improving the tone of your guitar?

[veji]

aside from getting a better amp/efx. What are things you do to help improve the tone coming from your guitar?

1) Big block for floyd rose
2) ESP Arming Adjuster
3) Raw vintage tone springs(5 springs)
4) thicker strings
5) practice

anything else?

 

[Vrad]

aside from getting a better amp/efx. What are things you do to help improve the tone coming from your guitar?

1) Big block for floyd rose
2) ESP Arming Adjuster
3) Raw vintage tone springs(5 springs)
4) thicker strings
5) practice

anything else?

"Improving tone" is a very subjective thing.
What are you looking for? What's your current situation? What don't you like?

 

[veji]

making my guitar thicker/ballsier.

 

[lolzgreg]

What guitar is it?

I'd say pickups first!

 

[Vrad]

making my guitar thicker/ballsier.

What guitar is it?
What wood?
What pickups you have in there?
Are you sure your problem is the guitar? Your amp and speakers have alot to do with it.

 

[glpg80]

neck relief being properly set
set intonation
set proper nut heighth/shimming
fret polishing
oiled/mojo'ed fretboard
(personal taste = raw oiled necks, no finishes) for smoother playing
proper string heighth and floyd rose tension
checking to make sure the tuners are tight
check to make sure the neck bolts are tight
check to make sure the neck has proper 3 degree pitch.
brass, tungsten, or titanium blocks
proper pickup heighth
parallel runs of wiring, proper grounding practices,
twist pair wires since signal is AC to reduce chances of noise
heavier guage of strings
heavier pick or picking style.

 

[Mailman1971]

Yeah I definitely need to use a gauge heavier string.
Going to move up to 10's. I know when I used them last time the Chords seemed fuller and wasnt sure if it was just in my head or not. But they felt stiff to play. I just need to get used to them. Hell I remember using 8's back in the 80s when I used to practice all the 'shredding' licks.

 

[glpg80]

to tell you the truth 10's have their advantages, but i like noodling more on 9's - 9's are easier to flow on, but solo's sound better with 10's and arpeggios are easier on 10s as well. but i have to sacrafice string heighth having the strings higher off of the fretboard due to the larger mass/swing causing buzzing.

its cool to have a few guitars with 10's and a few with 9's, my playing has improved with 10's - im more controlled in my bends now and dont have to worry about overbending on 10's like i do with 9's

 

[Vrad]

Yeah I definitely need to use a gauge heavier string.
Going to move up to 10's. I know when I used them last time the Chords seemed fuller and wasnt sure if it was just in my head or not. But they felt stiff to play. I just need to get used to them. Hell I remember using 8's back in the 80s when I used to practice all the 'shredding' licks.

I detest anything but 9's. 8's sounds like shit. 10's feel like shit and sound almost too round. I like to have a percussive edge which 10's lack. So yeah... it again goes back to "What do you want?"

 

[Mailman1971]

Yeah I definitely need to use a gauge heavier string.
Going to move up to 10's. I know when I used them last time the Chords seemed fuller and wasnt sure if it was just in my head or not. But they felt stiff to play. I just need to get used to them. Hell I remember using 8's back in the 80s when I used to practice all the 'shredding' licks.

I detest anything but 9's. 8's sounds like shit. 10's feel like shit and sound almost too round. I like to have a percussive edge which 10's lack. So yeah... it again goes back to "What do you want?"

Your description is damn near to the letter on how I felt about the 10's last time I tried them!
Just felt crappy and I thought maybe it was just me.

 

[glpg80]

i like the heavier tone and feeling of 10's, they do bring out whatever wood your guitar is more - a dark guitar will sound darker, and a bright guitar will sound brighter.

but its more of a feeling thing to me... i can haul ass on 10's in a controlled way that i cant do on 9's, but 9's give a better feeling of freedom - shit flies from my brain to the fretboard alot more effortlessly which means its overall easier to play.

hey dan, check out 9.5 guage strings if you would like, best of both worlds?

 

[Mailman1971]

The 9.5....
are they like the Heavy top strings....light bottoms?
Or the whole set is a hybrid gauged at 9.5?
Sounds interesting.......

 

[sg guy]

if your guitar doesnt sound good unplugged,..your at a disadvantage to begin with, nomatter what you have for pickups...the biggest mistake young guitarist make is to tune down, then they throw on the biggest set of piano wire they can find,..now the strings are so high off the fret board,..and there big bulky strings are so tight that it's impossible to play/sound good,...99% of the guitars were made for 9's....(get 9's with heavy high strings)...if there is any buzzing or dead strings,..islolate the problem one at a time and fix them,...adding mass to the head stock adds sustain (i have gone so far as to add a big hunk of steel to the head stock of an old guitar i had just as an experiment,...worked awesome!!)
if you have a plywood guitar or a guitar made from jungle wood,...your fighting a loosing battle,...hold a gibson sg in your right hand and a epiphone sg in the left,.......you'll feel the real difference,..

 

[moltenmetalburn]

if your guitar doesnt sound good unplugged,..your at a disadvantage to begin with, nomatter what you have for pickups...the biggest mistake young guitarist make is to tune down, then they throw on the biggest set of piano wire they can find,..now the strings are so high off the fret board,..and there big bulky strings are so tight that it's impossible to play/sound good,...99% of the guitars were made for 9's....(get 9's with heavy high strings)...if there is any buzzing or dead strings,..islolate the problem one at a time and fix them,...adding mass to the head stock adds sustain (i have gone so far as to add a big hunk of steel to the head stock of an old guitar i had just as an experiment,...worked awesome!!)
if you have a plywood guitar or a guitar made from jungle wood,...your fighting a loosing battle,...hold a gibson sg in your right hand and a epiphone sg in the left,.......you'll feel the real difference,..

I have always tuned down and used 11-52.

I have no problem setting up the guitar correctly so the strings are not high off of the fretboard, with careful tweaking after each string change they are at exactly the height they should be. Every guitar I have ever owned did just fine with the heavy gauges when set up properly.

I chose heavier strings in order to get a heavier sound which they provide, tighter, fuller and crunchy. 9s sound so weak in comparison to me now. IMO thicker strings sound far better.

I also have a heavy hand and would break and bend 9's out of pitch far too easily. 11-52 is like butter for me.

Everyone has their own preference but your post is quite misleading; you have said it is impossible to play or sound good with heavy strings. Maybe for you it is...

 

[Sixstring]

making my guitar thicker/ballsier.

Viagra...

 

[veji]

...adding mass to the head stock adds sustain (i have gone so far as to add a big hunk of steel to the head stock of e,..

interesting. Awhile back i bought groove tubes fat finger.. its a chunk of bell brass that you attach to the headstock. at first i thought it added sustain/beef to my tone and since satch uses it i guess its good. Well my friends and drummer didn't notice any difference with the fat finger attached and w/o. back and forth. i guess it was all psychological.

are there any tricks to actually make the sound coming from the guitar darker/thicker? or maybe take away the piercing highs? I am using 9 gauge strings if i go to 10's would that make the guitar darker/thicker?

 

[nighttrain69]

years ago i only used 9s now its 11-50 tight fits love em,but there on hgs guitars so playability is great and your tone is nice and thick

 

[moltenmetalburn]

...adding mass to the head stock adds sustain (i have gone so far as to add a big hunk of steel to the head stock of e,..

interesting. Awhile back i bought groove tubes fat finger.. its a chunk of bell brass that you attach to the headstock. at first i thought it added sustain/beef to my tone and since satch uses it i guess its good. Well my friends and drummer didn't notice any difference with the fat finger attached and w/o. back and forth. i guess it was all psychological.

are there any tricks to actually make the sound coming from the guitar darker/thicker? or maybe take away the piercing highs? I am using 9 gauge strings if i go to 10's would that make the guitar darker/thicker?

I love the fat finger. It works as advertised on every guitar I have tried it with, sustain =mass.

10's will get thicker but not darker. new pickups sound in order.

 

[sg guy]

if your guitar doesnt sound good unplugged,..your at a disadvantage to begin with, nomatter what you have for pickups...the biggest mistake young guitarist make is to tune down, then they throw on the biggest set of piano wire they can find,..now the strings are so high off the fret board,..and there big bulky strings are so tight that it's impossible to play/sound good,...99% of the guitars were made for 9's....(get 9's with heavy high strings)...if there is any buzzing or dead strings,..islolate the problem one at a time and fix them,...adding mass to the head stock adds sustain (i have gone so far as to add a big hunk of steel to the head stock of an old guitar i had just as an experiment,...worked awesome!!)
if you have a plywood guitar or a guitar made from jungle wood,...your fighting a loosing battle,...hold a gibson sg in your right hand and a epiphone sg in the left,.......you'll feel the real difference,..

I have always tuned down and used 11-52.

I have no problem setting up the guitar correctly so the strings are not high off of the fretboard, with careful tweaking after each string change they are at exactly the height they should be. Every guitar I have ever owned did just fine with the heavy gauges when set up properly.

I chose heavier strings in order to get a heavier sound which they provide, tighter, fuller and crunchy. 9s sound so weak in comparison to me now. IMO thicker strings sound far better.

I also have a heavy hand and would break and bend 9's out of pitch far too easily. 11-52 is like butter for me.

Everyone has their own preference but your post is quite misleading; you have said it is impossible to play or sound good with heavy strings. Maybe for you it is...

what sounds better to the human ear,...a chord strummed on a bass,..or a chrord strummed on a guitar?....

 

[glpg80]

sg guy, i think you are missing the point.

thicker strings do sound better on a guitar tuned for upper frequencies, a bass guitar is an octave lower than guitar and serves no purpose other than filling up the frequency spectrum of a band and holding the notes while also providing musical taste from the player to make things more interesting.

totally different and irrevalent than what we are trying to explain.

when i hit a D chord on my 10's that was something 9's cant give you. 11's on a 23.75 scale length guitar is close to the same tension as 10's on a 25.5 - it sounds heavier, fuller, solo's dont sound like a weak crying plea of help or fingernails on a chalkboard, and rhythms are much more solid - you can feel them in the guitar.

again - you are missing the point i believe..

from a tonal perspective do whatever feels right to you. 8's, 9's, 10's, 13's, whatever fits the style of music and the player's needs.

FWIW, on the yngwie strat i plan to build, i will do a hybrid set of 8's because i like that sqwaky character in a single coil pickup that smaller strings give you, yngwies tone cant be had on SRV's strat, the string guage difference makes it impossible.