New Posting Member/NGD!!

[radiomatts]

Hey everyone,
I wanted to say hi and introduce myself. My name is Matt, and I live just outside of Chicago. I just bought my first REAL PRS last night. I have one of the newer Santana SE's and I love it. Well, I had a chance to unload a bit of old gear and got a 98 Custom 22 in what they call Black Cherry. I have to get used to it, because I'm a bit of a Les Paul die hard, but this was too good of a deal to pass up.

Here it is.








I have a couple of questions if you guys don't mind.

• What's with these tuners? I feel like I'm trying to keep a Floyd Rose in tune. Are there any tricks to this? FYI, the tech at Guitar Center did a hell of a job setting this up for me. The action is beautiful and really low the way I like.
• For any of you with Les Pauls, it is common for it to feel odd or harder to bend notes going from an LP to a PRS or is it just me?
• This guitar has what looks like the same speed knobs that are on my Santana SE. Is this normal? Every PRS I've seen has those cool lampshade knobs. Can I get those knobs from PRS or eBay?
• This guitar came in a PRS case, but no hang tags or wrenches. I read somewhere that it's a big deal to include it if you're selling a PRS, etc. I also read somewhere that PRS won't replace the hang tag. Are the wrenches hard to find? Are they proprietary like on a Taylor?
• This guitar has Dragon II pickups. They sound like the treble knob on my amp was rolled off a tiny bit. It's not a deal breaker, but just wanted to know if this is normal. Can anyone give me an analogy of what these pups are like if they were... say Seymour Duncans? Just as some kind of idea. I am a PAF guy at heart, but open to new sounds. Again, just wanted to know what you guys thought. You're the experts... I'm just the newb!

So.. here's my Santana SE.




Thanks to everyone here for just reading this. Please, please chime in with thoughts and opinions!

Matt

 

[markie]

Welcome to the Forum Matt :hello:

Speed knobs look right to me.

GC Tech must not be overly familiar with PRS Guitars. Not strung properly, which could be why it is going out of tune. Also possible that the cams on the Tuners are slipping. There is prolly a sticky on this forum for using the Tuners. If not, you can get to the PRS Website from the tabs at the top of the page & find it there. Note: The strings should not be wrapped all the way around the posts .... like a couple of your strings are!

 

[prsrocker1988]

Welcome!!!

 

[11top]

For any of you with Les Pauls, it is common for it to feel odd or harder to bend notes going from an LP to a PRS or is it just me?

It might seem a bit tougher to bend the strings on the CU22 compared to a Les Paul since the scale length is a bit longer.

 

[László]

As Markie pointed out, it's definitely not strung correcttly. Whether that affects the feel is hard to say, but as 11 Top says, the scale length is 25" instead of 24.75".

Beautiful axe, though!

 

[radiomatts]

Thank you guys so much for the welcome. I do need to be clear on something you didn't see. The headstock pic was before it was restrung. There are no overlaps on the posts. Could this just be due to string stretchiness?

Anyway... I wanted to ask about the pickups. These are Dragon II's. Are those stock in general? Also... is there a Duncan pickup that is comparable? I'm just trying to learn about these guitars, and analogies help.

Matt

 

[justmund]

Hey Matt, sweet guitar! Can't tell you much about the Dragon IIs sorry.

As for the tuning issues, I'm just gonna copy and paste something:

Some of the common causes of tuning instability are:

-Incorrectly stretched strings;
-Faulty strings (it happens);
-Incorrectly wound strings around the tuning post;
-String binding in the nut (slots may need widening and/or lubrication);
-Incorrect intonation making you think there's tuning instability;
-Trem sticking on the pivot screws (I believe light machine oil is the go here);
-Incorrect use of trem (sometimes it needs a pull up after heavy use);
-Trem knife edge not sitting in the screw recesses properly;
-etc!

A little bit more info https://www.prsguitars.com/csc/bridges.html

Hope this helps, that guitar should be rock solid! Out of interest, what gauge strings so you have on there?

 

[newbuilder]

I would bet that harder to bend would be the floating trem vs fixed bridge. When you bend the bridge will dive some. Stretch those strings out really well and see if that helps with you tuning issues. Nice guitar very pretty!

 

[radiomatts]

Hey Justmund. Thank you. Every guitar I own is strung with Ernie Ball 9's.