Buying New or Used Guitars Can Be Tricky!

Buying a brand-new guitar should be a fun, simple process, but did you know that often that new guitar buy can become a nightmare?

A guitar, new or used, can have deal-killing flaws that aren’t apparent, even to experienced players, when you first try it out.  And almost all guitars have several problems that will affect your guitar playing.  But we offer a (FREE!) solution at the end of this article.

 Typical New Guitar Problems

Nearly all new guitars have problems.  That’s why experts advise to always have a new guitar professionally setup by a reputable guitar shop. 

What problems?

Typical problems with new guitars include, but aren’t limited to:

• High nut slots – which throw out intonation and make your guitar sound out of tune.
• High frets – which cause dead notes and buzzing.
• Low nut slots – which kill tone and cause buzzing on open strings.
• High action – causing playing discomfort and making fast riffs difficult.
• Incorrect neck relief – causing fret buzz and several other issues.
• Loose hardware like strap buttons, tuners, etc.

We recently had a customer bring in a brand-new Gretsch that had over a dozen high frets. 

Our “Complete Setup”, which every new guitar should have, covers high frets, nut slots and all the above issues, ensuring the guitar will be in perfect playing condition, so the customer should be ok, right?  

But these frets could not be properly reseated because it was built with the wrong size fret wire and within a day, they would pop back up.  Apparently the factory ran out of the proper fret wire and “borrowed” some fret wire from another model run.

What’s the solution?  We could try using glue as we reseat the frets, but that would likely void the warranty and still wouldn’t guarantee a permanent fix.  The best solution would be a total refret with the right size fret wire, but that would cost nearly as much as the guitar itself!

Another brand-new guitar had an invisible, but fatal flaw.  The guitar looked perfect when it was strung and tuned.  But with the strings off, you could see a deep crack that ran under the fretboard halfway across the first fret, under the nut and into the headstock.

It’s the reverse of the typical headstock / neck crack we usually see, yet this is not uncommon.  I was scammed by one of these several years ago by a “very nice widow” selling one of her late husband’s guitars.  (Her husband was probably waiting at home, laughing while sipping a cold brew!)

We see more serious problems with boutique manufacturers, than with the big names, but big-name “Custom Shop” guitars are also prone to poor engineering and hardware problems since, apparently, the builders have free reign to mix and match parts without the oversight of engineers and without the customer feedback you get from model runs of tens of thousands.

These problems can include terminally poor design, like the bass guitar that had a slotted headstock with tuner posts that were not supported at the ends.  String tension quickly pulled the posts, elongating the holes in the soft wood and angling the posts toward the fretboard.

Or the Custom Shop guitar that had its bridge placed too far forward, making it impossible to intonate.  Or.. oops, there goes my “Article getting too long” warning.  I’d better wind things up here.  But drop by the shop and I’ll talk your ears off!

If you’ve bought a new guitar recently, bring it in to Hank’s Guitar Shop in Clearwater, FL and we’ll check it out for FREE, while you wait!  If we find a problem, we can provide documentation for you to return the guitar while it’s under warranty. 

Sometimes, an online retailer, like Sweetwater, will just pay to have us get the guitar in proper playing condition. 

If you want a guaranteed, safe buying experience, remember that Hank’s guitars are professionally setup and come with a 90-day warranty.  Happy Holidays!

I’ll write about the pitfalls of buying used guitars next week, so stay tuned & subscribe!