Re-string: Ibanez 540R

I had the opportunity to work with this Ibanez 540R over the weekend, it belongs to Brother Halim (who is having a day off work & most probably sipping coffee while reading this) who passed the guitar to me before he departed for KL.

It required a re-string & a change of string gauge from a set of .009 to .010. The first thing done was to 're-set' the fine tuners to a neutral level- I had it up halfway so there is an equal leeway to flatten (raise up) & sharpen (screw down) the notes after the nut is locked. This is one of the most fundamental things to do but often overlooked.

I removed all strings when re-stringing an instrument for the sole reason of being able to clean/ re-condition the fretboard. In this case, the 540R required only a little bit of re-conditioning but the stubborn bits were the ones over at the first fret but that was dealt with using a toothbrush. Remember, if you are doing this, use a soft-bristled brush. Any harder & you'll end up scratching the board.

I managed to tighten this gap here which gave me some play for the action adjustment subsequently. In fact, I only needed to raise the action very slightly to accommodate the thicker set of strings (.010). 

Over at the headstock, I was happy to have successfully removed those minor scratches caused by the tip of strings during re-stringing. I managed to give it 5 rounds of treatment while watching a Van Halen DVD- applied rubbing compound, scoured, swapped cloth & wiped clean the cloudy build-up.

All in all, I must say that it was an enjoyable episode with the 540R. It's a battle-scarred guitar & there's only so much you can do to such an instrument to make it appealing. Bringing it back to its initial condition is an impossible engagement, it's like asking the cobbler to revive a seasoned pair of shoes to a fresh, out-of-the-box status without accepting the fact that some parts are worn out & require replacement instead of a mere refurbishment.