Months of struggling to play classical guitar I have succumbed to a electric guitar. A fender Stratocastor the knowledgeable man in the shop told me would suit. It looks and feels good and has all the knobs required.
Below is an article that helped with my purchase.
1. 4-axis Alignment of the guitar neck.
The guitar neck is checked and adjusted to insure that it is true and straight to insure proper alignment on all axis. This step insures proper action and allows for more accurate and easier guitar tuning, playing and set-up in the following steps.
2. Inspect and Lube the guitar tuning gears.
Each tuning gear is adjusted so that there is no play in the mechanism. They are then lubricated to insure smooth and even movement to make your guitar tune accurately.
3. Potting the guitar pickups.
Dip the pickups in hot wax to reduce squeal and unwanted guitar feedback.
4. Prep the guitar body.
Upon installing the guitar electronic components, great care is taken to insure that all wires are properly routed, spaced, and grounded to insure years of trouble free service with your guitar.
5. Level and polish the frets.
This insures that all of the guitar frets are level, eliminating any possibility of fret buzz due to unevenness.
6. Radius the guitar strings.
Most guitar necks have a contour over the top of the neck called the “radius”. Adjust the strings to make sure the height of each string follows the contour of the guitar neck.
7. Adjusting the overall guitar string height and the action.
Once the string contour and radius of the guitar strings is set, it’s time to adjust the overall height or “action” or distance of the strings from the top of the frets to the bottom of the guitar strings.
8. Set the guitar intonation
This step should be done twice. The intonation is normally set two times with a 24 hour period in between to allow the new guitar adjustments to properly re-seat.
If these steps are performed before playing your new guitar then, you won’t be disappointed. Your focus can then be on the music and not the problems of the instrument. If it is “set up” properly a player will not have to “get used to” it. Everything on it will feel natural and fall right into place and the music can flow.
