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  #1  
Old 01-10-2018, 06:32 PM
Mtbbirder Mtbbirder is offline
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Default back bow after man years of collecting dust...

Hello everyone,

I just put tuning machines and finally strings on an Alvarez Regent 5210. About 20 years ago I took the machines off and it went unstrung until today. No I never took any precautions for storage as I honestly didn't know any better. So it's seen 5 homes and never a case mostly leaning on a wall in closet from place to place.

I think the neck relaxed after so much time unstrung. I have tuned it a few time in the last 2 hours, every time all the strings went flat, this tells me the tension of the strings might be helping it correct. The buzzing gets better with each tune too. It's almost playable now, when I first strung it the strings were resting on the center area of frets.

So what I'm thinking is I will probably give it a few days to get used to strings before I attempt to loosen the truss.

But if anyone else has any ideas I'm open to hear them. Is it possible I'm missing something here? I paid $75 this guitar and I worst case scenario it's a chance to learn something, I've always been interested in guitar repair and I just recently got re-bitten by the guitar bug, hence me trying to get this time working.

Thanks,

James
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  #2  
Old 01-10-2018, 06:55 PM
jessupe jessupe is offline
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when you took the strings off, the truss was most likley adjusted to counteract the string tension, the string tension will put a slight bow in the neck, the truss adjustment counteracts this and straightens it out.

So when you take the strings off and do not relax the truss rod to a neutral position, the truss rod is now acting on neck but no longer has the string tension pulling it, so therefore the still engaged rod is stressing it and putting the back bow into the neck as that is the direction it bends the neck to counteract the string pull

How permanent this is would be is unknown. I would suggest loosening the rod and allowing the neck to sit "free" to see if it has an inclination to straighten out by itself. Or try installing the strings not tuned up all the way, and do not tension the rod and see if they act like slow acting come alongs that help straighten it to a more neutral position.
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  #3  
Old 01-10-2018, 07:22 PM
Mtbbirder Mtbbirder is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jessupe View Post
when you took the strings off, the truss was most likley adjusted to counteract the string tension, the string tension will put a slight bow in the neck, the truss adjustment counteracts this and straightens it out.

So when you take the strings off and do not relax the truss rod to a neutral position, the truss rod is now acting on neck but no longer has the string tension pulling it, so therefore the still engaged rod is stressing it and putting the back bow into the neck as that is the direction it bends the neck to counteract the string pull

How permanent this is would be is unknown. I would suggest loosening the rod and allowing the neck to sit "free" to see if it has an inclination to straighten out by itself. Or try installing the strings not tuned up all the way, and do not tension the rod and see if they act like slow acting come alongs that help straighten it to a more neutral position.
Thanks!

my playing still sounds bad but the guitar sounds happier!

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  #4  
Old 01-11-2018, 01:25 AM
jessupe jessupe is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mtbbirder View Post
Thanks!

my playing still sounds bad but the guitar sounds happier!

Cool, hope it works, sounds ok to me
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