[Author’s note: This is a repost dated Oct 16th, 2006 - taken from my old blog.]

Ok, this is for noobs. It’s gonna be done on J’s guitar. It is a decent Fender, pretty trustworthy. We used it for most of our practices back when we were in school. The high-E string was broken when I borrowed it. Maybe it was left untouched for too long. Or maybe it was a case of mishandling. Anyway, the rest of the strings were in bad shape too so I figured that I’d have all of them replaced.

That’s the view of the headstock before anything was done to the guitar. Note that the G and B strings have been incorrectly wound. The strings should not run ‘on the outside’ of the extension (in the picture, refer to the top-right tuner, and the one below it). They should run on the ‘inside’, like those of the bass strings (refer to the three tuners on the left). The reason? See following pic.

From this angle, it is obvious that the G-string (pun unintended) is touching the B-string. As a result, the string is slightly bent (top-right tuner). Same goes to the B-string. The bass strings (all three tuners on the left-hand-side) have been correctly wound, though. So this is a case of inconsistency. It should be avoided because the direction of the tuners is affected as well. For example, if counter-clockwise means tightening the string, an inconsistency like this may result in the person accidentally breaking a string by tightening it, instead of loosening it as intended. Get it? Now let’s replace the broken string.

This is the bridge area, where you can see 6 rounded ’stoppers’ that hold the strings in place. You’ve gotta first remove the stoppers in order to remove the string.

Yeah it’s *that* long. By the way, usually they are too tight for our bare fingers. So use a tool. A plier or something. Becareful though, you don’t want to break those plastic stoppers.

A new string. Of course, don’t make silly mistakes like choosing the wrong string! A high-E string means a high-E string. Fixing a wrong string and trying to tune it up to high E note will obviously break it.

Insert the new string into the bridge. Don’t insert the string without a round ’stopper’ at the end! All new strings should come with this at one end (that gold-coloured little ring in picture. Of course, it may not always come in gold colour lah!).

After inserting, replace that ’stopper’ (look, I don’t know what it’s called formally but what it does is that it ’stops’ or prevents the end of the string from slipping). If you notice carefully, the stopper has a ‘lining’ that allows the string to go through it, but narrow enough to prevent that ‘gold ring’ from slipping out. Rotate the stopper such that the lining faces the soundhole. This is common sense. You’ll know what I’m talking about once you see it. Remember to press it in firmly once you’re done.

Insert the other end of the string into the hole on the extension of the tuner. You might want to loop it a few times first to prevent slipping. But don’t use a plier or anything like that to tighten it! Just loop it one or twice is more than enough. Then, turn the tuning knob clockwise, viewed from the side. Ok, bad description. In any case, just ensure that you turn in the direction such that the string ‘runs on the inside’ of the extension (don’t make the mistake shown in the first and second pic above!).

That’s how it should look like once it’s done. This is the conventional way of winding the strings. If you’re lazy, like most seasoned rockers are, you may want to avoid straining your wrist by turning the tuner so many times. That’s why you see some of their guitars have very messy windings with strings protruding from all over, and there are only 2 or 3 loops made around these ’studs’. Honestly, I do think that that is cooler. But let’s stick to the ‘long-winded’, proper way. Note that the B-string is touching the winding - which it shouldn’t be. Now we shall replace that B-string with a new one, and wind it correctly.

Since it is not a broken string, REMEMBER to loosen it first before you do anything! Furthermore, in this case, since the direction of the winding is wrong, make sure that the tuning knob is turned in the direction that would loosen the string, and not tightening it. You don’t want a high-tension steel string to snap for nothing.

The rest of the steps are similar with the ones discussed earlier. The pic above shows the shiny, new B-string.

And its winding on the ‘tuning stud’ (again, I made up this name). The string now runs on the ‘inside’ and as a result, it does not come into contact with the E-string which we first wound.

Next, we shall replace the G-string that have also been wrongly wound (shown touching the B-string in pic).

A new G-string, with god-knows-how-many-loops in the winding. Actually, you can just cut it shorter before actually winding it. That way, you don’t need to loop so many times. Now proceed and replace the remaining strings in a similar manner.

All-new, shiny strings. Rust-free and sound good! Let’s take a look at the headstock after all the strings have been replaced.

The strings do not come into contact with anything now. All have been wound in the right direction. Note that the bass strings have considerably lower number of loops in their winding compared to the treble strings. (Btw, bass strings refer to the three thickest strings and the ‘treble strings’ simply refer to the thinner ones. I made up the ‘treble’ name. I don’t think there is a ‘formal’ name for them.). That’s because I had cut them into shorter length to avoid looping so many times. In the case of the A-string (middle-left), there are only two loops made :).

Here are some more pics.

That’s J’s Fender. The guy’s currently reading actuarial science in Canada. And the Malaysian community in the university made him the Vice President of the Malaysian Association there (something like that). Haha.

Old, rusty strings. Not only do they stain your fingers, their sound quality is bad, too. And you also wouldn’t want your fingers to be cut by them during sliding. Next up:

Yep. In my next post, we’ll be replacing classical guitar strings. Actually, I bought these two sets of strings together, today. No broken strings on my classical guitar though, but they’re damn old and sound terrible. When a string is old, you can tell by its out-of-tune in different parts when played. Maybe I’ll also blog about guitar tuning basics some time next week. But as for now, I’m hitting the sack.

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