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Truss Rods, String Height, Tune-o-matic & Heavy Strings


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After a quick, but far from comprehensive search on the topic, I have a question that needs answering.

I have just rewired the electronics and polished the frets of a friend's Epiphone SG copy (it's a G-310) and the strings were stuffed and the only spares that I had were a set of 12's. There's no problem with the strings themselves, or anything else that I've done, but with a heavier set of strings on, the string height seems to have increased enough for the playability on the heigher frets to be decreased. I am quite sure that the last set of strings were 11's.

To solve this problem, should I lower the bridge to get a lower action or should i adjust the truss rod?

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The heavier strings need more tention to bring them into tune. The neck is pulling forward with this added tention. Adjusting the truss rod is the correct way to compensate for neck bow. Adjust without string tention from -.002 to 0 inches of releif and recheck with string tention. Adjusting the neck to be straight or slightly back bowed should compensate for the added tention. Once you have adjusted the neck you may still need to adjust the bridge height and it probably will need to go up due to the increased string size.

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