Avoid Expensive Guitar Buying Mistakes!

When buying a guitar, especially second hand, it is important to be very thorough in checking it before parting with your hard earned cash. The Nitty Gritty Guitar Book offers excellent advice on buying and maintaining guitars, and will help you avoid expensive mistakes when buying guitars. The following is some of the things you need to check before buying. For more great tips like these, buy the Nitty Gritty Guitar Book.

1. Aesthetics & Appearance - choose carefully. Although an electric guitar shaped like a shark may seem like the coolest thing in the world right now, will you still like it in a week once the novelty has worn off?


2. General condition - check for damage to the body (cigarette burns, belt buckle marks), and whether the guitar has its original finish or not. On acoustics check for splits and cracks. Remember, you will be spending a lot of time with this instrument, so take some time to make sure there's nothing that will annoy you later.


3. Weight and balance - the guitar should hang comfortably on its strap when placed around your neck, and not tip one way or the other.

4. The Neck - this is one of the most important parts of the guitar, not least because major problems in this area can be very difficult to fix. Check the following carefully;

- Is it straight? - an easy way to check this is by fretting a string at the first and twelth frets simultaneously (with the aid of a capo), and making sure that the string is parallel to the neck along its length. If it is, then the neck is straight.

- Fret wear - Frets should be smooth to the touch, with no rough edges and sit tightly in the fingerboard. Badly worn frets will require a refit, which could set you back up to £200, so again check this carefully.

For more information on common guitar problems, and how to avoid expensive mistakes when buying guitars, including how to check the playability, electronics, tone and tuning, have a look at the Nitty Gritty Guitar Book, available NOW on Amazon.com