Tag Archives: setup

Yamaha Pacifica Set-up

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So yesterday a lovely chap dropped over his Yamaha Pacifica 112 guitar which was in need of a setup. In its lifetime it had been strong with 9’s, 8’s, and mostly recently 10’s, leading to a raised tremolo bridge and high action. The bridge saddles were set flat, so they needed attention too.

The client simply wanted the guitar set for the 10’s, with minimal buzz – at a height whereby his fingers didn’t rise on top of his fingers.

In order to achieve this, I fitted an extra spring to the tremolo, which brought the bridge flat to the body (another request of the client), and then set about getting the action just so.

I set it to factory settings (1.9mm and 2.4mm at the top fret respectively for each E string), and this was to the customer’s liking.

After intonating the guitar and a quick polish, this guitar spent a little over 36hrs in my possession all told, and it was great to be able to get it back into the customer’s hands before Christmas!


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Gibson Les Paul Standard – Fret Stone and Electrics Troubleshoot

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There seems to be lots of lovely Gibson Les Pauls around here! This particular one is a left hander, in ebony, and the condition was such that it needed quite a deal of love and tidying up.

The fret wire came to me severely pitted, and it looked like it would be borderline whether this would be a re-fret or whether a simple fret stone/re-crown would suffice.

Having seen how little fret height you can get away with on a Les Paul, I went ahead with the fret stone option, and it came out really well. There’s a lot more life yet in these frets, and after some careful work, this guitar was back to playable!

The action was so low when it arrived, that the strings were completely choking on the upper frets, however that has been rectified and there is a consistent feel along the length of the neck.

One other problem that needed fixing was a faulty tone control. Upon inspection this turned out to be a broken leg from the capacitor joining the bridge volume pot to the tone pot. It was an easy job to switch it out, and now the LP has its full compliment of controls working again!

A final clean and polish finished this baby off, and she was gratefully received!


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Ibanez Set-up

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Just a quick post about an ibanez guitar in need of some love!

The nut was sitting white high on top of a couple of brass shims, and upon removal the action over the lower frets was much better.

I was also able to tweak the truss rod to allow a little more bow in the neck, then take the bridge down by a fraction, and now she’s playing super-slick! Oooh yeah!


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Squier Refret

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This Squier guitar is getting the refret treatment because the owner desires a different feel to the guitar – the previous fret wire was so shallow it made it very difficult to bend and play expressively, so we’re replacing the existing profile with a taller one.  Here’s the guitar so far – more tomorrow!

 

Strat Fret Stone and Set-up

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Today I spent some time fret stoning and setting up a Fender USA Deluxe Strat.  The fret wear was fairly consistent along the neck, although the upper frets/dusty end weren’t too worn, so needed a touch more attention to bring them into line with the rest of the neck.  It was plain sailing though, and sure enough this baby is ready to sing and get going again!

Player’s Tele

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This was a set-up that had three saddles in a vintage configuration.  The action was able to come down significantly and the relief in the neck was already sufficient for a decent feel, so no need to touch the truss rod on this occasion.  Getting the intonation balanced was certainly time-consuming, but the end result was lovely!


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