Restringing the Guitar - Step-by-Step Guide

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Members practicing this lesson:
SPELLcaster

Hi GMC, welcome to my new guide on restringing the electric guitar. This video can serve as a guide how to properly restring a telecaster type of guitar with stoptail but applicable to similar types of guitars. Note that I'm showing one way to change the strings and not the only way. You can make your own restringing process, and I hope you will learn something from my own that you already don't know. Have fun!

STEPS:

1. Unwinding the old string set
2. Straightening up the old string set
3. Removing the old string set out of the body
4. Making the spare set out of old strings
5. Cleaning the Guitar
6. Inserting new string set into guitar body
7. Winding the new string set
8. What to do with string leftovers
9. Tuning and stretching the strings

Lesson Questions, Feedback & Comments

Kristofer Dahl	24th February 2008
GMC Founder & Rocker	WOW Ivan - this is a fantastic restringing tutorial. Very well done!

Tuubsu	24th February 2008
Member	Great! this will surely help beginners on restringing. I remember I didn't like the fact that I had to figure out restringing by myself...

kaznie_NL	24th February 2008
Member	Cool, I realy need it.

botoxfox	24th February 2008
Member	Very useful.

Muris Varajic	24th February 2008
Instructor	Cool topic Ivan,I'm sure many will benefit from this!

Henkka	24th February 2008
Member	Allright, this is golden.

Marcus Lavendell	24th February 2008
Instructor	I wish I had this tutorial when I started playing guitar! Great job Ivan!

Bogdan Radovic	24th February 2008
Bass Instructor	Awesome tutorial Ivan!

Ivan Milenkovic	24th February 2008
Instructor	Thanks guys. I remember too having a lot of trouble with restringing when I was starting. I just hope I can help a little to all those who need some restringin' advices!

The Uncreator	24th February 2008
Fire Up The Blades, Moderator	Great idea, im glad to see this kinda stuff now, fantastic!

Dejan Farkas	24th February 2008
Instructor	Great job Ivan

Kristofer Dahl	24th February 2008
GMC Founder & Rocker	I still have alot of problems restringing - in fact it drives me crazy!! No more of that hopefully

Toni Suominen	24th February 2008
Instructor	Great tutorial Ivan, really helpful for guitar players of any level!

Xranthoius	24th February 2008
Member	Cool I can use some of this!

Rodnator	24th February 2008
Member	Great tutorial very well done. Great editing

DeepRoots	24th February 2008
Member	This is awesome- never reused strings before- cheers Ivan

David Wallimann	24th February 2008
Instructor	Excellent video, very well done.

fire	24th February 2008
Member	cool stuff "i'm really gonna learn this"

Eat-Sleep-andJam	24th February 2008
Member	This is great We now should have one for a Floyd Rose Tremelo just to complete the cycle

kyldeee	24th February 2008
Member	Awesome tutorial Ivan Very useful, thanks

Gabriel Leopardi	24th February 2008
GMC Coordinator & Instructor	Great job Ivan!

Joe Kataldo	24th February 2008
Instructor	Useful and well done

Ivan Milenkovic	24th February 2008
Instructor	Thanks guys I really appreciate the support! Unfortunately I don't have a FLoyd Rose equipped guitar, but if someone else could do it it would be great!

Sweden	24th February 2008
Member	I would have needed a floyd rose lesson earlier this week! haha Had to solve it on my own!

seagull	24th February 2008
Member	I think this guide is great. The majority on this site probably already knows how to restring a guitar, but the point about saving the strings as a spare set is great I think, because far to many times have I broken a string and been in need of a new set, when, of course, the stores are all closed.

Pablo Vazquez	24th February 2008
Instructor	Great tutorial Ivan! Thanks!

Davidian	24th February 2008
Member	Great tutorial, A Floyd Rose one sure would come in handy because i need to restring my Floyd Rose for the first time in a few days

Hisham Al-Sanea	24th February 2008
Instructor	usefull and great tutorial Ivan for all GMC,rs

Nick325	24th February 2008
Member	awsome

Andi F	24th February 2008
Member	Great Job Ivan! Very helpfull lesson! More lessons like this one, please!

Ivan Milenkovic	24th February 2008
Instructor	Sure, but....what like this?

visi0n	25th February 2008
Member	very usefull .. thankyou but its great i do exactly the same way you describe in your lesson

Iluha	25th February 2008
Member	Great! really needed a lesson about restringing Ivan.. Iv'e got one question though, isn't using water to clean you'r guitar hurts you'r guitar? shouldn't you use polish instead?

Juan M. Valero	25th February 2008
Instructor	It's really cool !!!! great lesson my friend, yo did an excelent work

Gerardo Siere	25th February 2008
Instructor	Please watch out, specially on classical guitars. Nice lesson and topic, and one more coment. If you have a set neck guitar don´t take the all the strings at once. Change them one by one. Set necks guitars like classical (I think this should aply to electricals too) have the neck glued and the angle of the neck is very straight, It's calculated that with string tension the neck bends a little so the strings doesn´t buzz on frets, If you take all the strings in and out in a year your weakening the glue so in a time the neck will bend a lot, watch out.

at lights end	25th February 2008
Member	very useful.

vikingraider1	26th February 2008
Member	Thats really helpful. Thanks! I have a Floyd Rose guitar and would love to do a video on how to restring it. I have found a lot of methods on you tube to be slightly misleading, its only through trial and error that I've finally come up with a good technique on how to do a Floyd.

Fran	26th February 2008
Member	Really well done Ivan!

Ivan Milenkovic	26th February 2008
Instructor	QUOTE (Gerardo Siere @ Feb 25 2008, 12:56 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Please watch out, specially on classical guitars. Nice lesson and topic, and one more coment. If you have a set neck guitar don´t take the all the strings at once. Change them one by one. Set necks guitars like classical (I think this should aply to electricals too) have the neck glued and the angle of the neck is very straight, It's calculated that with string tension the neck bends a little so the strings doesn´t buzz on frets, If you take all the strings in and out in a year your weakening the glue so in a time the neck will bend a lot, watch out. This is true Gerardo, with set neck guitars it is best to change the strings one by one. But here the guitar has a truss rod so it gets back into it's original position after a while, with my guitar, around 24h.

Sonny	4th March 2008
Member	This is Grate! i've been playing for some years now, and i still have some problems restringing... but i guess i wont have problems any more!! Thanx Ivan!!

Carlos Carrillo	6th March 2008
Instructor	beutifull sounds!!!!!!!! great lesson!!!!!! thanks ivan,..

shideru_guitar	27th March 2008
Member	i love the speed it takes!

Ivan Milenkovic	29th March 2008
Instructor	@ Carlos Thanks man, the sound is kind of nice @Shideru Guitar Actually some parts are somewhat sped up to keep the flow

Young Guitarist	17th April 2008
Member	I really needed this! Thanks alot!

Ivan Milenkovic	17th April 2008
Instructor	I'm glad that I could help man. Rock on!

Pi38	18th April 2008
Member	This is going to be very useful for me. Do you have the wet cloth dripping wet, or just damp?

Pi38	18th April 2008
Member	Really cool background music, too!

Ivan Milenkovic	18th April 2008
Instructor	QUOTE (cathyybe@yahoo.com @ Apr 18 2008, 09:30 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> This is going to be very useful for me. Do you have the wet cloth dripping wet, or just damp? I'm glad you like it man! The cloth is just damp wet. Don't know the expression since english isn't my mother language, but I think it means like not too wet.

Pi38	19th April 2008
Member	lol Yeah, it does. Thank you.

Ivan Milenkovic	19th April 2008
Instructor	No problem