Installing Strings in an Electric Guitar

There are several ways of stringing your guitar, ways are from simple as just to insert the string at the post hole and winding up to more sophisticated ways. Stringing your guitar should not be a minor subject as a wrong stringing could create out of tune problems and reduce string longlife. So, there is a way called locking tie which is a simple method and worked great with me for more than 30 years of guitar playing.

Safety issues: Yes indeed, before starting stringing your guitar, you must carefully control your string waste such as string cuts and old replaced strings for disposal. Remember that some guitar strings are sharper than needles and could produce serious injuries, so be sure to keep these strings waste away from children and pets.

Fig. 1

Now lets go back to the locking tied stringing method: before start you will need some basic tools such as cutter and a string winder (Fig 1) and a tuner (preferable). Place the guitar on a table and over a soft cover to avoid scratches on finishing. I suggest to go string by string instead of removing the old strings first, this is to avoid sudden changes of tension at the neck.

Now take one string (I suggest to star with the 1st string) pass the string by the post hole and leave enough string to wrap 3 times around the post (Fig 2).



                              



Fig.2

You will make the first wrap OVER the string (see Fig 3) and the following wraps will be under the string (Fig4). 



Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Try to keep constant pressure on string while you are winding it up. Then tune to new string and bend it along the fretboard as show in Fig. 5a & 5b

                                     

Fig. 5a: bending 1st string after installed

Fig. 5b

                                        

After this, re-tune the string again and repeat this operation many times till the string keep tuned after bending. Repeat the same operation for the rest of strings, when you place a new string and bend a re-tune, it is important to check that the other strings are tuned too. Finally you can cut the excess of string on the posts by using a cutter (Fig. 6).



Fig. 6