Electric Guitar Trends

All of the advice says that you could really damage to your guitar if you adjust your guitar truss rod.  I suppose that’s true, given that your guitar’s truss rod is threaded to a bolt deep inside the neck of your guitar.  If the rod snaps, or the bolt comes unseated, your guitar could become almost worthless.

This is less likely to happen with a new guitar, that is not so set in its ways.  And last year I had two guitars that had clearly developed a neck bow over the winter months. I was not looking forward to leaving my guitar with a guitar tech for who knows how long.

So, I screwed up my courage, and attempted to adjust the truss rod of my ESP EC-1000 Deluxe first.  It was a strange feeling turning that allen key - you can see what it is doing, but you can’t actually see it turning inside the neck of your guitar.

About a 1/2 turn later, I had a guitar that had lower action, played faster, and intonated better. A miracle!

Next I took on my Gibson Billie Joe Armstrong Les Paul Junior.  This puppy took 1 1/2 turns to straighten out the neck.  Rather a lot, considering that the neck is also getting slightly compressed, as the rod gets screwed further into its fitting.  There is the chance that, over the years the fret board could become bumpy. Again, the results were wonderful for my Junior.

I should quickly add that I prefer a straight guitar fret board, because I have a light touch. A straight guitar neck is not for everyone and some neck relief is normal.  Also both of these guitars can be adjusted with the strings on.  This a good feature because it eliminates some trial and error.

In the end, I not only saved time and money by adjusting thosee truss rods myself, I now feel confident to make minor corrections with the seasons.