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johnpb0
October 5th, 2009, 11:08 PM
Hi. This is my first post so apologies if this is the wrong place. I have a 1971 red label FG 180 that I bought new on Oct 1st 1971 for £UKP43. It was played for a few years then hung up as an ornament for 20 years or so (during the work/kids period). It has survived (unplayed) 2 divorces, a year on a canal boat and being moved about to wherever I ended up. A couple of years ago I was inspired to start playing again after visiting some open mic sessions. I took the old Yam out of the cheap plastic bag it had been living in, polished it up, restrung it and was astounded at how good it looked and sounded. The action had always been too high from new so I did a set up (with help from Google), fitted a pre-slotted graphtec nut with wider string spacing and filed the bridge down a bit.
The action was now much improved and it continued to sound better each time I played it! 2 problems then arose. First I noticed the string ball end windings were almost sitting on the saddle. Underneath I found some ball damage to the bridge plate which was instantly solved with a "Platemate" (http://www.mitchelsplatemate.com/3.html) This is a great, simple device and there will be no more bridge plate wear on this guitar!
6 months later it developed a weird "sitar" like sound! After much frustration I found that the bridge has risen and angled itself towards the neck due to the lower bout bellying quite badly - there was virtually no break angle at all at the saddle. I thought this was the end so went out and bought a brand new Yamaha LS6, which I'm afraid just doesn't sound as good as the FG180 and isn't as easy to play, even with a perfect textbook setup.
As the bridge appeared to be well stuck on I looked for cost effective ways to keep the old Yamaha playable and discovered the JLD Bridge Doctor (http://www.jldguitar.net/warped_tops/fixtop.html), another simple but very effective device. I ordered one and it was fairly easy to fit. To my amazement and pleasure it worked immediately and over time the top has become almost flat again with the sound, action and playability better still.
That's the history so back to the subject. I have decided to sell the LS6 and invest in an Ibeam pickup and new tuners for the FG 180 (the original Yamaha open back tuners still work fine but look sad and a bit corroded). So does anyone know what the spindle size is for the tuners on this guitar and can I get replacements that will fit with a minimum of modifications? I like the look of the Grover Gold locking rotomatic tuners (even though they won't match the chrome truss rod cover)! Unless something catastrophic happens to it I intend to keep and play this fantastic guitar until it (or I) falls apart:smile:
Regards John
The action was now much improved and it continued to sound better each time I played it! 2 problems then arose. First I noticed the string ball end windings were almost sitting on the saddle. Underneath I found some ball damage to the bridge plate which was instantly solved with a "Platemate" (http://www.mitchelsplatemate.com/3.html) This is a great, simple device and there will be no more bridge plate wear on this guitar!
6 months later it developed a weird "sitar" like sound! After much frustration I found that the bridge has risen and angled itself towards the neck due to the lower bout bellying quite badly - there was virtually no break angle at all at the saddle. I thought this was the end so went out and bought a brand new Yamaha LS6, which I'm afraid just doesn't sound as good as the FG180 and isn't as easy to play, even with a perfect textbook setup.
As the bridge appeared to be well stuck on I looked for cost effective ways to keep the old Yamaha playable and discovered the JLD Bridge Doctor (http://www.jldguitar.net/warped_tops/fixtop.html), another simple but very effective device. I ordered one and it was fairly easy to fit. To my amazement and pleasure it worked immediately and over time the top has become almost flat again with the sound, action and playability better still.
That's the history so back to the subject. I have decided to sell the LS6 and invest in an Ibeam pickup and new tuners for the FG 180 (the original Yamaha open back tuners still work fine but look sad and a bit corroded). So does anyone know what the spindle size is for the tuners on this guitar and can I get replacements that will fit with a minimum of modifications? I like the look of the Grover Gold locking rotomatic tuners (even though they won't match the chrome truss rod cover)! Unless something catastrophic happens to it I intend to keep and play this fantastic guitar until it (or I) falls apart:smile:
Regards John