Guitar Lessons: How to Re-String Your Guitar

If your guitar strings are no longer smooth and shiny, but are instead sporting the latest in dull, brown rust, then it’s about time you re-string your guitar! If you play every day, you should have to do this at least every month, maybe even more- and if you’re breaking strings, that’s too long to wait. You see, when your strings start to age, they lose their stretchiness (I’m sure that’s a word…), and this adversely affects the tone they produce.

If this has happened to you, then fear not, for I am here to save you with more instructions. In this post, I will guide you through the process of re-stringing your guitar step-by-step.

Step 1- Buy a Pack of Strings

Again, right from the basics: if you need to re-string your guitar, first go and buy some strings. Make sure the strings are the same size as the ones that you’re taking off.

String size -or gauge- measures the thickness of the string. It is normally measured in inches (yes, inches), and quoted from the thinnest string. Common gauges include “0.009″ (known as “Nines”), 0.010 (or “Tens”), or 0.011 (“Elevens”). You may also hear “Ten to fifty two”, which means the thinnest string is 0.010 inch, and the thickest is 0.052 inch.

So, once you have the right string gauge, take the pack if strings home and open it (to make sure you have a full set of six). If you only have 5 strings instead of six, don’t even think about moving on to the next step.

Step 2- Remove the Old Strings

Before you start just ripping the old strings off, you should know that there is a proper way of doing things. You want to replace each string separately, so as not to change the tension over the neck too much (this can lead to intonation issues).

Detune the first string, you can start from the thinnest or the thickest, it doesn’t matter. Once the string is slack, it’s quicker to take a pair of wire cutters and cut the string in the middle than to try and untangle an entire string at once. Then all you need to do is unwind one end from the tuning peg and thread the other through the bridge. If you have a floating, Floyd Rose-style bridge, then you will need to loosen the blocks that hold the string in place with an allen key first.

Step 4- Apply New Strings

First, thread the shiny, new string through the bridge, or if you have a floating bridge, cut the ball end off the string and clamp it in place using the block and an allen key. Then thread the other end of the string through the tuning peg. This step was pretty easy, now comes the difficult part.

Step 5- Tighten the Strings

My method of doing this may seem a but odd, but I can assure you it works. Place your index finger against the nut and pull the string far away from the neck with your hand. If your finger is still in contact with the nut, this is how much slack you should allow the string before tightening. Pull the string tight with your hand, making sure it’s held firmly in place at the nut with your index finger, and then start to tighten with the tuning pegs. You’ll notice that as the string tightens, your hand is pulled towards the fretboard (this is a good thing), keep tightening until the string is no longer loose (don’t forget to move your hand out the way as it gets tighter!).

Step 6- Tune the String

Tighten the string until it is in tune. You can either tune it with the other strings (a method that gets harder as you put more and more new, stretchier strings on), or with a tuner. Once the string is in tune, grab it at the twelfth fret and pull it about an inch from the fretboard, letting it snap back into position- this will stretch out the string. Now tune it again, you’ll notice that the string has gone out of tune.

Repeat the stretching and tuning process until the string stays in tune every time.

Step 7- Repeat with All Six Strings

Go back to step 2, and repeat the entire process for each string- until each string is perfectly in tune. If you have a floating bridge, you’ll notice that as you tune one string it changes the tension on all the others (and thus, their pitch), and you may need to tune each string to equalize the tension.

Step 8- Rock Out

Last, but by no means least, play your guitar and have fun! This is by far the best way to stretch a new set of strings in.

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December 1, 2009 at 2:59 pm | How to | 4 comments

4 Responses to “Guitar Lessons: How to Re-String Your Guitar”

sumatriptan says:

01/12/2009 at 7:02 pm

works for me
Beginner Guitar: 5 Reasons You need to change Your Guitar Strings | Chainsaw Guitar Tuition says:

24/02/2010 at 4:16 pm

[...] If you haven’t already read it, I did a post a while ago about re-stringing your guitar in which I explained how to replace old guitar [...]
Lee Forst says:

04/03/2010 at 4:38 pm

Valuable lesson !!! Guitar 101:
Never over indulge in alcoholic beverages while trying to tune new strings as this can lead to excessive use of foul language and the expense of another set of new strings. LOL !!! (Very recent experience.)
How to set your Guitar’s Action (string height) | Chainsaw Guitar Tuition says:

16/06/2010 at 11:05 pm

[...] was the easy part (and if you have trouble putting new strings on a guitar, you should refer to this post on how to re-string)- the more interesting (or should that be “difficult”?) part of the process was setting [...]