High Action (for guitars)

Here are a few items to look at if you have high action on the guitar:

1. Sight the neck for forebow by looking down the top of the neck. With the guitar body towards your feet and the headstock towards your face, try to look straight down the top of the fretboard. You can also use a machined flat straight edge to check the top of the fretboard. If it is bent forward, then you have to fix one of the following:            Adjust the truss-rod,            Refret using compression fretting,             Cook the neck and bend back to shape
2. If the neck is straight, check the belly of the guitar if it is bulging up and pulling out. This problem requires softening the top and bending the wood back to shape. Re-glue may be necessary.
3. If  the belly is straight, the next step is to check the neck joint. If it became loose or cracked, you need to reset the neck. This is quite expensive for an acoustic. It should only be done by an experienced luthier.

Most of the above work should only be done by experienced professionals. You risk destroying the instrument if you make a mistake.

Tags: action, difficult playing, high action

This entry was posted on Monday, August 25th, 2014 at 11:35 AM and is filed under Guitars, Instrument-Playing, Repairs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.