Article by Jeremy Monkhouse
To a complete beginner, restringing an acoustic guitar can be a daunting, confusing and scary thought. While it seems like there are some people that never break any strings on their guitar, there are invariably those of us who are less lucky, so knowing exactly how to do it (and how to do it right) is really important.
The first thing to do when restringing your acoustic guitar is to buy some new strings! You need to decide what type of strings that you want - nylon, steel or classical (which is basically 3 nylon strings and 3 steel strings). I personally prefer steel strings since I think they sound the best, but the choice is yours.
Once you've bought your strings you need to then remove your old or broken strings from your guitar. To do this, unwind them (by turning the machine head at the top of the guitar) until they're loose, then pull them out. At the other end you need to pull out the tiny what peg that's clamping the string in place. Once this is removed (be careful not to lose it!) the string should just slide out. It's handy to have a pair of pliers here in case you need to cut the strings out, but this isn't usually necessary.
Once this is done, take you new strings out of the packet and work out which ones go where. They should be packaged individually, with the sizes of them on the side, so just line them up in order of size (with the largest at the bottom, obviously).
One by one, feed the ball end of the string through the guitar and clamp it in with the peg. Then, feed the string through the tuner at the other end (whilst giving yourself an inch or so of slack). Gently turn the tuner until the string is tight, then move onto the next one.
About the Author
Jeremy has been writing articles for nearly 4 years. Come visit his latest website about buying a ceiling mounted curtain track which also helps people find the best custom kitchen window treatments on the market.