How to Restring Your Electric Guitar

So what electric guitar do you have?

What are the benefits of each (hardtail/Synchronised trem/Floyd Rose)

Firstly it’s important to know what kind of guitar you have and to understand the mechanics behind how they operate.

There are several different types of guitar and several different ways the strings are anchored to the body.

All electric guitar strings for basic electric guitars have what’s called a ball end on them, this anchors the string to the guitar at one end and is then wound at the opposite end by the guitars machine heads, we will cover this in a later article.

So first let’s talk saddles, saddles or bridges as they can be known are where the string sits prior to passing over the pickups then running up the neck, the strings are anchored to the body of the guitar, this is where your right hand sits and picks at the strings (your left if you’re a lefty) the main job of the saddle is to help the string align with the neck that then passes over a nut and is secured with machine heads/tuning  keys to a headstock. The saddles can be adjusted when needed to alter the height of the string and adjust the intonation (string length) intonation gives you the correct length for the string so that when it is fretted (played) it is in the correct key, very important as no one wants a guitar that is in tune but not playing in the correct key when fretted.

So here are the basic types of saddles:

Hardtail/fixed saddle : 6/7 saddles depending on the style of guitar most commonly you get six string guitars there are many variations but let’s stick to six/seven-string guitars, the strings are fed either through the body from underneath the guitar or from machined holes towards the back of the hardtail, very common on Les Paul style guitars, Gibson’s.

Pros: easy to restring, great tuning stability, more sustain, easy for beginners

Cons: Can’t bend the pitch of strings unless you bend by hand.

Synchronised tremolo system: again six or seven saddles depending on style of guitar but with a hole to the right of the trem (the abbreviation of tremolo, actually a vibrato) very common on Stratocaster style guitars, this is where a whammy bar/trem bar usually screws in allowing the player to bend the notes changing their pitch, never over tighten a trem bar as you can split the trem block rendering the system useless. (I will cover this in a later article)

Pros: Easy to change the pitch of the string, easy to restring. Medium tuning stability

Cons: needs a good setup to be able to use efficiently, can make keeping the guitar in tune more difficult.

Floating trem: (Floyd rose) or double locking trem system these are much different to setup but work in pretty much the same way as a synchronised trem the previous system I have mentioned as the process used is much more time consuming to restring and set up the guitar owing to the fact that the ball ends on the guitar strings all need to be cut off the, locked into place, there are a series of springs that perfectly balance the tremolo so that the strings can not only be bent down but up?

Pros: think Satriani/via, dive bombing galore, incredible tuning stability. Masses of fun

Cons: difficult and time consuming to restring, best left to a technician, this can be costly as the amount of time it takes to reset the guitar and balance it so that is playable.

So! There you have the three most common types of saddle, there are permutations on these but most guitars are based on these three designs.

If you would like more information on how to restring your electric guitar, please give us a call on 01704 532145 or pop in and see us in our Southport store.