luthier
or your local guitar maintenance guy,

most music shops have a guitar
kind of guru that works there,

and ask them to give you a guitar set up.

Sometimes it can seem kind of expensive,

but it can make a huge difference
to the playability of your guitar.

In fact, one of the nicest guitars that I ever played,

as far as the feeling goes of the guitar,

was a 200 pound Epiphone
Hummingbird, acoustic guitar

which was a horrible guitar, it didn't play very well,
it didn't seem to stay in tune

and I took to this guitar guru guy for a set up

and when it came back it was really, really nice.

it played really easy, it was just incredibly different.

And only at that point did I realise quite
how important a guitar set up can be.

and since then I make sure
that all my guitars regularly go

for a proper guitar set up
with somebody who knows what they're doing.

So, acoustic guitars, definitely take
them off to someone for a guitar set up.

I'm sorry, I know that means
forking out a bit more cash,

but it will make a difference,
physically how easy it is to play guitar.

So that's important.

However, for electric guitar,
they're a little bit more adjustable,

so I want to talk to you a little bit about how you might
go about adjusting your electric guitar.

So I'm just going to to chuck my acoustic
guitar back down here on the stand

and grab up my trusty Stratocaster.

Now, most electric guitars have a lower action
than acoustic guitars, which is fine.

Now, there's a couple of simple adjustments
that you can make on electric guitar yourself.

There's a few things going on.

The first thing that you can adjust is these parts here,
in the bridge of the guitar,

the bridge saddles they're usually referred to as.

And if you look really closely in the top of this,
you will find a little hole that takes an Allen key.

And by putting an Allen key in there,
the very small one, and turning it around

it lifts these pieces up and down.

And of course, if you put them up it'll mean

that the string get a little bit
further away from the fingerboard

and if you put, screw them back in, which is clockwise,

then the little thing will go down and it'll make
the action a little bit lower.

And that's the kind of thing you can
have a bit of a play about with yourself,

just trying to make sure that you don't get it,

if you get it too low, it'll buzz
to much and sound horrible

and if it gets too high, you won't be able to play it.

So, that's one thing that you can have a go
at adjusting yourself on electric guitar.

The other thing that's
really important on electric guitar

that you can have a go at if you want,
but I don't touch this myself,

even though I'm pretty experienced
with guitar maintenance.

I don't like touching the Truss Rod of a guitar.

Now, a Truss Rod on a guitar is two metal poles

that go right down the length of the guitar neck.

and by turning a little Allen key,
you can adjust whether the neck,

if I'm looking at you like that,

whether the headstock comes forward
or whether it goes back.

Now, on the Stratocaster we've got
a Truss Rod adjuster thing

just right in the end of the headstock,

but on different guitars it's in different places.

Usually acoustic guitars have a Truss Rods as well.

I'd definitely not be touching the
Truss Rods on acoustic guitar.

Get somebody professional who
knows what they're doing to do that.

Sometimes you have the Truss Rod
adjuster on electric guitar

in the inside of a neck, just here.

So, what you might find is that you've got
a really high action in this part of the guitar

and a really low action here, because the neck is
kind of bent a little bit forward like that,

so by adjusting the Truss Rod you
can pull it back to the correct position

and then you'll have an even
action down the guitar neck.

This is the kind of adjustment that you also need to do
if you change string gauge.

So if you go from a very light set of strings
to a very heavy set of strings,

it can be really good idea to adjust your Truss Rod
to bring your neck back into alignment.

That can make a big difference.

But, again, a really good guitar tech will be able to do
probably a far better set up than you.

I've set up hundreds, well set up my same guitars

hundreds of times over the last 20 years

and I still, when I take it to my guitar gurus,

they always set it up loads better
that I could have done.

So, I might tweak a little bit myself when I get home,

if I notice that string's buzzing a bit or whatever,

but generally I take it to a guitar guru.

The guy that I use these days is called Charlie Chandler.

And you can find him at
Charlie Chandlers Guitar Experience, in Kew.

He is a total guitar genius and does,
makes everything about guitars be better.

So definitely look up Charlie, if you need to get some
work done on the guitar and you live in London.

The other thing that's really obvious
is the tremolo system.

Now, if you've gone against my advice

and bought what's called a locking tremolo system,

a floating tremolo system, on your
guitar when you're a beginner;

that's just generally a really, really bad idea,
something that you shouldn't be doing.

What I recommend is having a regular tremolo system

and fixing it so it's right down flat on the guitar.

Now, what you'll find is that this bridge part,

can actually lift up, lift forward, which is kinda cool.

if you're playing like Jeff Beck guitar solos
you need to have this lifted up,

because when you put the tremolo on, you can pull it up

and make the notes go higher in pitch.

But if you're a beginner guitar player,
you're probably never going to be using that.

I only just started mucking around
with the tremolo arm a month ago.

And I've been doing this stuff for ages.

So, I would recommend pulling this bridge
so it's back flat against the guitar.

That way your guitar will stay more in tune
and it'll actually sound a little bit better as well.

And the way that you do that on a Stratocaster guitar,

so like a Gibson Les Paul
doesn't have a tremolo system

so you don't have to worry about it,

if I flip this over here you will see
that there's a little base plate here

which is the back of the tremolo
system and some springs.

So, if you want, I've angled my springs in

which gives them a little bit more tension as well,
but you can leave them square.

you can add up to five springs
in the back of a Stratocaster type guitar.

And then there's two little screws here at the end

and if you just keep screwing them in
and in, and in, and in,

eventually you'll pull that bridge part, this part,
so it's flat against the guitar.

And that would be, I would recommend
for a beginner guitar player,

really, really important thing to do
is to fix your tremolo so you can't use it,

You don't need to use it yet.

Yeah, it's fun to grab it sometimes
and go mweee-mweee-mweee,

but it's not, you're not gonna
probably use it in a very musical way,

if you're a beginner guitar player.

So, I would recommend bringing that down
so it's nice and flat on the guitar.

So, that should tell you a little bit
of stuff about guitar set ups.

We've talked a little bit about the tremolo,

we've talked about the action
which is the height of the strings.

You can also adjust the nut,

which is the little kind of bone
or plastic thing at the top.

Again, I've never done that,
I would recommend you getting

a serious luthier to do that for you.

One other very quick little thing for,
particularly for electric guitar players:

Often, people's straps fall off their guitars.

This is really, really heinous.

If you can, buy yourself some
locking nuts for your strap.

It's very, very cheap to buy,
well "very, very cheap",

probably 15 British pounds, so like
25 dollars or something like that.

So, that'll be a good idea.

Failing that, put your regular strap on

and get a bit of plastic that
goes over the top of your strap

to lock the strap onto the guitar,

because what you really
don't want is the strap falling off

when you go to stand up and
guitar smashing on the floor.

Seen that happen to a student before
and it's really not a very happy situation.

So, I hope that gives you a bit of
a run down on the guitar

and I'll see you for another lesson
some time real soon.

Bye, bye!