MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
I've got a Washburn super strat with a Floyd rose trem.. I've never really used it and locked it out.
Trems are over rated IMO
I’m probably projecting my own wishes onto you, so ignore the PRS for the moment and go for a fixed bridge guitar in a colour you like. A Telecaster has worked for everyone from Joe Strummer to Bruce Springsteen, so it’s a solid shout. I’m you’re a complete guitar newcomer, then avoid tremolos and fancy quirks. Then just plug into your bass amp and wail! And if you want a grungier/rockier sound, just get any cheap Chinese overdrive pedal for £20 and have fun. It’s like bikes, even the cheap guitars these days are very good - just add enthusiasm.
yep, been looking for 'non tremelo' jobbies on the local marketplace but all the ones i see seem to have them.
ive just seen a cort G200 for £60 (2002, been hung on a wall for last 20 years) and a yamaha pacifica pac212vfm for £180 which i thought seemed closer to the brief, but i think as you say i ought to stick out for a simpler 'hardtail' if i can find one cheap enough.
cheers
Hopefully this is the year I start playing again rather than just walking past my guitars...
Just bought myself a gibson les paul standard. It's lovely, but it plays and sounds near identical to my epiphone les paul which cost a fraction of the price.
So buy an epiphone les paul, or a cheap equivalent and you'll be grand as long as its set up right. Or buy my old one off me!
Maybe not for your first electric, but I built a diy tele from a 90 quid kit. Stuck some toneridwr pickups in it and it's brilliant. Or certainly no worse than any of my other guitars based on my limited skillset
It’s not that you shouldn’t get a guitar with a trem, but it’ll just add a bit of complexity.
a guitar that’s been hung up for 20 years will need new strings, a good clean and probably some switch cleaner at least 🤣
It’s not that you shouldn’t get a guitar with a trem, but it’ll just add a bit of complexity.
A cheap trem system is pointless. As you say it'll add complexity, and if its locking it make tuning a pain.
Plus a beginner will never use it. I have 2, on my strat and jackson. I've been playing on and off fir 30 years and have never used one once.
Fixed bridge all the way. Get a tele, les paul or strat type guitar (the latter has a trem but if you don't use it won't really affect tuning), second hand, or check out harley benton if you need one new. Unbelievable value. Cheap guitars are so much better than when I started playing in the late 90s
thanks all. good advice which i'll take and i'll stay away from the tremeloes and look out for one of your suggestions ^^^
Or buy my old one off me!
@tpbiker by all means feel free to message me if you think you have something that would fit my criteria but i think youre up in scotlandshire arent you, so the postage might be a barrier.
cheers
I wouldn't get too hung up about the trem. If you have one and don't want it, tighten a couple of screws and you have a perfectly good hardtail.
On the other hand, one of my guitars is a £200 Harley Benton PRS-alike. When I was making my own Telecaster-alike I asked the luthier I was being instructed by how to make it work better. I ordered a graphite nut and locking tuners, he fiddled with the screws on the trem and I have to say it's flipping perfect. It always stays in tune no matter how much you bend it up or down or however long I leave it hung on the wall. I guess I play it once a week.
However, I took the lever off about a year ago because I never use it and it gets in the way.
a guitar that’s been hung up for 20 years will need new strings, a good clean and probably some switch cleaner at least
just had another look at the ad.....
"Cort G200, 2002 model made in Indonesia Cort factory. Newly setup and serviced, cleaned in and out, new strings, polished frets and lemon oiled the fret board. With tremolo arm, free guitar stand, gig bag, strap and capo. Scratch plate colour is originally white now it turned aged white after 2 decades of just hanging on the wall, frets are all still in good shape."
would that change your opinion do you think? is the G200 a decent guitar despite its age?
cheers
I wouldn't get too hung up about the trem. If you have one and don't want it, tighten a couple of screws and you have a perfectly good hardtail.
You'll know more about this than me I'm sure, but does it not depend on the trem system? Ie I have a strat, never use the trem, and it's no worse than a fixed bridge
But a Floyd Rose thingy is a different beast. I use to have a guitar with one and it was a pain in the backside
A Cort g200 is a budget guitar but will work fine, it doesn't have a locking trem so won't be an issue. Age won't affect it. It should be perfectly functional
All depends how much you are planning to pay for it. They use to cost a couple of hundred quid I think, so I'd not be paying more than 100 for it. Depends what your budget is?
Don't know if you already have an amp, but if not I'd prioritise a decent one over a more expensive guitar. Something like a katana is a magnificent amp for playing at home.
For £60 for that lot how wrong can you go? I'd try it and if everything worked, sounded and felt Ok buy it. If it goes out of tune when you use the trem take the trem cover off the back and make up a little block of wood to block the mechanism with the strings at the deck height wanted. You might even get lucky and find the trem is correctly set up and returns to balance when used. Coat the strings at the nut in 2b pencil lead (or softer) so they slide nicely in the nut when you use the trem or do bends - old cheap plastic nuts are sometimes sticky.
well ive just been and bought it. as a few of you have intimated, whats the worst that can happen, and i got it for £45 in the end. dont understand it myself but apparently "it has the better 2 point trem system, instead of vintage 6 point/screws" and "It’s already decked (spring at the back was tighten) so the tremolo seats to body to stay in tune. Though you can still use the tremolo for downward, no upward."
wont have chance to play with it for a while, and wont even know whether it sounds as it should, but i spose i can always sell it on if i end up not playing it.
thanks all for your advice
45 quid!!! That's an absolute steal
Even if it goes horrifically out of tune, or you find the action is ridiculous high, you coukd get it set up for 30-40 quid and it'll play great
Your bigger issue may be guitars are like bikes...that 45 quid may cost you significantly more on long run if you get into it. I'm on a guitar forum, there was a poll, average number of guitars owned was 7!
What you doing amp wise?
I wonder if we did a poll here, what the average number of guitars would be - on a bike forum!? 🙂
As @tpbiker says, that's a complete bargain and it'll be great. Get rocking out!
What you doing amp wise?
i'll use my bass amp, a fender rumble 100.
I wonder if we did a poll here, what the average number of guitars would be - on a bike forum!?
I have 7..6 electrics plus and an acoustic. Also have a Bass but it only counts if it has 6 sttings or more!😉
They are of varying qualities, from diy built to top end. The important thing is, in my hands I'm capable of making all of them sound equally awful.
Hmm, there are nine electrics in the room with me (though one is a friend's)... Nope, just found four more in cases... plus another, er, couple in the living room. What's that then? 15? Four are homemade, one dating back to 1987. Hey! I've cut down, OK? And then of the remaining, some I can't sell as they're either sentimental, or were gifts, or no one would want them. 🙂
N+1 applies equally to bikes and guitars..
15 is an impressive number!
15 is an impressive number!
Gotta have a hobby, right? And I guess it's been my other hobby (apart from bikes) for the last 40 years... Doesn't make me any good at it - but that's also like bikes, right?... 🤣
I wouldn't get too hung up about the trem. If you have one and don't want it, tighten a couple of screws and you have a perfectly good hardtail.
You'll know more about this than me I'm sure, but does it not depend on the trem system? Ie I have a strat, never use the trem, and it's no worse than a fixed bridge
But a Floyd Rose thingy is a different beast. I use to have a guitar with one and it was a pain in the backside
A Cort g200 is a budget guitar but will work fine, it doesn't have a locking trem so won't be an issue. Age won't affect it. It should be perfectly functional
All depends how much you are planning to pay for it. They use to cost a couple of hundred quid I think, so I'd not be paying more than 100 for it. Depends what your budget is?
Don't know if you already have an amp, but if not I'd prioritise a decent one over a more expensive guitar. Something like a katana is a magnificent amp for playing at home.
Yeh, I dont know the terminology, but a basic/normal strat style trem, if you don't use it just unscrew the lever and carry on.
With a floyd rose style floating bridge, it's a bit more complicated!
Mere 7 here - 4 electric, 2 electro-acoustic, one resonator. I've got rid of a couple recently, currently happy with the collection.
i own 2 guitars currently (a prs se paul's guitar and a charvel sassafras hss floyd guitar). i used to have more guitars but sold the lot due to depression and laziness early last year).