Of course these holes are important... It is the reset hole, like you have on your phone... If you insert a needle in the hole, you reset your guitar to the default configuration
Just FYI you can also just use a pencil to lube the nut so the strings don't catch, the graphite in pencil lead is a great lubricant and you can't get cheaper than a good old #2 pencil 😁
i do this with a mechanical pencil! had the same one for a decade, just keep buying 0.5mm or 0.7mm so it fits in every nut slot lol i do it on both the nut and the bridge rightr before restringing to allow proper lubrication. works like a charm
I have a Gibson EDS-1275 double neck that wouldn't stay in tune. It had graphite in the nut. I restrung the guitar and used the nut sauce and it fixed it immediately.
Cool facts! Never drop oil in that tuner hole--use a tiny bit of Vaseline as demonstrated. Oil will seep into the wood and stain the back of the headstock. It's pretty unsightly when that happens.
I am 68 and have been playing since I was 13. I too learned some things I did not know. I still pick up one of my acoustics most nights just to play along to movie themes and relax. Not the performing pressure from the old days.
73 and playing since 14 but I even have the spring in my Strat. Bought second hand a '66 transition model in '68 came with ashtray but no spring that I recall. Added many years later, 80's as I thought the thread was getting stripped and it didn't "hang" right anymore. Wrong I finally rediscovered the spring. 😆😂
O...m...g...the tiny spring for the firm whammy bar thing, how have i never heard of this in my 20 years of playing?? I've had so much sadness over that for so long, thank you for enlightening me!
Don't feel goofy.. I've been playing guitar since I was 4yo 🤣 Only became half decent when I was around 8yo thanks to my Uncle. I've had numerous guitars with bars over the years and at age 55, I literally only found out about these magic little springs about 3 years ago because two came with a squire affinity strat I bought. If it weren't for the internets, I'd still be wondering where this little spring belongs
@tobymearing8407 i will definitely be checking now! I have two with trem bars, one is a Floyd, which would be most useful on that one. My other three are tune-o-matics, which i prefer, but you gotta have a couple wiggle sticks!
Hey Samurai! Love your content. Both your musical journey and your journey as a content creator has inspired me greatly throughout the years. Thanks for all that you do!
The string tree claim is wrong. String trees exist to stop sympathetic buzzing. When a string doesn't have enough of a break angle(the angle from the playing surface to the tuner or wherever the string stops) the string behind the nut/bridge the sting will vibrate along with the playing area of the stings. The longer and thinner the string the more easily this will occur. If you look at some 60s student guitars you'll notice a string tree bar across all the strings because the headstock has a shallow break angle. Think about it this way if a string was perfectly straight after the nut or bridge there's not a lot stopping the entire length of the string from vibrating. I suppose a string tree may increase sustain a minor amount because the string isn't fighting itself vibrating at 2 different pitches but that isn't the main purpose.
It actually changes the pitch. The easiest way to hear this is when replacing standard machine heads with locking machine heads. Usually the top of the shaft sits lower and many players don't bother with string trees so if they are still on you can hear the difference in-between using and removing the string tree. Also the higher the pitch, the less that noise is heard by the pickups. On hollow bodies you usually have the other end of the string in-between the bridge (usually floating) and the tailpiece. There is a split design called a Frequensator that splits the tailpiece design into two lengths and if you swap out a standard "Bird Swing" tailpiece for a Frequensator you can hear the difference. Also the difference in-between the bridge and the Trem unit for a Wide Swing Tremolo like on a Jazzmaster or Jaguar you can hear the sympathetic resonance and there is even a string guide you can add that goes on the top of the WST in order to increase downward pressure on the strings. If you can't stand those overtones from sympathetic vibrations above the nut or below the bridge you can either buy products like Jimmy Clips or use foam (not pretty but it works) to absorb the sounds.
I agree and don't think the string tree adds much if any sustain. What it could theoretically do is to add a bit of elasticity. Jimmy Page moved the tail of his double neck way back toward the back of the guitar, lengthening the string. This changed the feel of bends. The longer the string, the greater the elasticity. You can find the same effect if you play two of the same guitar types, but one has a Bigsby - lengthening the strings. Having said that, the extra length provided by the string tree is pretty small and perhaps statistically insignificant.
@@michaelwamback9730 It depends on the type of string tree. I think the standard "bent tin" style trees are absolute crap. Even my budget guitars have Tusq string trees mainly to eliminate friction. I have other guitars that have the roller style to them and they tend to be higher than the stock "bent tin" ones so less of an angle between the nut and the tree. Have I noticed more sustain from any of the upgraded trees? Not really. Do they work better than the stock ones? Yes, they do. I do have to be honest in the guitars that I put the new string trees on are usually highly modified so a before and after comparison is a massive difference. I found a great drop in locking tuners for my Import guitars so that goes on too. The only time where I hear a "bigger" difference is usually in replacing bridges (I prefer vintage Tele bridges so modern "vintage" takes with brass compensated barrels to me, feel and sound the best to my ear) and replacing the Trem block on a Stratocaster from stock to brass was probably the single biggest change. The string trees are more for downward pressure and reduced friction so it's basically taking care of a problem before it becomes a problem.
@@gringogreen4719 Not a fan of the standard trees either. I just always felt they were prone to binding. I replace them with the rounded ones on mine (not the roller - just rounded). It makes sense that 2 round objects touching each other at a 90 degree angle have the most minimal possible contact, which equals less friction, which equals less chance of binding. As for the bridge, totally agree. The only things which really impact tone are the bridge and the nut. A hard nut like Tusq will be very different than plastic (although only on open strings - once you fret a string you remove the nut from the equation.) The construction of the bridge and materials it's made from can impact tone, and definitely sustain. Those Tune-O-Matic bridges have more sustain because of that knife edge not bleeding energy from the string as quickly. So many snake oil products out there all promising they will add sustain, when they really don't do a thing other than put money in someone's pocket.
@@michaelwamback9730 I agree. Tusq was a way to make bone more of a uniform material. Bone changes in density so some bone is better than others, same as wood (in terms of quality and how useful it is). Some products do work better than others, I've had parts off of one guitar just be ok but once you love them to another guitar, they work even better. Go figure. So far the Tusq string trees work well as they are not a problem and they give the headstock a different vibe. That with the locking tuners have worked out so well I have done that combination in multiple guitars. I agree with you that some parts are solutions in search of problems or something better replaced it, but these things need to be sold anyways.
Thank you for your video, I'm sure you must have mentioned this before in one of your videos but I can not stress enough how important it is to have your hearing tested and if needed to have hearing aids. I had no idea how much of the upper register of my hearing was lost until I got my hearing aids 3 years ago, I don't even know if I could hear some sound in the first place..... Now I have fallen in love with playing the guitar again especially my 12 string acoustic. Soon after getting them I was watching a Hawker Hurricane (WWII Fighter) doing a flyby and the sound of the Merlin Engine was astounding.
5:05, For the whammy springs, make sure your guitar's whammy bar hole has a dead end. When i tried this with my Ibanez, the spring fell inside the body and eventually out the back cover hole where the springs are.
Yeah I agree too. I actually thought the Fender bridge ones were slanted because when Leo Fender designed the Tele, the pickup he used (off a lap steel maybe?) was too wide for the string spacing so he had to angle it to make it fit.
@@stevendavidson391that’s what I heard too. It even was a 50/50 choice of which way to angle it and he just happened to choose that angle because hey, he had to choose one. I don’t think how it sounded was even a consideration.
I think its more the changes in how we want the guitar to sound now (i.e. amplified and/or distorted) compared to when it was designed. Its the same reason why Gibson calls the pick ups Rhythm/Treble despite most rhythm guitar parts being play on the treble setting these days.
This may sound odd but … I really enjoyed the rhythm of this video. The pace of the information you delivered, the very short space between cuts, the speed of the speech. I could go on. Regardless of the content. I really enjoy the feel as well as finding everything you said interesting. Kudos on editing, lighting, sound quality and everything else you did to make this video. 👏🏻👍🏻👌🏼⭐️
Another reason for standard tuning is that when using it, you can play the basic chords in C without moving from first position (even B dim, which is a little tricky, but doable), many of the other major and minor chords as well as a few of the sus and aug chords right there at the nut. Try that with alternate tunings, especially if you want 5 and/or 6 string chords.
Uuummm aktually, a B chord would be played at the Second Position. Boo yah, sucka! Got cho ass. Now, who's the Smart Guitar Guy? That's damn right. Me.
@@GazerOfShoe And just for fun: B Maj x21x03 (if you are feeling really stretchy, add the B on the G string at fret 4 with your 3rd finger). Also in the first position.
re: why the tuning is E-E i've experimented a little with different string gauges and the string tension calculator stringjoy provides, and if you're able to go approximate the same tension (say c# to c# with ernie ball mammoths vs. standard with 10s) the guitar sounds equally good and is equally easy to play. i haven't experimented with doing the converse with 8s or similar but that might work too!
Yeah, I have my main guitar (25.5" scale) tuned to B with d'addario light baritone strings and it actually plays better than my other guitar in standard because the neck is thinner.
I think you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned why is E the standard when you mentioned it sounding well with the human voice. I think that frequency and tuning is the easiest to match with any vocal you are faced with. Especially live and raw. Which everything pretty much was back then. No autotune. Not many effects or pedals. Things like this. You don't get any better then a raw live guitar and vocals.
5:34 these help to exacerbate the problem described earlier in the video: 1:16 I never had a string pop out of the nut while playing. The only issue (for some) is the sympathetic vibration of strings behind the nut. But of all the strings it mostly affects the G, which on many Fender guitars doesn't have a string tree anyway! So just bypass the string trees for better tuning stability and wrap a cloth ribbon or something around those ringing strings, make sure it isn't tight, and that'll take care of the ringing.
I had to replace the tuners on my 1968 Gibson acoustic because I didn't know what those holes were for. 40 years of never lubing them resulted in them becoming almost impossible to turn. I did keep the old tuners, though, just in case of the highly unlikely event that I decide to sell the guitar, and the buyer might want the original equipment.
If you have a vintage guitar with a nitro finish, it's a good idea to remove your tuners to lubricate them. Overflow will leak out and react with the finish, which can't be fixed without a refinish.
Because you are the one and only samurai guitarist. I believe you owe it to all of the rest of us. Grasshoppers to do an overview of the slammeri distortion pedal.
Yeh. Drip a little drop of 3-IN-1 oil in there, or down the string post ... OR BOTH!! Then do the Chubby Checker on those tuning key knobs to get it worked in ... every time you change strings.
7:17 I actually think the last reason for tuning might be the most probable one from my experience. As a baritone, which is the most common male voice type (at least in where i live), the low E is pretty much as low as i can sing (except for morinings ;-) ), and high E is as high as i can sing.
"Your Guitar sounds its best when it is really Loud" - YES! New subscriber. And I'm a drummer. But I have always said this and people thought I was nuts. Now who is really nuts? And I'm nuts for Loud Guitars! I tried first playing guitar. I was already playing Trumpet in school, and when I was 14-15 I took guitar lessons. And after 2 years I was not happy at the way I sounded. And told my guitar teacher I was thinking about taking a break from lesson and honest, his answer was: "Thank God! Oops I didn't mean to say that". Yeah you did, I suck on guitar. One year later after saving my money I bought a new Pearl Export drum set with Zildjian Custom A cymbals $1,800. And this time around I skipped the lessons, learning on my own. lol
I heard somewhere that reason for the major3rd b string was a comprimise to alternate between playing chords and solo picking....ease for runs, as you said. Makes sense.
I tried using chapstick under the third string - took out 80% of the highs. Only now months later is back to normal. Will try the sauce. Thanks for these tips.
You are correct. For many Strats it would make more sense to slant it the other way. Originally it was done to give a bright tone for soloing. Back in the day when Leo created Strat and Tele the amp were low power, dark and clean. You needed plenty on top end to stand out in a mix.
imo, having that major third in standard tuning makes harmony a lot easier, but I think it's bad that it's on the B string. Oud has a similar tuning, but the major third is between the bass and the treble. This makes playing melody way less confusing, but you still get harmony between the open strings. It's still a bit confusing when you have a melodic line going to the bass, but that's far less likely to happen. Tuning is usually CFADGC (3rd is F-A), FADGCF (3rd is F-A), or DGBEAD (3rd is G-B).
Why we like electric guitars loud specifically is less to do with the Fletcher-Munsen curve, its more to do with amplifiers & clipping. Generally we don't want amplifiers to distort, but when we start to distort things, that initial bit of clipping we regard as "warmth" as the lower harmonics will start to clip first, which results in increased lower mids and extra harmonic content increasing the frequency range, as well as increased sustain as the sound is starting to compress. All in all, it just makes how electric guitar sounds & plays more exciting and we've pushed it far beyond "warmth" and guitar amplifiers, even legendary "clean" amps are designed more for this than an actual reproduction of the signal going in. So "That" point on the volume knob where your guitar comes alive, that's when it's starting to distort. Then there's resonant feedback! So guitarists liking things loud is more about the effects from clipping than simply being loud. Regarding Gibsons, just learn to restring a guitar properly. The headstock is possibly a bit more sensitive to bad restringing habits. No need for any popular "hacks". My Les Paul Studio was terrible when I first got it and when I restrung it for the first time, all the problems disappeared and its as solid as any other guitar I've owned since.
While that's true, I don't think that's what he was getting at. It's why people turn up music on the stereo - it has nothing to do with the guitar signal clipping.
@@nuberiffic As I said, in the context of electric guitar, it's hugely relevant because of the dramatic change it has both on the sound & behaviour of the instrument. If none of this took place then "bedroom" tones would be easy.
I like how you put this. I'm curious to as we all have differing opinions on what we want for a distorted tone, does anyone ever have a preferred distortion (softclip vs hardclip, preamp distortion vs poweramp distortion, etc...) that they prefer loud? I find myself liking a smooth, warm softclip overdrive from the preamp loud where I can feel it. When doing country, rockabilly, blues, or roots rock, I like the rougher poweramp distortion or that Fender barely there dirt to be at moderate volume. Of course the latter does screw with my ears worse so that may be why. I think it may be where the harmonics occur and that one of my ears is really sensitive to high-mids to the point of being painful.
Phil McKnight covered the D/G issue on LPs and mentioned its not the angle on its own, the reason is they cut the nut too deep and generally not sloped correctly. The top of the string should stick out of the nut slightly, so if you see the string completely flush or lower than the top of the nut, paired with the angle, you’ll get tuning instability. Its why you don’t see the issue with other 3x3 headstocks with just as aggressive of an angle, but see it on every Gibson - Gibson “keeping it authentic” meaning Gibson not improving their nut cuts for decades.
Gibson uses an aggressive ~17º headstock angle which results in a much higher compression force on the nut and more friction between nut and strings. Other 3x3's use a shallower angle (Epiphone ~14º, PRS ~10º, etc) Many people joke that the jointed Epiphone headstock design is superior, but cork sniffing Gibson buyers wouldn't buy a Les Paul if the G string was in tune as it's not authentic!
Yep. Quality nut work with curve, slope, shallow slots, and a very high polish will fix it. Most people have no idea how to do it perfectly. If the material used in the nut won’t take a high polish then it’s not an ideal material. Bone takes an extremely high polish. By high I mean no less than # 10,000 on the JIS standard.
I keep a pencil with my string change tools, when i change a string I rub that in the nut slot, and bridge. The graphite acts as a lubricant and it works. My guitars stay in tune and I don’t break strings at the nut or bridge anymore.
0:51 Highs being higher and lows being lower makes it a less balanced sound. The more balanced way would be opposite of this. It's like on a P-bass where the bass strings are more bassy and the treble strings are more trebly, and why many people run a reverse P pickup to balance it.
I didn't worry too much about the spring in the wammy bar hole on my strat. I tried it and still have it in but not sure. I like it mostly out of the way and it drops away when I let it go. With it raised it seems to get in the way. I've had my strat for 40 years btw.
Ah, that's why when you are tuning using standard tuning you move up a fret when going from G to B! I tune harmonically except for B :). I use standard tuning techniques for B because I never learned the harmonic for B :P Also, now I know a name for those string holder thingies (that was my prior name for them) - string trees! Finally, I have an old Squire Strat that for some reason has two string trees and a very pronounced angle past the nut. I always had a problem keeping it in tune because of the E and G strings! I swear I could put that guitar in it's case after playing and it's perfectly in tune. I pick it up the next day and it's already a few cents off.
it is my belief allthough only my own opinion, the ones who designed these and all instruments, had so much insight, and it seems that they had put a lot of thought into their desisions, consider, you would most likley be playing with a piano and you are able to play all the diatonic chords in the key of C on a guitar open ! even with four notes ? so to me this explains standard guitar tuining very well
My 2 tips for electric guitars are: 1. Grab a phillips-head screwdriver and wind your pickups closer to the strings, focus on the one closest to the bridge and the front one. This will give you a brilliant Metallica Kill Em All tone or a bassy Black Sabbath tone depending on your tone switch position. 🙂 2. Lower your strings by adjusting the grub screws on the bridge, wind them out about half way so you have about a 4mm gap between the strings and the fretboard. (You'll have to retune the strings afterwards.) These 2 tips will give you a hyperactive pickup tone and make even a cheap guitar sound great while giving you the ability to play fast and accurate. 🙂
The reverberation is transferred through the air into the body, not the bridge (primarily). The bridge (& nut or fret) are actually nodal points in the standing wave of the string, meaning that the string isn’t actually moving (or in practice, moving bugger all) at the points where it physically contacts the guitar
5:53 Gotta fact check the part on the standard tuning. Renaissance lutes have frets, play chords and are tuned in 4ths, G-C-F-A-D-G (plus optional bass strings) I think since around 1200. (Tune a guitar's 3rd string down to F# and then capo at the 3rd fret.) The familiar moveable guitar chord shapes work on a lute, except shifted up 1 string. I don't know the exact history, but lute tablature predates standard music notation.
I'm sure I read somewhere that Leo Fender meant the Stratocaster bridge pickup to be bright so as to give something of the sound of a hawaiian steel guitar, which he was a fan of.
regarding to the _caster thing. Fenders biggest failure (in hint sight) was naming the Jazzmaster Jazzmaster instead of Surfcaster. I love my Jazzmaster, but I call it the Surfcaster. Even tho I play way more Jazz on it, than Surf stuff :D
One extra note on lubricating tuners: be VERY careful using a liquid oil lubricant on Gibson guitars (or any guitar with a nitrocellulose finish), because it can leak out of the tuner casing and stain your finish around the tuner. I've been watching Trogly's channel, and he keeps pointing out the discoloured finish around tuners on instruments where the tuners were re-lubed with an oil.
@@futureace73 Honestly, no idea. Even Trogly didn't mention a recommendation in his videos, if I remember. I remember reading a forum post once that mentioned powdered graphite, but it's really messy. I think Samurai's idea of Vaseline might be a good bet, as the gel will stay in place and not flow around (and he did say he asked an actual luthier).
AFAIK standard E tuning is what it is to make most if the basic chords (C major, E minor, etc.) easy to play, and to have as many of them as possible relatively easy. Nobody cared if the lowest sting is E as it did not affect the key they would play in like it is nowadays. It was all about easy availability of chord shapes. And in fact, the lowest string they considered to be relevant was actually the D string, and the lowest E is ab extra that was added again to have more open chord shapes available easily... It was just the ultimate compromise for needs of music styles at the time.
The "Caster" part of Telecaster and Stratocaster was similar to "Broadcaster" and "Broadcasting" in the it comes from farming. Casting is how a farmer or a farmhand distributes seeds by throwing them in a controlled manner. So the Caster part was in realtion to spreading out the notes or your sound.😉👍✨
Sort of correct. Broadcasting comes from radio use, which comes from casting which farming gets from cast, AKA throw. Etymology of a word is easy now with the Internet, you may want to check what I said, I haven't.
@@DavidBostock-ti2fv Well, yeah. The guitar was first the "Broadcaster" and then the "Nocaster" (they just cut the Broadcaster part of the decals they had made, Leo Fender was extremely frugal) then it became the "Telecaster" and followed up by the "Stratocaster." The implications to actual Radio Broadcasting was heavily implied since Television was really only for the REALLY well off in the early 50s. You are correct in that "Broadcasting" was the source of both the name and the colloquial implantation of using the "Casting" as a farm technique was well known (as the US and many countries still had a large percentage of their population living in rural areas and small towns) so that connection would not really need to be explained to them back then. This is more for a modern audience where the vast percentage of the Western World lives in major cities.
Sammy brother the reason that it sounds different depending on where you pick it is that closer to the bridge has less harmonics and closer to the neck has more
First off, those little holes in the machines come from a time when the tuning machine was mostly steel sometimes with a brass gear. The steel tuning shaft rode in steel holes and needed lubrication. But now, the modern version of these tuners have brass, bronze and even Teflon berrings and bushings in them, and they are factory packed with grease, so that they do not need oiling. And second the angle of the strat bridge pickup make the sound more distinct, it does not "help balance the sound". The angle make the treble strings sound MORE treble and makes the bass strings sound more bassey. Hence making the pickup sound less balanced.
Look up ditonic or Pythagorean comma. The problem is that any semi tonal scale is a compromise as a genuine harmonic scale does not quite divide into semitones. I thought the problem was with my guitar, or worse was my hearing. No. It's just that we use an artificial scale. Really x
That's a really interesting video. The American Pro II Tele has a string tree but also staggered tuners, I'm wondering if I can just not bother with it (the string tree that is, keeping the Tele!)?
Wasn’t the turned Strat pickup based on it being initially a mistake by shoving an old lap steel pickup into an early tele? Some say it should he the other way around which is what Hendrix essentially had
The angle of strat and tele pickups as well as the traditional placement of the split p-bass pickup (lower two strings PU farther from the bridge) are horrible decisions soundwise as they make the sound LESS balanced actually. It's the exact opposite of that myth of a more balanced sound. The reason so many companies copy that principle is 100% aesthetics only. There's no sound benefit in it - quite the contrary. At least ESP, Ibanez and Yamaha have reversed the PU placement in some of their basses. Unfortunately nobody dares to break the rules and counter angle a bridge single coil against the typical guitar body's angular shape. A bridge PU sound would indeed benefit massively from the opposite angle. But nopesters, you gotta follow the herd as a guitar builder it seems... Humans are dumb.
The benefit is that they make the bass strings bassier, and the treble strings treblier. I say that makes it more balanced because I like to hear greater string differentiation, balance sounds like a positive word, and since gravity doesn't apply to psychoacoustics, I also get to use this non-applicable word in a way that makes no rational sense but makes my preferencse seem objectively superior.
And here I thought the name Stratocaster is a homage to the legendary luthier Antonio Stradivari and the caster comes from "casting a spell" in the context of magic, because in comparison to a violin the electric guitar feels like a magical thing at that time...
Re: the Gibson tuning problem. Surely the Gibson company is aware of this annoying problem, so why don't they slant the 'D' and 'G' nut slots accordingly? Hello Gibson R&D Dept. can you hear me...?
My tuners on my accoustic guitar dont have lube holes but i did discover they have white stickers on them which i thought was part of the colour of them. Silly me not to notice before.
With all of the times I've seen people wanting to get rid of the trebly ice pick on strat bridges and/or tighten up the bottom end on guitars in general, I find it hard to believe the strat slant isn't backward.
Of course these holes are important... It is the reset hole, like you have on your phone... If you insert a needle in the hole, you reset your guitar to the default configuration
😂
Almost. It's where the government stores chips that track your shitty playing.
My guitar's like a tamagochi, I put a needle in the hole and my guitar gets reset into an egg and rehatches with new strings.
Good to know! I always thought it was for popping out the SIM
you have to hold the volume down while you plug it in, or blow into the output jack
"Lubed up and ready to twist" was crazy
Oh, but no mention about Sammy saying you can file your nut?
Crazy stuff
You need to get out more.
Wow the maturity
Why? That's what your mom tells me regularly 🤷♂️
Just FYI you can also just use a pencil to lube the nut so the strings don't catch, the graphite in pencil lead is a great lubricant and you can't get cheaper than a good old #2 pencil 😁
2B or not 2B that is the question...
i do this with a mechanical pencil! had the same one for a decade, just keep buying 0.5mm or 0.7mm so it fits in every nut slot lol i do it on both the nut and the bridge rightr before restringing to allow proper lubrication. works like a charm
I have a Gibson EDS-1275 double neck that wouldn't stay in tune. It had graphite in the nut. I restrung the guitar and used the nut sauce and it fixed it immediately.
@@IndyRockStar bro said nut sauce 💀
The easiest solution is to sell your Gibson and buy a properly-made guitar.
Cool facts! Never drop oil in that tuner hole--use a tiny bit of Vaseline as demonstrated. Oil will seep into the wood and stain the back of the headstock. It's pretty unsightly when that happens.
I reckon graphite would be best.
Isn’t that just going to add value, like relic’ing the guitar?
Ridiculously priced guitars have far worse done to them, than wood stain.
Mineral oil
Do not lubricate your tuners unless you want your guitar to go out of tune. They are supposed to be stiff.
@@dreamdiction where is that hole for then?
i still think ash tray covers on strats and teles look so cool
Same
I started playing guitar at 10 yrs old. I’m now 67 and I learned some information I never knew about. Great video 👍
I am 68 and have been playing since I was 13. I too learned some things I did not know. I still pick up one of my acoustics most nights just to play along to movie themes and relax. Not the performing pressure from the old days.
@@josephdurbin8736 70 and just started learning. Wonder if I will live enough to be 1/2 way decent!
73 and playing since 14 but I even have the spring in my Strat. Bought second hand a '66 transition model in '68 came with ashtray but no spring that I recall. Added many years later, 80's as I thought the thread was getting stripped and it didn't "hang" right anymore. Wrong I finally rediscovered the spring. 😆😂
O...m...g...the tiny spring for the firm whammy bar thing, how have i never heard of this in my 20 years of playing?? I've had so much sadness over that for so long, thank you for enlightening me!
**opens ink pen**
Don't feel goofy.. I've been playing guitar since I was 4yo 🤣
Only became half decent when I was around 8yo thanks to my Uncle.
I've had numerous guitars with bars over the years and at age 55, I literally only found out about these magic little springs about 3 years ago because two came with a squire affinity strat I bought.
If it weren't for the internets, I'd still be wondering where this little spring belongs
@@thegratefulnedyeh.. nowhere near the required tension
my understanding is the springs come as standard but are taped behind the bridge and people just don't see them, then they fall out and are lost.
@tobymearing8407 i will definitely be checking now! I have two with trem bars, one is a Floyd, which would be most useful on that one. My other three are tune-o-matics, which i prefer, but you gotta have a couple wiggle sticks!
Hey Samurai! Love your content. Both your musical journey and your journey as a content creator has inspired me greatly throughout the years. Thanks for all that you do!
The string tree claim is wrong. String trees exist to stop sympathetic buzzing. When a string doesn't have enough of a break angle(the angle from the playing surface to the tuner or wherever the string stops) the string behind the nut/bridge the sting will vibrate along with the playing area of the stings. The longer and thinner the string the more easily this will occur. If you look at some 60s student guitars you'll notice a string tree bar across all the strings because the headstock has a shallow break angle. Think about it this way if a string was perfectly straight after the nut or bridge there's not a lot stopping the entire length of the string from vibrating. I suppose a string tree may increase sustain a minor amount because the string isn't fighting itself vibrating at 2 different pitches but that isn't the main purpose.
It actually changes the pitch. The easiest way to hear this is when replacing standard machine heads with locking machine heads. Usually the top of the shaft sits lower and many players don't bother with string trees so if they are still on you can hear the difference in-between using and removing the string tree. Also the higher the pitch, the less that noise is heard by the pickups.
On hollow bodies you usually have the other end of the string in-between the bridge (usually floating) and the tailpiece. There is a split design called a Frequensator that splits the tailpiece design into two lengths and if you swap out a standard "Bird Swing" tailpiece for a Frequensator you can hear the difference. Also the difference in-between the bridge and the Trem unit for a Wide Swing Tremolo like on a Jazzmaster or Jaguar you can hear the sympathetic resonance and there is even a string guide you can add that goes on the top of the WST in order to increase downward pressure on the strings.
If you can't stand those overtones from sympathetic vibrations above the nut or below the bridge you can either buy products like Jimmy Clips or use foam (not pretty but it works) to absorb the sounds.
I agree and don't think the string tree adds much if any sustain. What it could theoretically do is to add a bit of elasticity. Jimmy Page moved the tail of his double neck way back toward the back of the guitar, lengthening the string. This changed the feel of bends. The longer the string, the greater the elasticity. You can find the same effect if you play two of the same guitar types, but one has a Bigsby - lengthening the strings. Having said that, the extra length provided by the string tree is pretty small and perhaps statistically insignificant.
@@michaelwamback9730
It depends on the type of string tree. I think the standard "bent tin" style trees are absolute crap. Even my budget guitars have Tusq string trees mainly to eliminate friction. I have other guitars that have the roller style to them and they tend to be higher than the stock "bent tin" ones so less of an angle between the nut and the tree.
Have I noticed more sustain from any of the upgraded trees? Not really. Do they work better than the stock ones? Yes, they do. I do have to be honest in the guitars that I put the new string trees on are usually highly modified so a before and after comparison is a massive difference. I found a great drop in locking tuners for my Import guitars so that goes on too. The only time where I hear a "bigger" difference is usually in replacing bridges (I prefer vintage Tele bridges so modern "vintage" takes with brass compensated barrels to me, feel and sound the best to my ear) and replacing the Trem block on a Stratocaster from stock to brass was probably the single biggest change. The string trees are more for downward pressure and reduced friction so it's basically taking care of a problem before it becomes a problem.
@@gringogreen4719 Not a fan of the standard trees either. I just always felt they were prone to binding. I replace them with the rounded ones on mine (not the roller - just rounded). It makes sense that 2 round objects touching each other at a 90 degree angle have the most minimal possible contact, which equals less friction, which equals less chance of binding.
As for the bridge, totally agree. The only things which really impact tone are the bridge and the nut. A hard nut like Tusq will be very different than plastic (although only on open strings - once you fret a string you remove the nut from the equation.) The construction of the bridge and materials it's made from can impact tone, and definitely sustain. Those Tune-O-Matic bridges have more sustain because of that knife edge not bleeding energy from the string as quickly.
So many snake oil products out there all promising they will add sustain, when they really don't do a thing other than put money in someone's pocket.
@@michaelwamback9730
I agree. Tusq was a way to make bone more of a uniform material. Bone changes in density so some bone is better than others, same as wood (in terms of quality and how useful it is). Some products do work better than others, I've had parts off of one guitar just be ok but once you love them to another guitar, they work even better. Go figure. So far the Tusq string trees work well as they are not a problem and they give the headstock a different vibe. That with the locking tuners have worked out so well I have done that combination in multiple guitars.
I agree with you that some parts are solutions in search of problems or something better replaced it, but these things need to be sold anyways.
Thank you for your video, I'm sure you must have mentioned this before in one of your videos but I can not stress enough how important it is to have your hearing tested and if needed to have hearing aids. I had no idea how much of the upper register of my hearing was lost until I got my hearing aids 3 years ago, I don't even know if I could hear some sound in the first place..... Now I have fallen in love with playing the guitar again especially my 12 string acoustic.
Soon after getting them I was watching a Hawker Hurricane (WWII Fighter) doing a flyby and the sound of the Merlin Engine was astounding.
5:05, For the whammy springs, make sure your guitar's whammy bar hole has a dead end. When i tried this with my Ibanez, the spring fell inside the body and eventually out the back cover hole where the springs are.
"The back hole cover where the springs are" seriously, please use its proper name: The Apple Airtag Storage Compartment
Great video! You can use a pencil in the nut slot as a lube - Pencil's use graphite and that will work just as well as some store bought lube.
Richard Fortus argues that the bridge pickup should be angled the other way. Hendrix perfected it by accident, and I agree.
Yeah I agree too. I actually thought the Fender bridge ones were slanted because when Leo Fender designed the Tele, the pickup he used (off a lap steel maybe?) was too wide for the string spacing so he had to angle it to make it fit.
@@stevendavidson391that’s what I heard too. It even was a 50/50 choice of which way to angle it and he just happened to choose that angle because hey, he had to choose one.
I don’t think how it sounded was even a consideration.
I think its more the changes in how we want the guitar to sound now (i.e. amplified and/or distorted) compared to when it was designed. Its the same reason why Gibson calls the pick ups Rhythm/Treble despite most rhythm guitar parts being play on the treble setting these days.
As someone who loves shooting and playing guitar, the moment I saw the thumbnail, I knew EXACTLY what you were going to say. Love your content man.
This may sound odd but … I really enjoyed the rhythm of this video. The pace of the information you delivered, the very short space between cuts, the speed of the speech. I could go on. Regardless of the content. I really enjoy the feel as well as finding everything you said interesting. Kudos on editing, lighting, sound quality and everything else you did to make this video. 👏🏻👍🏻👌🏼⭐️
Always wondered why the P-Bass was called that. Thanks for this!
LOVE this video. 40 years of playing and I didn't know half these things. Awesome!
Love this format for videos
samuraiguitarist, You're amazing! I hit the like button as soon as I saw it!
The p bass info was dope thanks
Been doing this, as required for almost 50 years now. But glad you are catching up !!
We need more Steve!
Also, standard tuning is just the ultimate compromise
I learned so much in less than 10 mins. Excellent informative vid man!
Another reason for standard tuning is that when using it, you can play the basic chords in C without moving from first position (even B dim, which is a little tricky, but doable), many of the other major and minor chords as well as a few of the sus and aug chords right there at the nut. Try that with alternate tunings, especially if you want 5 and/or 6 string chords.
Uuummm aktually, a B chord would be played at the Second Position. Boo yah, sucka! Got cho ass.
Now, who's the Smart Guitar Guy? That's damn right. Me.
@@GazerOfShoe B dim, x2Ox31. First position .
@@GazerOfShoe And just for fun: B Maj x21x03 (if you are feeling really stretchy, add the B on the G string at fret 4 with your 3rd finger). Also in the first position.
@@GazerOfShoe Now, how about a BMinor?
020022: first position.
@@GazerOfShoe Would you like a Bsus2?
x2xx22, First position.
re: why the tuning is E-E
i've experimented a little with different string gauges and the string tension calculator stringjoy provides, and if you're able to go approximate the same tension (say c# to c# with ernie ball mammoths vs. standard with 10s) the guitar sounds equally good and is equally easy to play. i haven't experimented with doing the converse with 8s or similar but that might work too!
Yeah, I have my main guitar (25.5" scale) tuned to B with d'addario light baritone strings and it actually plays better than my other guitar in standard because the neck is thinner.
I think the string gauges were chosen based on the pitches though, not the other way around
@@toekey7570 Yup. It's called the Stuttgart pitch. Which is also why the A is 440Hz.
I think you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned why is E the standard when you mentioned it sounding well with the human voice. I think that frequency and tuning is the easiest to match with any vocal you are faced with. Especially live and raw. Which everything pretty much was back then. No autotune. Not many effects or pedals. Things like this. You don't get any better then a raw live guitar and vocals.
It's because of the Stuttgart pitch...
5:34 these help to exacerbate the problem described earlier in the video: 1:16
I never had a string pop out of the nut while playing. The only issue (for some) is the sympathetic vibration of strings behind the nut. But of all the strings it mostly affects the G, which on many Fender guitars doesn't have a string tree anyway! So just bypass the string trees for better tuning stability and wrap a cloth ribbon or something around those ringing strings, make sure it isn't tight, and that'll take care of the ringing.
These recent videos of the past few months have been a huge improvement in quality, pacing, and quantity. Hats off to you, SammyG!
The lubing of tuners was a great tip !
I love these type of videos because some of this stuff makes me wonder why,and you answer them
Absolutely loved the info, I wondered about a few of these and found it really cool to learn. Thank you so much.
That was very informative and interesting. I learned alot of things that I never knew.
Great stuff! Thanks, SG!!
cool info! lot of things I've sometimes wonder myself and my students also asked me. thanks man!
Happy almost 10 years on yt sam
I had to replace the tuners on my 1968 Gibson acoustic because I didn't know what those holes were for. 40 years of never lubing them resulted in them becoming almost impossible to turn.
I did keep the old tuners, though, just in case of the highly unlikely event that I decide to sell the guitar, and the buyer might want the original equipment.
Thank you for these little bits of info
Really fun and helpful all ‘round
If you have a vintage guitar with a nitro finish, it's a good idea to remove your tuners to lubricate them. Overflow will leak out and react with the finish, which can't be fixed without a refinish.
Because you are the one and only samurai guitarist. I believe you owe it to all of the rest of us. Grasshoppers to do an overview of the slammeri distortion pedal.
I really enjoyed this video. Nicely done!
Yeh. Drip a little drop of 3-IN-1 oil in there, or down the string post ... OR BOTH!! Then do the Chubby Checker on those tuning key knobs to get it worked in ... every time you change strings.
7:17 I actually think the last reason for tuning might be the most probable one from my experience. As a baritone, which is the most common male voice type (at least in where i live), the low E is pretty much as low as i can sing (except for morinings ;-) ), and high E is as high as i can sing.
"Your Guitar sounds its best when it is really Loud" - YES! New subscriber. And I'm a drummer. But I have always said this and people thought I was nuts. Now who is really nuts? And I'm nuts for Loud Guitars! I tried first playing guitar. I was already playing Trumpet in school, and when I was 14-15 I took guitar lessons. And after 2 years I was not happy at the way I sounded. And told my guitar teacher I was thinking about taking a break from lesson and honest, his answer was: "Thank God! Oops I didn't mean to say that". Yeah you did, I suck on guitar. One year later after saving my money I bought a new Pearl Export drum set with Zildjian Custom A cymbals $1,800. And this time around I skipped the lessons, learning on my own. lol
always something new to learn about how the guitar works, thanks.
I heard somewhere that reason for the major3rd b string was a comprimise to alternate between playing chords and solo picking....ease for runs, as you said. Makes sense.
Thank you, I can feel my brain getting bigger! 😊
I tried using chapstick under the third string - took out 80% of the highs. Only now months later is back to normal. Will try the sauce. Thanks for these tips.
Loved this! Informative.
I saw the thumbnail and came here looking for marriage advice.
And now she’s lubed up and ready to twist?
Lmao
😂
Lol 😂 marriage advice
You’ve got a great channel bro, one of a few inspirations for my channel! Keep it up 🤙
been watching your channel for years and just realised i've not subscribed xD but i am now!
Thanks for the info! Gonna go add more nut sauce to my guitar to improve my playing 😊👍
Great stuff. Really learned a lot.
Nice vid. I'll be looking for more from you.
0:43 but why would you want the higher strings to sound brighter. Seems less balanced
It’s about trying to boost the fundamental frequencies of the notes
@@angrypantsman6034 so bridge humbuckers are positioned wrong?
@@caseykittel I wasn’t suggesting it’s the “right” way to do it, just the reasoning behind it.
You are correct. For many Strats it would make more sense to slant it the other way. Originally it was done to give a bright tone for soloing. Back in the day when Leo created Strat and Tele the amp were low power, dark and clean. You needed plenty on top end to stand out in a mix.
Reverse slant strats sound better through modern (as in, not 1950s) rigs yeah. Actually one of the things that went into Hendrix's bridge tone imo
imo, having that major third in standard tuning makes harmony a lot easier, but I think it's bad that it's on the B string.
Oud has a similar tuning, but the major third is between the bass and the treble. This makes playing melody way less confusing, but you still get harmony between the open strings. It's still a bit confusing when you have a melodic line going to the bass, but that's far less likely to happen. Tuning is usually CFADGC (3rd is F-A), FADGCF (3rd is F-A), or DGBEAD (3rd is G-B).
Excellent presentation and information.
Why we like electric guitars loud specifically is less to do with the Fletcher-Munsen curve, its more to do with amplifiers & clipping. Generally we don't want amplifiers to distort, but when we start to distort things, that initial bit of clipping we regard as "warmth" as the lower harmonics will start to clip first, which results in increased lower mids and extra harmonic content increasing the frequency range, as well as increased sustain as the sound is starting to compress. All in all, it just makes how electric guitar sounds & plays more exciting and we've pushed it far beyond "warmth" and guitar amplifiers, even legendary "clean" amps are designed more for this than an actual reproduction of the signal going in. So "That" point on the volume knob where your guitar comes alive, that's when it's starting to distort.
Then there's resonant feedback!
So guitarists liking things loud is more about the effects from clipping than simply being loud.
Regarding Gibsons, just learn to restring a guitar properly. The headstock is possibly a bit more sensitive to bad restringing habits. No need for any popular "hacks". My Les Paul Studio was terrible when I first got it and when I restrung it for the first time, all the problems disappeared and its as solid as any other guitar I've owned since.
While that's true, I don't think that's what he was getting at.
It's why people turn up music on the stereo - it has nothing to do with the guitar signal clipping.
@@nuberiffic As I said, in the context of electric guitar, it's hugely relevant because of the dramatic change it has both on the sound & behaviour of the instrument.
If none of this took place then "bedroom" tones would be easy.
I like how you put this.
I'm curious to as we all have differing opinions on what we want for a distorted tone, does anyone ever have a preferred distortion (softclip vs hardclip, preamp distortion vs poweramp distortion, etc...) that they prefer loud?
I find myself liking a smooth, warm softclip overdrive from the preamp loud where I can feel it. When doing country, rockabilly, blues, or roots rock, I like the rougher poweramp distortion or that Fender barely there dirt to be at moderate volume. Of course the latter does screw with my ears worse so that may be why. I think it may be where the harmonics occur and that one of my ears is really sensitive to high-mids to the point of being painful.
Phil McKnight covered the D/G issue on LPs and mentioned its not the angle on its own, the reason is they cut the nut too deep and generally not sloped correctly. The top of the string should stick out of the nut slightly, so if you see the string completely flush or lower than the top of the nut, paired with the angle, you’ll get tuning instability. Its why you don’t see the issue with other 3x3 headstocks with just as aggressive of an angle, but see it on every Gibson - Gibson “keeping it authentic” meaning Gibson not improving their nut cuts for decades.
Gibson uses an aggressive ~17º headstock angle which results in a much higher compression force on the nut and more friction between nut and strings. Other 3x3's use a shallower angle (Epiphone ~14º, PRS ~10º, etc)
Many people joke that the jointed Epiphone headstock design is superior, but cork sniffing Gibson buyers wouldn't buy a Les Paul if the G string was in tune as it's not authentic!
Yep. Quality nut work with curve, slope, shallow slots, and a very high polish will fix it. Most people have no idea how to do it perfectly.
If the material used in the nut won’t take a high polish then it’s not an ideal material. Bone takes an extremely high polish.
By high I mean no less than # 10,000 on the JIS standard.
Great video. Keep up the great work.
This was great!!
Thank you Samurai Guitarist.
I keep a pencil with my string change tools, when i change a string I rub that in the nut slot, and bridge.
The graphite acts as a lubricant and it works.
My guitars stay in tune and I don’t break strings at the nut or bridge anymore.
0:51 Highs being higher and lows being lower makes it a less balanced sound. The more balanced way would be opposite of this. It's like on a P-bass where the bass strings are more bassy and the treble strings are more trebly, and why many people run a reverse P pickup to balance it.
I didn't worry too much about the spring in the wammy bar hole on my strat. I tried it and still have it in but not sure. I like it mostly out of the way and it drops away when I let it go. With it raised it seems to get in the way. I've had my strat for 40 years btw.
What an excellent video, thanks!
Ah, that's why when you are tuning using standard tuning you move up a fret when going from G to B! I tune harmonically except for B :). I use standard tuning techniques for B because I never learned the harmonic for B :P Also, now I know a name for those string holder thingies (that was my prior name for them) - string trees! Finally, I have an old Squire Strat that for some reason has two string trees and a very pronounced angle past the nut. I always had a problem keeping it in tune because of the E and G strings! I swear I could put that guitar in it's case after playing and it's perfectly in tune. I pick it up the next day and it's already a few cents off.
Super interesting, thanks!
I heard you can use a graphite pencil on the nut slots also
it is my belief allthough only my own opinion, the ones who designed these and all instruments, had so much insight, and it seems that they had put a lot of thought into their desisions,
consider, you would most likley be playing with a piano and you are able to play all the diatonic chords in the key of C on a guitar open ! even with four notes ? so to me this explains standard guitar tuining very well
My 2 tips for electric guitars are:
1. Grab a phillips-head screwdriver and wind your pickups closer to the strings, focus on the one closest to the bridge and the front one.
This will give you a brilliant Metallica Kill Em All tone or a bassy Black Sabbath tone depending on your tone switch position. 🙂
2. Lower your strings by adjusting the grub screws on the bridge, wind them out about half way so you have about a 4mm gap between the strings and the fretboard. (You'll have to retune the strings afterwards.)
These 2 tips will give you a hyperactive pickup tone and make even a cheap guitar sound great while giving you the ability to play fast and accurate. 🙂
The reverberation is transferred through the air into the body, not the bridge (primarily). The bridge (& nut or fret) are actually nodal points in the standing wave of the string, meaning that the string isn’t actually moving (or in practice, moving bugger all) at the points where it physically contacts the guitar
5:53 Gotta fact check the part on the standard tuning. Renaissance lutes have frets, play chords and are tuned in 4ths, G-C-F-A-D-G (plus optional bass strings) I think since around 1200.
(Tune a guitar's 3rd string down to F# and then capo at the 3rd fret.) The familiar moveable guitar chord shapes work on a lute, except shifted up 1 string.
I don't know the exact history, but lute tablature predates standard music notation.
I'm sure I read somewhere that Leo Fender meant the Stratocaster bridge pickup to be bright so as to give something of the sound of a hawaiian steel guitar, which he was a fan of.
regarding to the _caster thing. Fenders biggest failure (in hint sight) was naming the Jazzmaster Jazzmaster instead of Surfcaster. I love my Jazzmaster, but I call it the Surfcaster. Even tho I play way more Jazz on it, than Surf stuff :D
wow master class!! Thank you so much!!!
You can use graphite (pencil lead) to lubricate the nut.
One extra note on lubricating tuners: be VERY careful using a liquid oil lubricant on Gibson guitars (or any guitar with a nitrocellulose finish), because it can leak out of the tuner casing and stain your finish around the tuner. I've been watching Trogly's channel, and he keeps pointing out the discoloured finish around tuners on instruments where the tuners were re-lubed with an oil.
Do you have any recommendations for brand/type or do we just need to go easy on how much we use
@@futureace73 Honestly, no idea. Even Trogly didn't mention a recommendation in his videos, if I remember. I remember reading a forum post once that mentioned powdered graphite, but it's really messy. I think Samurai's idea of Vaseline might be a good bet, as the gel will stay in place and not flow around (and he did say he asked an actual luthier).
AFAIK standard E tuning is what it is to make most if the basic chords (C major, E minor, etc.) easy to play, and to have as many of them as possible relatively easy. Nobody cared if the lowest sting is E as it did not affect the key they would play in like it is nowadays. It was all about easy availability of chord shapes. And in fact, the lowest string they considered to be relevant was actually the D string, and the lowest E is ab extra that was added again to have more open chord shapes available easily... It was just the ultimate compromise for needs of music styles at the time.
The "Caster" part of Telecaster and Stratocaster was similar to "Broadcaster" and "Broadcasting" in the it comes from farming. Casting is how a farmer or a farmhand distributes seeds by throwing them in a controlled manner. So the Caster part was in realtion to spreading out the notes or your sound.😉👍✨
Sort of correct. Broadcasting comes from radio use, which comes from casting which farming gets from cast, AKA throw. Etymology of a word is easy now with the Internet, you may want to check what I said, I haven't.
@@DavidBostock-ti2fv
Well, yeah. The guitar was first the "Broadcaster" and then the "Nocaster" (they just cut the Broadcaster part of the decals they had made, Leo Fender was extremely frugal) then it became the "Telecaster" and followed up by the "Stratocaster." The implications to actual Radio Broadcasting was heavily implied since Television was really only for the REALLY well off in the early 50s.
You are correct in that "Broadcasting" was the source of both the name and the colloquial implantation of using the "Casting" as a farm technique was well known (as the US and many countries still had a large percentage of their population living in rural areas and small towns) so that connection would not really need to be explained to them back then. This is more for a modern audience where the vast percentage of the Western World lives in major cities.
The guy was an electrician, not a farmer. Didn't overthink it. He was broadcasting sound electronically. The end
Sammy brother the reason that it sounds different depending on where you pick it is that closer to the bridge has less harmonics and closer to the neck has more
ok, most of it I knew... But still great to have educational videos like this.
Thanks for this 🎸
Thanks ,know a lot now one should know all they can I'm new at playing at 55
3-in-1 oil is considered the best stuff for tuner lube. Other things tend to gunk up
if you bottom-wind the G on a Gibson it gives it a little more break angle and far fewer issues.
Nice info thanks
First off, those little holes in the machines come from a time when the tuning machine was mostly steel sometimes with a brass gear. The steel tuning shaft rode in steel holes and needed lubrication. But now, the modern version of these tuners have brass, bronze and even Teflon berrings and bushings in them, and they are factory packed with grease, so that they do not need oiling. And second the angle of the strat bridge pickup make the sound more distinct, it does not "help balance the sound". The angle make the treble strings sound MORE treble and makes the bass strings sound more bassey. Hence making the pickup sound less balanced.
Look up ditonic or Pythagorean comma.
The problem is that any semi tonal scale is a compromise as a genuine harmonic scale does not quite divide into semitones. I thought the problem was with my guitar, or worse was my hearing. No. It's just that we use an artificial scale. Really x
That's a really interesting video. The American Pro II Tele has a string tree but also staggered tuners, I'm wondering if I can just not bother with it (the string tree that is, keeping the Tele!)?
Cool thanks!
Wasn’t the turned Strat pickup based on it being initially a mistake by shoving an old lap steel pickup into an early tele? Some say it should he the other way around which is what Hendrix essentially had
5:05 but what if im looking for more flop and swing to my arms?
The angle of strat and tele pickups as well as the traditional placement of the split p-bass pickup (lower two strings PU farther from the bridge) are horrible decisions soundwise as they make the sound LESS balanced actually. It's the exact opposite of that myth of a more balanced sound. The reason so many companies copy that principle is 100% aesthetics only. There's no sound benefit in it - quite the contrary. At least ESP, Ibanez and Yamaha have reversed the PU placement in some of their basses. Unfortunately nobody dares to break the rules and counter angle a bridge single coil against the typical guitar body's angular shape. A bridge PU sound would indeed benefit massively from the opposite angle. But nopesters, you gotta follow the herd as a guitar builder it seems... Humans are dumb.
The benefit is that they make the bass strings bassier, and the treble strings treblier. I say that makes it more balanced because I like to hear greater string differentiation, balance sounds like a positive word, and since gravity doesn't apply to psychoacoustics, I also get to use this non-applicable word in a way that makes no rational sense but makes my preferencse seem objectively superior.
@@martinkrauser4029, Jimi Hendrix
And here I thought the name Stratocaster is a homage to the legendary luthier Antonio Stradivari and the caster comes from "casting a spell" in the context of magic, because in comparison to a violin the electric guitar feels like a magical thing at that time...
Re: the Gibson tuning problem. Surely the Gibson company is aware of this annoying problem, so why don't they slant the 'D' and 'G' nut slots accordingly? Hello Gibson R&D Dept. can you hear me...?
String trees for me helps remove dead notes and improves tuning stability aswell as your examples :j
My tuners on my accoustic guitar dont have lube holes but i did discover they have white stickers on them which i thought was part of the colour of them. Silly me not to notice before.
With all of the times I've seen people wanting to get rid of the trebly ice pick on strat bridges and/or tighten up the bottom end on guitars in general, I find it hard to believe the strat slant isn't backward.
Good one Sammy