How to tell if a guitar neck is twisted?

[syzygy]

Just got a NGD this afternoon that I've been super excited for, but it may have an issue. I bought a used RGD 7 string off of Reverb, and it's in pretty good condition, but I suspect that the neck might be twisted. How would I be able to tell for sure, and is a warped neck an issue? I don't have a ton of disposable income and I've had super bad luck with most of my musical gear purchases in the past, so I'm pretty dang paranoid that my guitar might have a problem. In the 10 minutes I had to play around with the guitar, the action actually felt pretty good and I didn't notice any fretting out, but I was still worried about the potential neck twist, because I live in Utah, and the weather here is the ultimate worst for guitars (cold and not remotely humid).

I'll include some pictures of the neck once I get off of work.

 

[tedtan]

Pictures would help, but if it is twisted, it will probably fret out on certain strings at certain frets but not elsewhere on the neck.

Why do you think it is warped? Are there any indications?

If it’s just bent forward or backward a bit, that’s fine and is adjustable.

 

[syzygy]

Pictures would help, but if it is twisted, it will probably fret out on certain strings at certain frets but not elsewhere on the neck.

Why do you think it is warped? Are there any indications?

If it’s just bent forward or backward a bit, that’s fine and is adjustable.

It looks like the fretboard is slanted down towards the high strings, and the low G# is pretty raised. Tried to get a few pictures but they're saying they're too large for SSO?

 

[syzygy]

 

[syzygy]

FWIW, the guitar seems to play really well; the pickups are cranked pretty high and I think I'll back them off a bit because the bridge pup is pretty much touching the string, but I haven't noticed any fretting out (which my first guitar needed work to fix). Obviously there's some string buzz but it's not there when plugged into an amp

 

[Robslalaina]

Hard to tell from the pictures, at least for me. Can you do a basic setup in order to start from a fresh base?
TUNE up and then adjust RELIEF so the neck is as straight as possible. Tune up again and if satisfied with relief adjust ACTION at the bridge. Tune up again and then finish off with INTONATION. Tune up yet again, play around and tell us what's what.
We may need a couple figures like 12th fret action, and relief if you can measure that, but if the setup doesn't uncover any fret height issues and/or if the guitar plays fine the way you'd normally play it I wouldn't worry too much. Unless there's an option to send it back if you can prove there's a flaw? Never bought anything off the Verb so no idea.

 

[Lemonbaby]

Just got a NGD this afternoon that I've been super excited for, but it may have an issue. I bought a used RGD 7 string off of Reverb, and it's in pretty good condition, but I suspect that the neck might be twisted. How would I be able to tell for sure, and is a warped neck an issue? I don't have a ton of disposable income and I've had super bad luck with most of my musical gear purchases in the past, so I'm pretty dang paranoid that my guitar might have a problem. In the 10 minutes I had to play around with the guitar, the action actually felt pretty good and I didn't notice any fretting out, but I was still worried about the potential neck twist, because I live in Utah, and the weather here is the ultimate worst for guitars (cold and not remotely humid).

I'll include some pictures of the neck once I get off of work.

So everything's fine with your guitar, but you want find something that's wrong?

 

[syzygy]

Hard to tell from the pictures, at least for me. Can you do a basic setup in order to start from a fresh base?
TUNE up and then adjust RELIEF so the neck is as straight as possible. Tune up again and if satisfied with relief adjust ACTION at the bridge. Tune up again and then finish off with INTONATION. Tune up yet again, play around and tell us what's what.
We may need a couple figures like 12th fret action, and relief if you can measure that, but if the setup doesn't uncover any fret height issues and/or if the guitar plays fine the way you'd normally play it I wouldn't worry too much. Unless there's an option to send it back if you can prove there's a flaw? Never bought anything off the Verb so no idea.

I've never done a basic setup before, what would I need in order to do that? Beyond an Allan key and a screwdriver, what else would I need?

So everything's fine with your guitar, but you want find something that's wrong?

Fair point I just have had some bad luck from day 1 with the other guitar I've had; I was more just trying to know if this would be something that would become a problem later on. I enjoy playing guitar but have next to no guitar tech know-how. I'll play around with the guitar more just to get more acquainted with it.

 

[CanserDYI]

It honestly LOOKS fine to me, and you're probably just seeing the angle of the nut being higher on the bass side than the treble side and looks like its twisting up.

 

[syzygy]

It honestly LOOKS fine to me, and you're probably just seeing the angle of the nut being higher on the bass side than the treble side and looks like its twisting up.

Yeah, that was also something that threw me off last night that I noticed after looking closer. I wasn't expecting there to be *that much* difference between bass and treble. In any case, I haven't noticed anything too wrong with playability so I'll keep getting used to it. 7 strings are way different from 6-ers!

 

[tedtan]

I don’t see anything wrong in those pics. I think what you’re noticing is that the wound strings have to be a bit higher due to their larger vibration pattern.

It’s impossible to say just from those pics, though - if you tell us where you live, someone may be able to recommend a good tech in your area to take a look at it for you.

 

[Neon_Knight_]

My first thought when I looked at your photos was "the nut is slanted just like it should be". I can see how this might create the illusion of the neck being twisted though.

The height difference between the highest and lowest strings will be greater on a 7-string guitar than on a 6-string, because the difference in string thicknesses is greater.

Another reason you may have been thrown by this is that, unlike a standard nut, a locking nut (as a lot guitars equipped with a floating bridge have) is level. The nut slots are cut to suitable widths and depths to accommodate different strings gauges, but the top edge of the nut doesn't slope down towards the treble side.

 

[syzygy]

My first thought when I looked at your photos was "the nut is slanted just like it should be".

The height difference between the highest and lowest strings will be greater on a 7-string guitar than on a 6-string, because the difference in string thicknesses is greater.

Another reason you may have been thrown by this is that, unlike a standard nut, a locking nut (as a lot guitars equipped with a floating bridge have) is level. The nut slots are cut to suitable widths and depths to accommodate different strings gauges, but the top edge of the nut doesn't slope down towards the treble side.

Okay, I think this is what I was seeing. And thanks to everyone for talking me down and explaining things; I really don't have any knowledge of 7 strings and am a pretty anxious person overall so I appreciate y'all for the help and for being patient with me!

 

[Robslalaina]

I've never done a basic setup before, what would I need in order to do that? Beyond an Allan key and a screwdriver, what else would I need?

That's it. You can use the lowest string as a straight edge to eyeball relief. Basically, use a capo or your left-hand index to fret at 1, use your right-hand pinky to fret at 19, and then extend your thumb to check relief at 8. The string should not rest right onto the fret - there has to be a little bit of space. Check this out for reference to get started (keeping in mind though that 0.3 mm relief is already too much for some, so YMMV): http://www.hoshinogakki.co.jp/pdf/ibanez/manual/en/eg/maintenance_en.pdf
If the truss rod feels too tight, do not force turn it, try detuning the strings first, like from E to Db. If it's still too tight and/or you don't feel comfortable doing that, bring it to a tech or luthier for a full setup instead.

 

[Neon_Knight_]

Okay, I think this is what I was seeing. And thanks to everyone for talking me down and explaining things; I really don't have any knowledge of 7 strings and am a pretty anxious person overall so I appreciate y'all for the help and for being patient with me!

It's a learning curve for all of us

I once got in a panic when a guitar's action was really high even though the floating bridge was at it's lowest setting. All it needed was a simple truss-rod adjustment. All of my other guitars have come into my ownership with the neck relief roughly right, and I had been so excited about receiving my shiny new guitar in the post that I didn't think it through, so I hadn't even considered whether the neck relief might be way off until someone kindly stated the obvious for me. The likelihood is that it was set up much better at the point of dispatch, but then temperature changes during shipping messed it up (it came from the other side of the pond in the middle of winter).

The previous owner of my RGD (acquired last month) had it tuned to drop A (I think he'd wanted it in A standard) "because that's the only way I could get the bridge roughly level". All of his other guitars were fixed-bridge, so the setup was new to him, but I could have sorted it out for him then and there in less than 5 minutes. I went through similar frustrations myself the first couple of times that I tried changing the tuning / changing string gauge with a floating trem.

 

[Neon_Knight_]

I've never done a basic setup before, what would I need in order to do that? Beyond an Allan key and a screwdriver, what else would I need?

I highly recommend that you take a look at this Ibanez setup guide: https://www.ibanezrules.com/tech/setup/index.htm

The author is an Ibanez dealer with a reputation for doing the very best setups going (and a regular on SS.org), so he knows what he's talking about. Not all of it is relevant to your RGD, as it's fixed-bridge, but there's still lots of useful advice there.

 

[cardinal]

You can use the strings as a straight edge: use one had to hold a finger on the first fret and the other hand to hold a finger over the fret where the body meets the neck. Then just eye ball the gap between the string and the under 7th fret.

Then tighten the rod in increments while checking that gap under the 1st and 6th string. In theory, that gap should be consistent as you straighten out the neck. If not, there's a chance that there's a twist

 

[syzygy]

Hey again! I don't know if this would fall more under general setup questions, but it might be pertinent to this one, so I figured it might be easier to necro a thread.

It's been 4 months, and since then I've been trying to teach myself to set up a guitar. I recently changed strings on the aforementioned 7 string RGD, and as it turns out, the previous owner had something like a .74 on the low string for G#. I swapped it for a set with a .62 on the low string, and as expected, the low string has almost unusable buzz. So I opened up the Ibanezrules guide for setting up a guitar (thanks for pointing me towards that side, btw), and got to work.

My guitar is now roughly set up in drop G# tuning, but it still has some issues. I currently have the neck relief set at 0.3mm, but lowering the action on the highest string beyond 1.5mm revealed a super dead 15th fret, and the 7th string is set at 2.0mm, but still rattles through an amp.

I guess my question is whether or not this is within parameters for something I could fully set up for standard-low action (as per Rich's setups on Ibanezrules), or if this is something I should take in to a local tech.

 

[nickgray]

a super dead 15th fret

Frets can lift out. Use mallet with a plastic head if you have one, you can also use a regular hammer, but put a piece of wood or strong (not easily compressible) piece of plastic. Never ever ever hit the frets with a hammer, steel is way harder than nickel silver, it'll dent the frets. Ideally completely remove the strings or at least move them away, but fully secure them so that they're nowhere near the fret, otherwise if you hit the string you'll dent the fret quite nastily. Don't hit too hard, but do apply a bit of force. It might take a few rounds.

This may or may not help because some frets are lifted in a way that they spring up, they need to be pressed in and glued if this is the case. But in some cases you will be able to push them in and they won't spring back.

You can also do ghetto string leveling, it depends on where and how high the offending frets are though, otherwise you can remove a bit too much because of the aforementioned fret lift problem which you have to deal with first. Remove the tension off the string and the adjacent strings so that you can push them away. Take an AA or AAA battery and wrap a thin piece 320 grit sandpaper over it, pull it tight with your fingers (you can also glue it if you want), and sand the fret, keep the battery as perpendicular to the fret as you can. Only sand where there's buzz. If you want to be extra secure, put some permanent marker on the top of the fret (ideally tape around it, it's somewhat easy to mark the fretboard accidentally) so that you'll have a visual cue of where you're sanding. Sand a tiny bit, retune back (in the ballpark, don't have to tune perfectly) and check for the buzz. When the buzz is gone, sand a tiny bit with 600 and then 1000. Go higher if you want to polish further.

Oh, and before you do all that you also need to figure out which frets are high and which are low. You can easily mess up and sand the wrong fret. Simply fret a string, look very very closely at the next fret and lightly tap the string over it so that it frets. Note how much clearance it has, both visually and feel wise. Then move one fret up, do the same and compare that clearance to the previous fret. Rinse, repeat. It's a ghetto fret rocker. Well, actually it kinda works better than a fret rocker in some sense because it's the thickness of the string, the string rests exactly where it needs to, and you can easily differentiate between low and high frets. You can't diagnose lifted frets without fret rocker though and fret rocker can be easily moved up and down the fret, and it also has a fairly fine resolution in terms of detecting inconsistencies, the clearance method above only gets you in the ballpark.

 

[HungryGuitarStudent]

Maybe it’s been suggested before, but do you have a straight edge (a straight ruler for example)? Warping in some directions can be detected and seen well if you place a straight edge on the fretboard (for example, neck humps in the higher frets). That’s how my tech detected my new Suhr had neck problems. Plek machine confirmed it.