Truss rod truth

[pgilmor]

I have heard for years from "Everybody" that if you loosen the strings on a guitar for any lenth of time, such as when traveling or storing a guitar, or even just long enough to change strings, that you can damage the neck because the truss rod is pulling back the other direction to balance the tension.

I don't believe it. I think that the truss rod is simply a reinforcement that makes the neck stiffer and harder to move.

So, please, from builders who know, is the neck in fact pre-stressed, or is it just reinforced?

Thank you much,
Pat

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by pgilmor

is the neck in fact pre-stressed, or is it just reinforced?

Depends on the instrument and the type of rod/reinforcement installed.

Regardless, under "normal" circumstances, one can leave it set for ideal playing - one does not need to adjust it when string tension is removed or the guitar put in storage. If one feels compelled to fool with the thing on those occasions, it won't harm the guitar to release the truss rod tension/compression. But, it doesn't need to be done.

[Glen DeRusha]

Truss rods is one of my favorite subjects. In my opinion, guitars are works of art and you really should not let them fall into careless hands. Don't believe everything you hear? You might want to take each and every guitar on a case by case basis? I said "might", and I ended it with a question mark on purpose.

Blanket statements like, you should do this, or you ought to do that, don't always hold up. It depends. Is this something that you are going to throw into a canoe and take it down the rapids with no case? Or is this something that you are going to play at Carnagie Hall when you get back from your trip to Paris?

It usually doesn't take very much heat, to heat treat a neck to straighten it out. Now if it was put together with epoxy, and 14 large registration pins were used, it might be a different story. So if you have your guitar set up for heavy gauge strings, when you chop them off, the truss rod should back bow the neck more then if you had extra lights on it. And then take said guitar and leave it in your car for a couple days in August, in Phoenix, it should heat treat a back bow into the neck that the string tension won't pull out of it when you string it back up. Unless it is made out of a steel I beam of course.

Of course someone will have a brother or a cousin with a Gibson J-45 that will defy all rules of guitar building. You can drive over it with a tank and not hurt it. That's what I have been told anyway.

"is the neck in fact pre-stressed, or is it just reinforced?"

It depends. Who made it? What did they do when they made it? Who worked on it last? What did they do when they worked on it last? How well was the wood that they used "seasoned" before they used it? And the list goes on and on?

So it depends. What is it? Where are you going to store it? In the attic through the summer? In the celler next to the sump pump? Where and when are you going to travel with it? And for how long? Etc.

Glen

[redir]

I wouldn't over think it too much. You definitely do not need to worry about the truss rod when changing strings. If you are storing the guitar then you want to tune down a whole step and just leave it at that.

If some one abuse the truss rod in the past ie they tried to use the rod to correct for a neck reset so that the rod it's under a lot of tension then you may want to loosen it for storage.

[Glen DeRusha]

[QUOTE=redir;3296128]I wouldn't over think it too much. QUOTE]

I would over think it. I make my living by fixing things for people because they didn't think.

Glen

[redir]

It's a good way to make a living I did it for several years myself and kind of miss it. But now I have more time for building so it's a sort of blessing in disguise.