McCarty keeps breaking a string

[Matt Carlton]

OK - New here but not new to PRS. Love (just love) my 2008 McCarty Korina. My 4th string (G) keeps breaking about every 30 days or so. I am a string bender and as you know the G and B are great strings to bend into unison.

Can I (very finely) file the edge of the groove where the G comes out of the tailpiece or am I really messing with my intonation and destroying the tailpiece? Help please!

 

[]-[@n$0Ma☩!©]

Can I (very finely) file the edge of the groove where the G comes out of the tailpiece or am I really messing with my intonation and destroying the tailpiece?

Is that where it's breaking?

 

[s.fitzsimmons]

I'll second that on my 2008 Korina McCarty. I'm having issue with the A and D's breaking right at the edge of the bridge. I can't feel any sharp spots at all and was wondering about the same issue of altered intonation. Never been a problem for me before on any other guitar. I change strings every two weeks or so as this happens.

 

[vchizzle]

I doubt filing is going to actually make it smoother. The tail piece is very smooth and rounded. If you play the guitar a lot and it sounds like you bend the strings a lot, 30 days could be a long time for a set of strings(depends on how you play, how often etc). Another thing to consider is trying a different brand of strings. I had issues with strings breaking a the tailpiece(and not just 1 particular string) at one time as well, I decided to change brands and that issue disappeared.

Probably best to at least contact PTC and see what they say. It is entirely possible there might be an imperfection there, just not all that probable. If you were going to do that, I would suggest sandpaper(fine going to finer) and not a file. You don't want to remove metal that is supposed to be there, only a burr if it actually exists. That would affect your intonation if you remove much...they are manufactured to tight tolerances for that reason.

Do you just have the one PRS? If you had another tailpiece, you could swap them to see if the problem existed with a different stoptail on that guitar.