Guitar Lessons: Maintaining Your Electric Guitar
Maintaining your guitar will take up your time and effort, but if you get into the habit early, it will come automatically to you. Make sure you develop certain rules on handling and storing your guitar quite early in the game. The right time to start developing this habit is immediately after purchasing your guitar. The newness of it might give you the incentive to develop good maintenance and care habits, which will continue even after you are more comfortable with and less in awe of your electric guitar.
Keep at room temperature
Electric guitars are made of wood, and hence the temperature can affect them in really extreme ways. Avoid keeping your guitars where it will come in contact with extreme temperature. This means no exposure to wind, rain, sun or snow. Guitars are constructed so that they function best when kept at room temperature. Extreme heat can cause the wood to warp while extreme cold can cause it to crack. Another thing to guard against is extreme humidity, which can make the guitar shrink, swell or crack. On the flip side, keeping it in a climate that is too dry is likely to lead to cracking as well. The ideal humidity level is around 50%. If the climate gets too dry, you can put a humidifier in the guitar case.
Tune the guitar regularly
A guitar needs regular tuning in order to stay in shape and produce good music. Many people never learn how to tune their own guitars, which is a distinct disadvantage. Learning how to tune a guitar must be taught along with basic guitar lessons. If this doesn’t happen, then it’s still never too late to learn. Learn how to adjust the pegs, tighten the strings, and other basic maintenance for keeping your guitar ready to play. You can tune the guitar at regular intervals. Always tuning right before a performance might however be a good idea.
Clean the guitar regularly
A guitar, no matter how good it sounds, also needs to look good. At some point, if you don’t have the habit of keeping your instrument clean, the dust and the gluck will collect and not just spoil the finish, but also get inside the nooks and crannies of your instrument and spoil its functioning. Simple caring techniques will ensure that your guitar looks and remains classy, clean and in good shape. Wipe the surface clean with a soft cloth after every playing session. The fewer products you use on your guitar, the better. But if you absolutely have to use a polish or a cleaning agent, buy a specialized one that is specially made for guitars.
Guitar cleaning and repair toolkit
You must have a guitar kit in which you can keep all the essential tools required for cleaning, tuning and repairing your electric guitar. Your cleaning kit should contain a feather duster, a soft cleaning cloth, a soft dusting cloth, guitar polish, and a small paintbrush to dust the hard to reach places. Your repair kit must contain miniature screwdrivers, miniature ratchet set, and wrenches. With these basic tools, you can make sure that your guitar is kept in good shape for its entire life. Learn these important things in your electric guitar lessons.
The kind of equipment that goes along with your electric guitar and must be similarly kept in good condition can be found here: http://guitarlessonssingapore.com/equipment-for-electric-guitar-lessons/. For an overview of electric guitars, please refer to www.guitarlessonssingapore.com.