guitar info

swans05

ok knowledge wise i'm terrible with guitar...taught myself and all and stillr efer to the strings as "1, 2, 3..." etc more so than eabdgb or whatever it is so now i'm buying a guitar (cheapo but it's all i can afford and if i'm not that good why spend a heap??)...hey i'm not that bad i suppose...i'd be a good 4th guitarist in a band (they're the best one's you know and they get all the chicks!!)...so i'm buying one that has the same knobs and switch things as this:

http://www.fender.com/products/search.php?partno=0101500764

what i need to know is what do they do??

thanks for any imput.

MLC2006

what??? what do the knobs and switches do???

the switch controls which pickup is being used. the front knob controls the volume. the middle knob controls the tone on the neck and middle pickup. the back knob controls the tone on the bridge pickup.

in case you were wondering, the pickups are the tubular shaped microphone like things under the strings, between the bridge and neck.

Novawind

There are a lot of Strat knockoffs out there, but I'm willing to bet the controls are like this.

5-way switch: All the way up (towards strings/neck position) is the neck pickup only, next is neck and middle pickup, next is middle pickup only, next is middle and bridge pickup, and all the way down (toward input jack) is bridge pickup only.

Top (volume) knob: Master volume for the guitar, controls the guitar's output volume no matter what pickup configuration.

Middle (tone) knob: controls tone for the neck pickup only

Bottom (tone) knob: controls tone for the middle and bridge pickups simoultaneously.

The tone knobs basically say how crisp you want the sound out of your guitar. If you want the strings and notes to be clearer and more distinguishable, set the tone higher. If you want a muddier sound, set the tones lower.

swans05

can i have pj song examples possibly? can't really follow that

MLC2006

sorry, and don't take offense to it, but your first 2 post have made little to no sense. what are you talking about?? what do you mean use a PJ song example?

exhausted

swans05 wrote:

can i have pj song examples possibly? can't really follow that

go play it and try all the controls to get a feel for it.

IDgotI

I'm going to guess you are not familiar with basic guitar terms, because Novawind does a really good job of answering the original question. Look at the picture you posted. Then identify the strings. They are the six silver lines that go up and down the guitar.The top of the guitar (the part at the top of the photo) is the headstock. The six stubs that rise off it at a slight angle to the left (when looking at the picture) are the tuning knobs or pegs.

Moving down from there you have the neck. The horizontal lines on the brown neck are called frets. The brown on the neck itself is called the fretboard.

Beneath that you have the guitar body. The neck is attached to the guitar body.

To the lower right of the body you see three circles. These are the knobs Novawind is describing.

In the middle of the boddy, under the strings, are three seperate shapes. Two, right below the neck are the same size. The thrid, the bottom one, is a little bit thicker. These are the pickups.


Here's how an electric guitar works, so you can understand the knobs and switches.

The strings are made of metal.

The pickups contain magnets, which are wrapped with a wire many many times. The wire is charged one way, and the magnets are charged another. This creates a magnetic field. When the metal strings vibrate, as you play them, the vibrations of the metal strings disrupt the magnetic field. These disruptions cause fluxuations between the negative and positive charges in the field and are passed along wires, as electrical fluctuations (This is an electric guitar after all), to a socket in the body of the guitar. You plug a guitar cable into this socket which carries these electrical signals to an amp. (The electrical signals are very weak... it's not like you will get a shock... unless your amp is ungrounded, and you grab an ungrounded mic on stage... but that's another story)

They are electrical impulses at this point, so the sound is being carried here the same way it would on a stereo (being very basic here).

Anyway, there is five position flip switch above the knobs that it's hard to make out in the photo. See those two dots above the knobs? Those are screws. In between them is the switch. It would be easier to see the switch from the side, or in a larger photo. The switch has five selectable positions. If you push the switch towards the "left" or "top" dot / screw... you will select the sound from the top pickup. Push it down one, and you'll get a mix of the sounds from the top and middle pickup. Push it down again, and you'll get sound from the middle pick up... down again a mix of the middle and bottom, down again the bottom.

When I say you'll get sound from one pickup or another, I mean that the elecrical signals comming from disruptions of that particular pickup's magnetic field will be the ones selected to go out of the guitar and through the cable that would be plugged into it to connect it to an amp.

The knobs effect the sound from the selected pick up just as Novawind describes.

If that doesn't help, then yeah... you need to just go put your hands on one and try to figure it out from there.

harrisonmerwin

IDGotI

good job...i was gonna write all that, saw your post, thanks!

by the way, are you knew to the M&G forum? i havent seen you around untill about two weeks ago. If you haven't been welcomed, then Welcome: to the best board on the pearl jam forum.

DOSW

IDgotI wrote:

The strings are made of metal.

The pickups contain magnets, which are wrapped with a wire many many times. The wire is charged one way, and the magnets are charged another. This creates a magnetic field. When the metal strings vibrate, as you play them, the vibrations of the metal strings disrupt the magnetic field. These disruptions cause fluxuations between the negative and positive charges in the field and are passed along wires, as electrical fluctuations (This is an electric guitar after all), to a socket in the body of the guitar. You plug a guitar cable into this socket which carries these electrical signals to an amp. (The electrical signals are very weak... it's not like you will get a shock... unless your amp is ungrounded, and you grab an ungrounded mic on stage... but that's another story)

They are electrical impulses at this point, so the sound is being carried here the same way it would on a stereo (being very basic here).

Hah, I actually never knew that before. I'm not sure it will help the thread starter very much, but it was enlightening nonetheless.

[EDIT] While we're at it, why is it that a vibrating metal string causes sound in the first place, like in an acoustic guitar? It's just a moving string, but somehow sound comes out of it... I probably learned it in physics class sometime, but I can't remember.

harrisonmerwin

DOSW wrote:

Hah, I actually never knew that before. I'm not sure it will help the thread starter very much, but it was enlightening nonetheless.

[EDIT] While we're at it, why is it that a vibrating metal string causes sound in the first place, like in an acoustic guitar? It's just a moving string, but somehow sound comes out of it... I probably learned it in physics class sometime, but I can't remember.

great question. "Sound" in a physical term is the sudden change in air pressure. So basically if anythign moves, it has a sound, depnding on how quickly, and vastly it moves the air, the result is louder, quiter, higher frequency, or low. when the strings are plucked, it oscillates/vibrates, which moves the air around it in a constant pattern. the "sudden change in air pressure" is detected by your ear, and trasmitted through your nervous system to be picked up by your brain. this is how speakers work as well, the speaker cone moves to the electrical impulse, and pushes air out (quite quickly, its why sometimes theyd ont look like they are moving, but you can feel a vibration) the bigger the speaker, the louder it is, because it is moving more air.

sennin

http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/electric-guitar.htm

http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/guitar.htm

lucylespian

Dude, there are all these people helping you with nice answers to these really basic questions, but I can't help thinking that you are taking the piss out of everybody.
I mean, you say you have taught yourself, and seem familiar with tab (you answered a tab question of mine elsewher, and gave me a link to a tab), but how have you been tuning your guitar if you are so ignorant ??
I mean seriously, you don't know what a fucking volume knob is ?? It's got VOLUME written on it.
I bought my first electric guitar, took it home plugged it in and played with the controls, worked out what the pick-up selector did etc without having my bum wiped by anybody.
Time to fess up dude !!

xtremehardy388

harrisonmerwin wrote:

great question. "Sound" in a physical term is the sudden change in air pressure. So basically if anythign moves, it has a sound, depnding on how quickly, and vastly it moves the air, the result is louder, quiter, higher frequency, or low. when the strings are plucked, it oscillates/vibrates, which moves the air around it in a constant pattern. the "sudden change in air pressure" is detected by your ear, and trasmitted through your nervous system to be picked up by your brain. this is how speakers work as well, the speaker cone moves to the electrical impulse, and pushes air out (quite quickly, its why sometimes theyd ont look like they are moving, but you can feel a vibration) the bigger the speaker, the louder it is, because it is moving more air.

Wow, physics class is REALLY paying off because while I didn't know all this, I DO understand what you're talking about!!!Thanks form all this help!

DOSW

harrisonmerwin wrote:

great question. "Sound" in a physical term is the sudden change in air pressure. So basically if anythign moves, it has a sound, depnding on how quickly, and vastly it moves the air, the result is louder, quiter, higher frequency, or low. when the strings are plucked, it oscillates/vibrates, which moves the air around it in a constant pattern. the "sudden change in air pressure" is detected by your ear, and trasmitted through your nervous system to be picked up by your brain. this is how speakers work as well, the speaker cone moves to the electrical impulse, and pushes air out (quite quickly, its why sometimes theyd ont look like they are moving, but you can feel a vibration) the bigger the speaker, the louder it is, because it is moving more air.

Ah, that makes sense, thanks! Also, Sennin's link elaborated a little bit:

"When the strings vibrate, the vibrations travel through the saddle to the bridge to the soundboard. The entire soundboard is now vibrating. The body of the guitar forms a hollow soundbox that amplifies the vibrations of the soundboard. If you touch a tuning fork to the bridge of a guitar you can prove that the vibrations of the soundboard are what produce the sound in an acoustic guitar."

So it's actually the vibrating wood itself that produces most of the sound, and not the strings. Cool. That makes sense because when you stretch a rubber band and pluck it, there's hardly any sound that comes from it. Interesting...

sennin

DOSW wrote:

Ah, that makes sense, thanks! Also, Sennin's link elaborated a little bit:

"When the strings vibrate, the vibrations travel through the saddle to the bridge to the soundboard. The entire soundboard is now vibrating. The body of the guitar forms a hollow soundbox that amplifies the vibrations of the soundboard. If you touch a tuning fork to the bridge of a guitar you can prove that the vibrations of the soundboard are what produce the sound in an acoustic guitar."

So it's actually the vibrating wood itself that produces most of the sound, and not the strings. Cool. That makes sense because when you stretch a rubber band and pluck it, there's hardly any sound that comes from it. Interesting...

That's why different "tone woods", the size and shape of the guitar makes a huge difference.....and why when you strum an electric guitar, it hardly makes any sound when unplugged.

swans05

hey leso, i tune by sound and i wasn't sure what the tone buttons do...there's one on my present guitar but i just keep it on 10 and even when i do move it i can't hear it anything different...i had a fair idea about the whammy bar...i can read tab it's pretty fuckin easy and yes i did teach myself obviuosly...and to those with there shitty replies, sorry if i can't be king music like some of you but if you don't like the questions, don't reply...if you're replying to be a hero, don't bother...if you read all the posts you will find that other's have learnt stuff from the thread which is the point

seecho

Never buy a guitar online from anywhere. If you do it will arrive broken. Always, always go to a guitar shop and pick one out, play it, play it, play it, tune it, play it some more then ask for one just like it new in the box then play it, play it, play it, tune it, play it some more.

sennin

seecho wrote:

Never buy a guitar online from anywhere. If you do it will arrive broken. Always, always go to a guitar shop and pick one out, play it, play it, play it, tune it, play it some more then ask for one just like it new in the box then play it, play it, play it, tune it, play it some more.

3 guitars...2 bought online....0 broken.

DOSW

sennin wrote:

3 guitars...2 bought online....0 broken.

Ditto. But seecho's advice (that you should play the exact guitar that you are going to buy) is still definitely valid.

sennin

DOSW wrote:

Ditto. But seecho's advice (that you should play the exact guitar that you are going to buy) is still definitely valid.

Totally. PLay before you buy is a good choice. I'd go one step beyond that...if you're going to play before you buy....buy the one you played.

I was just disputing the fact that your guitar isn't guaranteed to be broken if it's mailed to you.

swans05

just picked it today and it's a "bulet strat trd" and will play it all long weekend (australia day tomorrow)

MichaelMcKevin

swans05 wrote:

just picked it today and it's a "bulet strat trd" and will play it all long weekend (australia day tomorrow)

That mean's it's a Squier Bullet Stratocaster in the color Torino Red... TRD is a code for the color of your guitar. I'm glad you went with that instead of an American Deluxe. No offense, but I can't imagine you having the need for such a quality guitar at this point in your progress.

xtremehardy388

Yeah, totally. Also, if you play that squier enough, it'll play just as well and sound just as good as any high end Strat. PLUS you'll have the feel for the guitar and some kind of 'emotional' attatchment...anyone here know what I am talking about? COME ON, SOMEONE HAS TO HAVE EMOTIONAL ATTATCHMENTS TO THEIR GUITARS!!!

exhausted

i don't think he ever had the intention of buying the deluxe. it just had the same control layout.

moster78

I've never had a problem with any guitars I've bought online or through eBay or even off this message board. I'm 3 for 3 so far in that none of them have had anything wrong with them!