Haxasaurus
New Member
- Joined
- Feb 25, 2017
- Messages
- 6
Hey everybody, I'm super stoked to have gotten my dream guitar this past week but I'm having some issues that maybe you'll be able to enlighten me on a bit.
When I got the guitar, it seemed well enough set up from Sweetwater, but I didn't pay much attention as I was going to replace the strings with a thicker gauge. I replaced the stock strings with some 10-52s and tuned down to drop C and realized the strings weren't quite fitting in the nut slots very well. I took it to a guitar tech and had him widen out the slots and he also made them a bit deeper for better intonation on the first few frets. When I brought it home I set the neck almost totally flat, adjusted the action and the intonation and thought I was good to go.
After having some initial tuning instability, I looked up here on the forums some ideas and found out I could adjust the floating trem (first one I've owned) to make it perpendicular to the body of the guitar (to compensate for the increased tension from the thicker strings). After I did that, I noticed some improvements but it's definitely still not ideal. I re-set up the guitar because of the changes I made to the trem and put some pencil graphite in the nut slots to lubricate them. Still, a little bit better, but not nearly what I was expecting.
For example, if I play through a 3-5 minute song (without using the trem or any insane amount of bending), it's almost guaranteed that I need to re-tune at least one string as it will be several cents off from when I started. And because I need to re-tune that one string, it's likely to throw off another string (is the trem really that sensitive? haha). I know it's not a lot, but when you play a full chord you can hear is nastily ringing out. Now, if I do bend heavily or use the trem, it doesn't really stand a chance.
I'm kind of at a loss here because the only thing that I'm aware of that I haven't adjusted is the pivot screws on the trem, mostly just because I'm not too knowledgeable of them. I want to love this guitar so much, but this flaw is kind of preventing that. To add, the strings are definitely stretched in by now and I have about 2-3 windings on all of the tuning pegs (about how much I normally do). I don't hear any "pinging" when I am tuning so I am relatively sure the nut is cut correctly. Also, the pickups are the recommended length away from the strings (per the PRS setup guide) so I don't think that's an issue.
Any clues?
When I got the guitar, it seemed well enough set up from Sweetwater, but I didn't pay much attention as I was going to replace the strings with a thicker gauge. I replaced the stock strings with some 10-52s and tuned down to drop C and realized the strings weren't quite fitting in the nut slots very well. I took it to a guitar tech and had him widen out the slots and he also made them a bit deeper for better intonation on the first few frets. When I brought it home I set the neck almost totally flat, adjusted the action and the intonation and thought I was good to go.
After having some initial tuning instability, I looked up here on the forums some ideas and found out I could adjust the floating trem (first one I've owned) to make it perpendicular to the body of the guitar (to compensate for the increased tension from the thicker strings). After I did that, I noticed some improvements but it's definitely still not ideal. I re-set up the guitar because of the changes I made to the trem and put some pencil graphite in the nut slots to lubricate them. Still, a little bit better, but not nearly what I was expecting.
For example, if I play through a 3-5 minute song (without using the trem or any insane amount of bending), it's almost guaranteed that I need to re-tune at least one string as it will be several cents off from when I started. And because I need to re-tune that one string, it's likely to throw off another string (is the trem really that sensitive? haha). I know it's not a lot, but when you play a full chord you can hear is nastily ringing out. Now, if I do bend heavily or use the trem, it doesn't really stand a chance.
I'm kind of at a loss here because the only thing that I'm aware of that I haven't adjusted is the pivot screws on the trem, mostly just because I'm not too knowledgeable of them. I want to love this guitar so much, but this flaw is kind of preventing that. To add, the strings are definitely stretched in by now and I have about 2-3 windings on all of the tuning pegs (about how much I normally do). I don't hear any "pinging" when I am tuning so I am relatively sure the nut is cut correctly. Also, the pickups are the recommended length away from the strings (per the PRS setup guide) so I don't think that's an issue.
Any clues?
