Least favourite guitar maintenance task?

[Antag]

Question says it all really.

I'm thinking more about maintenance rather than repair/modification - so things you would expect to do reasonably often to a guitar rather than major changes like wiring new pickups etc.

What got me thinking about it was that my 12-string desparately needs new strings.  It's had 1 (yes, one) string change since I bought it in 2001.  I just find restringing a 12-string to be the most soul destroying ball-ache imaginable & as a result keep putting it off  :oops:  But now I want to record some 12-string & it sounds like cr@p with it's dead/rusty strings... :(

[Davey]

intonation...

thankfully you just gotta do it once, every couple of decades :P

[Will]

I don't do much myself. restringing locking trem is the worst IMO
Cleaning doesn't happen :lol:

[AndyR]

I don't have a 12 string (it would have very limited use for me), but seeing as I voted "Restringing anything" I can feel your pain! :lol:

[gwEm]

I quite like doing typical set up stuff. Its a bit like tinkering with an old racing car ;)

What I don't like is going through the process of trying different pots,pickups and wiring configurations in an awkward sounding guitar. Its expensive, soul destroying, and takes months.

Setting up a poor quality floyd is pretty bad too.

[WezV]

we really need setting up a transtrem on there ;)

 

[Philly Q]

I said "restringing anything".  I can actually do it pretty efficiently nowadays (and there aren't many things I can do efficiently  :( ) but I hate doing it.  Which is why most of my guitars have locking tuners.

I don't use them, but I REALLY hate setting up and string-changing on a Floyd Rose.  I don't know how anyone has the patience to use those things.

[SG Thrasher]

Truss rod adjustments for me, it's the one thing I don't have confidence in doing.

Although, the most stressful moment of my life was when my band was supposed to be onstage in 5 minutes and my mate says to me "Baz, I need to tune my guitar, can I borrow your tuner?"
 Not so bad, right? But he has an Edge III and has zero knowledge of floating trems. I broke a sweat trying to get that thing in tune. 

[gingataff]

For me it's cleaning frets.  :shock:
Mine seem to get quite dull and cruddy in a fairly short space of time, but everything feels so much better when they're shiny. Steel wool is ok but I have a hard time keeping the bits away from the pickups even if I mask them off, and scratch remover/polish works well but some always gets left on the fretboard next to the fret and I can never clean it out.

[Davey]

But he has an Edge III and has zero knowledge of floating trems. I broke a sweat trying to get that thing in tune. 

but why? that is one of THE finest trems in the universe these days.









yeah, right...

[shobet]

Intonating licensed Floyd Rose bridges. The proper ones are ok as I have a tool for that, but as for some of the others, oh dear god...

[gwEm]

we really need setting up a transtrem on there ;)

:)

but lets get that neck in position before being too hasty in taking down the ease of use

[Twinfan]

Intonating licensed Floyd Rose bridges. The proper ones are ok as I have a tool for that, but as for some of the others, oh dear god...

What he said!

[_tom_]

Intonation, I can never get it right.

[Philly Q]

Now that I've sold it (not to anyone on here!) I must say that the Wilkinson VSVG tremolo was a pig to set up. 

As soon as you release the screws which hold the saddles to the baseplate, they can move in all directions - forwards and backwards, sideways, at an angle... so getting both the intonation and the string spacing right was a real pain.  I'm sure the VS-100 must be the same.