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Gibson Acoustic Truss Rods Early 90's


Chelton

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I own a Gibson Humingbird I purchased new in 1993. I have adjusted the

neck a few times over the years, being that I live in Minnesota and guitars here

have a summer neck and a winter neck. At least at my house.

For the 1st time a few weeks ago I realized that the truss rod nut is not a

regular Gibson nut. I do not know why I never realized it before, but it fits

the same truss rod wrench as I use on my Rickenbackers. I called a few friends and

found out that another friend of mine has a Gibson acoustic, also from the

early 90's, and he has the same truss rod as my Hummingbird. Has anyone ran

into this before? Is it something we should be concerned about?

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I own a Gibson Humingbird I purchased new in 1993. I have adjusted the

neck a few times over the years, being that I live in Minnesota and guitars here

have a summer neck and a winter neck. At least at my house.

For the 1st time a few weeks ago I realized that the truss rod nut is not a

regular Gibson nut. I do not know why I never realized it before, but it fits

the same truss rod wrench as I use on my Rickenbackers. I called a few friends and

found out that another friend of mine has a Gibson acoustic, also from the

early 90's, and he has the same truss rod as my Hummingbird. Has anyone ran

into this before? Is it something we should be concerned about?

 

Take a close look at the adjustment nut. Is it actually a nut and does the nut turn or is the nut brazed onto the rod and the whole rod turns? One of Gibson's nasty little secrets is that they tried a double adjusting truss rod at about that time. The thing only worked on a couple of guitars and the rest are not adjustable. If I owned a guitar from this period I would certainly take a good look at it and if it is a double acting truss rod I would make sure the thing worked. Most don't. Don't worry about the fact that you have never seen this on a Gibson before. Most haven't and a lot of luthiers have no clue as to how to adjust them. Makes you wonder about how good they are doesn't it?

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Thank you for the responses - I do have a 5/16" and that is too big.

I did look at the nut and it does turn free of the rod and is adjusting

the neck so I might be one of the lucky ones. I have also heard from

2 local Gibson dealers that the truss rod experiments went from the

early 1990's to at least 2000.

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Thank you for the responses - I do have a 5/16" and that is too big.

I did look at the nut and it does turn free of the rod and is adjusting

the neck so I might be one of the lucky ones. I have also heard from

2 local Gibson dealers that the truss rod experiments went from the

early 1990's to at least 2000.

That informaation is incorrect. The dates are 1993 to 1995.

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I recently flipped a '93 Dove and in going through it for the typical flip setup (clean, new strings, general tweak and checkup) I thought I noticed something odd about the truss rod nut but for the life of me I can't recall. All I remember is that it was "different". It only needed yer typical seasonal tweak anyway, and seemed fine.

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Guest J-Doug

As mentioned in Gruhn's Guide to Vintage Guitars on p.177, you may have one of the double truss rod systems from the mid 90s. I have no other information to offer than that.

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