Restringing Your Guitar

There is a ton of information on the internet about how to change guitar strings. Here are a few videos that I think are pretty good.

This guy does it the way I do:

I learned from Dan Erlewine’s Guitar Player Repair Guide (I assume it is in the 3rd edition. I have the 2nd so I don’t know for sure.) He has a peg puller (I don’t have one, but would like to get one) and a string winder (I did without for 15 years, which was dumb because they are really cheap and save a lot of time.)

Here’s a video from string manufacturer D’Addario that shows a slightly different method:

He wraps a little of the excess string under the first wrap and only makes one wrap. Having only one wrap looks weird to me and makes me a little nervous, but my friend Matt Rocker strings his guitars this way. He also has some tips on how to get pegs out if you don’t have a peg puller.

The same D’Addario guy shows how to restring a classical guitar as well:

This guy uses the same method as the D’Addario guy, but it is worth including because he takes more time explaining how to wrap a little of the excess string under the first wrap. He also makes two or three wraps which makes me feel better.

Restringing an electric is basically the same as restringing an acoustic. However, some electrics, particularly older strats, teles and my G&L, have slotted “Kluson-style” tuners. This guy shows how to string these in this video:

This is how I do it. Dan Erlewine’s book describes another method, manually wrapping the string around the post and then sticking it in the slot and cutting it off, rather than using the little hole in the slot. I’ve never tried it because I like the neat look of having the cut end hidden, but it looks like a good trick, especially if you needed to change a string on stage.