Replacing Electric Guitar Strings

If you've purchased a guitar, sooner or later you're going to need to learn the tips and tricks behind replacing electric guitar strings. This burdensome task is not a favorite of any guitar player, but it is one of life's necessary evils. The most pressing reason you would need to replace a string is if you suddenly break one. Many guitar players wait until they start breaking strings to replace them, but the best habit you could get into would be to learn when your strings are becoming "dead", and then replace them whether they are broken or not. Dead strings are strings that have lost their tone, their brightness and their feel. They don't stay in tune very well, and they sap your guitar of its vitality and life. So if you have come face to face with dead or broken strings, read on to learn all you'll need to know to change them.

The following steps will take you from a guitar with dead strings to a guitar with bright, shiny, new strings.

1. Time – You're going to need about thirty minutes to an hour to change your guitar's strings. Since this is not something that you want to do in a hurry, make sure you have the time set aside to relax and consider all the steps carefully, especially when you're just learning.
2. Tools – You will need a few things on hand to change your strings. A tuner is essential and so is a pair of wire cutters to clean up when you're finished. If your guitar has an opening on the back where you pull the strings through, you will also need a screwdriver to remove the opening's cover. Of course, you will also need a new set of strings that are the same gauge or thickness as the strings you are taking off. If you replace your guitar's old strings with new strings of a different gauge, your guitar's intonation - or its ability to stay in tune with itself up the length of the neck - will be thrown off.
3. Remove the First String - Begin by removing the biggest string on the guitar, the low E. Simply unwind the string enough with the tuning peg until you can start unraveling it by hand. Once it is free of the peg, remove it by pulling it through the bridge. Some guitars like Stratocasters have a cover over the opening of the backside of the guitar that you will need to remove with a screwdriver to be able to pull the old string through.
4. Replace the First String – After you get the old string out of the way, it's time to find the E string in your new packet of strings. They are often color coded at the ball end; the back of the new packet will have a chart of the colors and the corresponding strings to help you make sure you get the right one. Take the non-ball end and feed it through the part of the bridge where you just removed the old string. Pull the string through until the ball end catches at the bridge. Now you need to begin winding the new string around the tuning peg. Feed the string through the peg so about four to six inches of extra string is through the peg before you start to wind it. If your guitar has six tuners in a line, wind all the strings counter-clockwise around all the pegs. If your guitar has three tuners next to each other, wind the three that hold the three lowest pitched strings counter-clockwise, and the other three clockwise. You want to ultimately end up with each string tuned up to pitch and wound around the peg a total of three or four times. This is tricky and takes a little practice to get it perfect.
5. Repeat – Repeat this process for the final five strings, removing them one at a time. Tune them all up roughly, making sure they are taught but taking care not to over tighten them as they can break.
6. Tune and Stretch – Plug your guitar into your electric tuner and turn up your volume knobs. Tune the guitar once through. Next, you need to stretch the strings. To do this, take each string individually between your thumb and forefinger and pull them away from the fretboard five or six times. Pull hard enough so you feel a gentle stretch in the strings, but don't pull so hard you could break them. Once you have stretched them all, you need to retune again. Repeat the tuning and stretching process a total of three times. The final tuning you do on your strings should be as accurate as possible.
7. Clip the Ends – Your last step is to take your wire cutters and snip off the extra ends of the strings at the guitar's headstock.

That's it. You've learned the tricks to replacing electric guitar strings. Now make sure you keep your guitar well maintained by changing your strings when they become dead so your guitar will always sound as good as possible.

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