My 325 has problems!
Posted: Wed Jun 06, 2001 2:41 am
Hi Mark -
I have a brand new 325V59, and I really like the guitar, but it has a lot of problems. I just thought I'd run over a few ideas with you for making my guitar more playable - anything you can advise would be very appreciated:
For one thing, it just seems too perfect, too new. I'm almost afraid to play it. What would happen if I placed the guitar on it's back on the floor, stood on it with one foot, and repeatedly stamped on the neck with the other at around the 9th fret, would you suggest this as a way of making the guitar feel more broken in? Another thing I was considered was holding it against a hot radiator for an hour, then submerging it in a bathtub full of cold water and Clorox, but this might not be cost effective. I mean, wouldn't sea water be a better choice? I've also heard that a great way to break in a new guitar is to completely bury it in mud and leave it there for 6 months to a year, but this seems rather silly, it would also leave you without a guitar for a long time. One thing I did try is I painted my guitar with margarine and put it in the oven; I was really annoyed because when I took it out an hour later, I dropped it because it was hot, and put a nick in the headstock - how do you repair that?
Regarding action and intonation: I'm not really getting a "rock & roll" sound from my guitar. I think it's the intonation, but I can't be sure. Any thoughts on this? Are the strings supposed to all be tuned to the same note, or 6 different ones? A friend of mine strung his guitar with 6 low E strings and tuned them all to 4 octaves above standard pitch. Can't you just get the same result with a capo? I tried that with my guitar, but I found the resulting action a little high for comfort; so I tuned them to 4 octaves below standard pitch and that felt a lot better (by the way, I like to turn my tuning pegs with pliers, you get a lot more leverage that way). Also, I hate the way the strings move around when I strum; what I ended up doing was using a chisel to bang a notch for each string into every fret, this seems to hold them in place better when I play. Is there a better way? My dad suggested duct tape.
I like the neck on my guitar, but it was missing a lot of fret dots; there was like only a few of them. I fixed this with a cigarette, which I used to burn in all the missing fret dots. This was a $1500 guitar; I think John Hall should be more careful about his quality control. Rickenbacker is a rich company, can't he hire someone to check the fret dots?
Finally, my guitar never seems to be loud enough. My buddy thought that maybe it was my amp. He brought over his Marshall stack (he plays a Strat, peon!), and we set it up in the bathroom, and closed the door. Then we turned all the knobs on the guitar up to ten, and all the knobs on the amps up to ten. That was pretty loud, but you can't bring a bathroom with you to a gig. Is that a good way to get a "rock & roll sound"? If you hold a butane lighter against the bridge pickup, you
I have a brand new 325V59, and I really like the guitar, but it has a lot of problems. I just thought I'd run over a few ideas with you for making my guitar more playable - anything you can advise would be very appreciated:
For one thing, it just seems too perfect, too new. I'm almost afraid to play it. What would happen if I placed the guitar on it's back on the floor, stood on it with one foot, and repeatedly stamped on the neck with the other at around the 9th fret, would you suggest this as a way of making the guitar feel more broken in? Another thing I was considered was holding it against a hot radiator for an hour, then submerging it in a bathtub full of cold water and Clorox, but this might not be cost effective. I mean, wouldn't sea water be a better choice? I've also heard that a great way to break in a new guitar is to completely bury it in mud and leave it there for 6 months to a year, but this seems rather silly, it would also leave you without a guitar for a long time. One thing I did try is I painted my guitar with margarine and put it in the oven; I was really annoyed because when I took it out an hour later, I dropped it because it was hot, and put a nick in the headstock - how do you repair that?
Regarding action and intonation: I'm not really getting a "rock & roll" sound from my guitar. I think it's the intonation, but I can't be sure. Any thoughts on this? Are the strings supposed to all be tuned to the same note, or 6 different ones? A friend of mine strung his guitar with 6 low E strings and tuned them all to 4 octaves above standard pitch. Can't you just get the same result with a capo? I tried that with my guitar, but I found the resulting action a little high for comfort; so I tuned them to 4 octaves below standard pitch and that felt a lot better (by the way, I like to turn my tuning pegs with pliers, you get a lot more leverage that way). Also, I hate the way the strings move around when I strum; what I ended up doing was using a chisel to bang a notch for each string into every fret, this seems to hold them in place better when I play. Is there a better way? My dad suggested duct tape.
I like the neck on my guitar, but it was missing a lot of fret dots; there was like only a few of them. I fixed this with a cigarette, which I used to burn in all the missing fret dots. This was a $1500 guitar; I think John Hall should be more careful about his quality control. Rickenbacker is a rich company, can't he hire someone to check the fret dots?
Finally, my guitar never seems to be loud enough. My buddy thought that maybe it was my amp. He brought over his Marshall stack (he plays a Strat, peon!), and we set it up in the bathroom, and closed the door. Then we turned all the knobs on the guitar up to ten, and all the knobs on the amps up to ten. That was pretty loud, but you can't bring a bathroom with you to a gig. Is that a good way to get a "rock & roll sound"? If you hold a butane lighter against the bridge pickup, you