maarud Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 hi everyone. i bought a new 335 a week ago and the seller in the store told me to leave the no.10 strings on for about a month.. to let the guitar get used to the tension, before i string it with no.11 strings.. that sounds strange to me.. i would really like to change them, because 10 feels too soft.. though if he is right, i will of-course wait. anyone has any thoughts on the matter? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny W. Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 hi everyone. i bought a new 335 a week ago and the seller in the store told me to leave the no.10 strings on for about a month.. to let the guitar get used to the tension, before i string it with no.11 strings.. that sounds strange to me.. i would really like to change them, because 10 feels too soft.. though if he is right, i will of-course wait. anyone has any thoughts on the matter? Thanks. I'm sorry, this really made me laugh. The guitar doesn't need to be coddled, it won't have its feelings hurt if you immediately restring it with .011s or any other gauge. That's why it has an adjustable truss rod. My rule of thumb is never believe anything that anyone in a music store tells you. That way you avoid learning a bunch of nonsense. Danny W. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maarud Posted December 17, 2012 Author Share Posted December 17, 2012 the first thing he did out of the box is to set it up. flatten the neck.. a little too straight for my taste.. but i'm no good at keeping my senses in those kind of circumstances.. i also sent a mail to Gibson asking the same question - no reply yet.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L5Larry Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 the first thing he did out of the box is to set it up. flatten the neck.. a little too straight for my taste.. When you put the 11's on it might be JUST RIGHT. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest EastEnder Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 Maarud: Make sure the truss rod works properly. The dealer's advice sounds like bovine waste to me. "About a month" sounds like a rough translation of "Our own return policy will be over by then." Call me paranoid, but at 66 I've seen worse on a number of occasions. L5Larry is right, as usual. Throw 11's on it and feel the magic. EE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny W. Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 the first thing he did out of the box is to set it up. flatten the neck.. a little too straight for my taste.. but i'm no good at keeping my senses in those kind of circumstances.. i also sent a mail to Gibson asking the same question - no reply yet.. Gibson has complete setup instructions on their website: My link First thing it says is to put on new strings. Doesn't say anything about waiting a month. <_< L5Larry is right--your neck may be just right when you put on .011s Danny W. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maarud Posted December 17, 2012 Author Share Posted December 17, 2012 maybe the salesman wasn't such a dush :) i i told him i wanted to change to 11's and that's probably why he flattened the neck - he said it will bend a little when i put the 11's on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny W. Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 maybe the salesman wasn't such a dush :) i i told him i wanted to change to 11's and that's probably why he flattened the neck - he said it will bend a little when i put the 11's on. Seems a better idea to adjust it for the strings that are on it, rather than the ones that may or may not be in the future. Having to readjust after changing the truss rod is not uncommon, so I don't fault him for that, just for giving bad advice. Danny W. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest EastEnder Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 "Oh, you prefer 11's? We'll throw a set on for you and adjust accordingly. All part of the service. Thanks for shopping here." Those were the days. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flintc Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 I put 11s on mine as soon as I got it. After a few days, I needed less relief. After a week, even less. A month later, even less! Now it's been 6 months with 11s and no more movement. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maarud Posted December 18, 2012 Author Share Posted December 18, 2012 I put 11s on mine as soon as I got it. After a few days, I needed less relief. After a week, even less. A month later, even less! Now it's been 6 months with 11s and no more movement. what do you mean by relief? forgive my ignorance... you needed to straighten the neck? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kurt V Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 what do you mean by relief? forgive my ignorance... you needed to straighten the neck? Maarud, Relief is simply the term that is used to describe the "up-bowing" of the neck. In other words, a neck with no relief would have a perfectly straight, flat fingerboard. On many guitars this will result in some buzzing of the strings on frets, so by creating some bowing or relief by adjusting the truss rod, the strings no longer buzz. A neck with "down-bowing" or "back-bowing" will certainly have buzzing. There are some very good books by Dan Erlewine which explain all of this and have very good drawings or diagrams. Kurt V Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maarud Posted December 18, 2012 Author Share Posted December 18, 2012 Hi. so, after all the comments here - that confirmed how i felt about it, i changed the strings. a pleasure to play. so far it holds the tuning and feels good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimmyl51 Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 Just when I thought that I have heard everything this suggestion is probably the only one that I have heard in all my years of playing jazz guitar that takes the cake for the absurd! By the way don't expect any great response from Gibson either. The vast majority of the people that Gibson has working for them presently really don't have alot of experience in knowing how a guitar should be set up unfortunately..............jim at Tinker AFB Oklahoma City,Oklahoma Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
badbluesplayer Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 Hi. so, after all the comments here - that confirmed how i felt about it, i changed the strings. a pleasure to play. so far it holds the tuning and feels good. Yup. Just go with the 11's. The easy way to check your setup is like this. First, check and adjust the "relief" of the neck - how much it bows upward. Then, after the relief is checked and/or adjusted, then you check the "action", or how high the strings sit above the frets. Relief - If you fret any of the strings at the first and about the fifteenth frets, you'll notice that there's a little space between the string and the fret at about half way between the two places where you fretted it. There should be a little space in there, like the thickness of a piece of paper or a little less. To get more relief, you loosen the trussrod. To get less relief, you tighten the trussrod. Check and adjust the relief. Action - How high the bottom of the strings sit above the tops of the frets. Measured at about the 12th to 15th fret. Usually in the range of 5/64" on the low e string to about 3/64" on the high e string. Adjust the height of the bridge to adjust the action. Again you have to make sure the relief is right first before you adjust the action. Having the right relief will allow the action to be low without buzzing. At the same time, if you don't get the relief right, you'll have a tough time getting the action low without it buzzing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swlabr Posted December 20, 2012 Share Posted December 20, 2012 the first thing he did out of the box is to set it up. flatten the neck.. a little too straight for my taste.. but i'm no good at keeping my senses in those kind of circumstances.. i also sent a mail to Gibson asking the same question - no reply yet.. Did he put new strings on it or set it up with the strings that were on it? There is no problem on changing from 10's to 11's right away. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maarud Posted December 21, 2012 Author Share Posted December 21, 2012 Did he put new strings on it or set it up with the strings that were on it? There is no problem on changing from 10's to 11's right away. he set it up with the strings that were on it.. a few days after "The Change" :-), the neck is still flat, as far as i can judge, maybe a tiny bit of relief.. but the guitar feels good, so i will leave it like this for now. i guess i should try and set it up only if something starts to feel not right.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Del Posted January 4, 2013 Share Posted January 4, 2013 Hi Like the OP, I've just bought a lovely new 335 - vintage sunburst plain top - beautiful - and it was (and still is) strung with 10's. I've been accustomed to using 11's on my LP and 335 copy with the strings over the top of the tail piece to give them a bit more of a slinky feel - and this does make quite a difference. But the 10's on the 335 have really been easy to play and, as they're strung through the tail piece they have a very similar feel to them as the other guitars. In the past, I've been one of the believers that the bigger the string the better the tone but, if thin strings work for the likes of Billy Gibbons, BB King and Eric Clapton, then why not me as well?!! As I don't intend to use this guitar for slide playing (at the moment anyway) which would benefit from more string tension, I think I'll be keeping the 10's on this one for a while to see if it makes any difference to my playing and tone. Cheers Del Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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