Hi,
I know it's the synth forum but just this once I would like to ask a guitar related question if that's ok.

I have an audition coming up with a band soon and I'll be playing guitar for them if all goes well. This is quite an urgent thread for me.

Ok... basically the trouble I'm having is that I dragged my old Strat out tonight for the first time in ages and it's totally ruined with dust contamination. I noticed straight away that I can't turn the volume knob on the guitar at all without tonnes of crackling going on-sometimes the sound even gets cut off completely. Infact, the only way that I can guarantee getting any sound at all is if I keep the volume at 10 all the time. This is not good.

Anyway, I have a can of WD40 in the house and I'm considering taking my guitar apart and spraying it onto the volume and tone pots.

Can someone just confirm for me whether or not that's a good idea?

Thanks

Hi Equalizer,
I don't believe I would use WD40! It will not evaporate, You need a cleaner that evaporates & leaves a dry lubricant on the surface of the slide in your control.
Don't you have some cleaner that you use to clean the heads in your VCR or maybe a tape recorder. If so spray it in the control,
turn the Ctrl. back & forth quickly before the cleaner evaporates. Turn the volume down on your amp. and you can do this with everything turned on! Then you can tell when it is clean. I've cleaned Hundreds of tv volume ctrls this way. WD40 might be all right, but I believe I would shy away from it. It could ruin your control.
Nobby

[This message has been edited by Nobby (edited 07-31-2003).]

Ok, thanks for the tip.

I'll shop around and see what I can find.

The stuff you need is called "TV Tuner Knob" cleaner, here in the states we get it from Radioshack. If the UK is blessed with not having any Radioshacks (they really do suck) try a store that sells individual little electronics components.

Thanks for that.

I'll be sure to buy some over the weekend.

EQ: Yes, basically, what you need is contact cleaner. You'll need to pull off the rear plates, spray the contacts, and work the knobs at the same time. A regular maintenance schedule is a good idea, and, if you're not going to use the guitar for a long time, remove the strings, they're cheap to replace. You might want to take your strat in to a tech to have her refurbished. If it's a strat, particularly a US strat(sweet)..then you want to take good care of it. If she's a Mexican, Taiwanese, or Japanese knock off, then it probably not worth it to have it professionally refurbished. I've been playing for over 35 years. I currently own a Tele,Ibanez, Danelectro,Les Paul, and Ovation acoustic. and apart from re-stringing, and general maint./cleaning and polishing, I take them in annually for a thorough going over. It's and investment, and they're worth it.
Good luck with your audition. Hope all goes well for ya. Leon

Nobby was correct DO NOT use WD40. It's a terrific lubricant, and yes it gets rid of most grease & grime, but it's not a contact cleaner.
[This message has been edited by Leon (edited 08-01-2003).]

[This message has been edited by Leon (edited 08-01-2003).]

I almost signed up for a guitar forum to get this one answered, but I knew that the Synthzone gang wouldn't let me don't.

Thanks for that. I think by the sound of things you've probably just saved me from ruining a guitar.

[This message has been edited by Equalizer (edited 08-02-2003).]

In the UK try Maplin Electronics for Cleaner.
http://www.maplin.co.uk

Graham UK

Great!

There's a Maplins just down the road and I can see from the website that they've got it in for £2.50.

I'll head in and get some on Wednesday.

I recently replaced the electronics on my Fender Strat. It had a volume pot problem and the standard single pole pickups were quite noisy. I bought an active EMG strat system, the DG20 ( based on Pink Floyd's Dave Gilmour's EMG setup ), which comes completely wired up on a strat pickguard. Just 3 wires to connect to the output jack and I had to redrill a couple of screw holes that didn't quite line up with those on my guitar. It is now noise free ( for the first time ), has twice the output and has midrange boost that is great for warming up the tone. For $260 from Guitar Center it made a nice guitar into a great guitar. And I still have the stock electronics on the pickguard in the closet should I ever want to put it back to stock .... but I can't see myself doing that. You can see the 5 different strat systems they offer at http://emginc.com/ProSeries.html

I am now looking around for a cheap strat or strat copy that plays OK so I can get the Steve Lukather system that has an EMG85 humbucker at the bridge. If you want to transform your strat these pickup systems are unbeatable.


[This message has been edited by Nigel (edited 08-15-2003).]