Aria Pro II Ta-65

[BillB]

Following on from:
Line 6 Variax series 1 - worth the effort?
https://www.soundonsound.com/forum/view ... hp?t=95368

...the Aria Pro II Ta-65 turned up this morning and it sounds as lovely as it looks.



Of the guitars I have owned, this is definitely the easiest to play. What hadn't quite occurred to me, is that it joins two other Matsumoku guitars that I have had since the eighties, the Pro II SB-600/700(?) fretless bass and the Vox Custom 25. I may have to get rid of the Cort bass and replace it with a Matsumoku fretted bass (only kidding...).



Apart from showing off a bit, the purpose of the post is to ask a bit more advice. The Ta-65 is a bit dusty and mucky. I felt like I needed to wash my hands after playing it. What would anyone suggest to give it an overall clean and polish? I have orange oil for the fingerboard but would like to clean that as well, before applying oil.

There is a bit of scratching on the back where it has obviously leaned against a stand. Any advice on polish that might infill the scratches a little?

The pickup switch felt a bit loose but I twisted the toggle in until it felt firm and it works perfectly, no noise. The jack nut was loose but I hand-tightened it and is now firm, and holds the jack lead tightly, no contact issues. Will tighten a bit more later. The volume pots were a little crackly, but nothing awful. Is it worth prizing the knobs off and trying to get some faderlube down the shaft? Can't see any other way to get to the pots.

The intonation on the G string feels a bit off (1st/octave fretted and harmonic, but I want to check it with a turner). The saddle intonation adjustment for the G string looks to be set closer to the bridge than for any of the other strings, so I assume that would be the thing to adjust, with the string loosened off.

There is some loss of gold finish on some of the metalwork but I'm not really bothered about that.

Any thoughts on cleaning/tidying would be appreciated. After that it has to go into storage until Christmas!

[Wonks]

Lemon oil or mineral oil (wooden chopping block oil, which is cheaper than lemon oil and is basically the same stuff without the lemon scent and colour) will also clean the fretboard. Just apply, leave for a while and then rub with clean lint-free cloths. Repeat until clean.

But if there's quite a build up of crud, I'd scrape it either with a woodworking scraper, or else a single edged razor blade (now used mainly for DIY purposes). the razor blade is probably thinner so easier to get right up against a fret and then pull it back across the surface until you reach the next fret. It's also a good way to remove small indents in the fretboard. Then add some lemon/mineral oil to the fretboard.

It depends on how dirty the surface is, and what you think is on it. Just a damp cloth can normally get most surface grunge off. Anything that won't come off easily should then come off with naphtha (lighter fluid). But to really polish it, I'd use a car finish scratch remover. If reasonably deep scratches, I'd start off with a medium scratch remover like T-cut. I'd then move on to a finer remover like Meguiars Scratch X2. And then I use a really fine scratch remover/polishing agent, normally Micro-mesh Micro Gloss.

[Wonks]

The pots I'd just rotate fully as many times as you can, which normally removes the loose dust on the tracks. If they are still crackly after 20-30 turns, then they will almost certainly need some contact cleaner in them, but you won't get enough of it down the shafts to work; the pots (plus selector switch and output jack) will need to come out and have it sprayed into the pot slots by the connection tabs.

It's not too complicated a job and with experience (and a reasonably stiff wiring harness) you can often do it without resorting to string or tubing.

[BillB]

Thank you, Wonks.

Are you saying lemon/mineral oil for the main body?

The finger board didn't seem too bad (as in needing scraping) but I will have a closer look.
Regarding cleaning, would you suggest taking the strings off and, if that is the case, replacing them? And, if that is the case, how would I know a suitable gauge? Vernier caliper on the bottom E, or is it just common knowledge (for knowledgeable people) what would suit a guitar like this? Apart from being a bit old and mucky, they feel like a good weight to me, light, very easy action, easy to bend.

Note your comment about the futility of squirting lube down the shaft of the pots. I'll give them a good spin. But I would be a bit terrified of trying to take the electrics out through the F-hole. Even more so getting them back in!
Ships and bottles come to mind!

[Wonks]

No, just oil the fingerboard. It will help clean the body but then you’ve got an oily body which you then need to get rid of. Better things for cleaning the body.

[zenguitar]

One major milestone as a luthier is replacing/repairing the wiring loom in a semi.

The first is always the hardest, then you start learning all the tricks and tips.

And as a freebie to get you started...

You don't work through the f-holes. Just drop out the bridge pick-up and work through the pick-up cavity.

And I have always cleaned the finished woods of neck and body with White Spirit. An important rule is that you never apply any polish until you have cleaned it. You really don't want to trap grease and dirt beneath any polish. And if I am being honest, I am not a fan of polish. Cleaning is all that's required.

Andy

[Wonks]

You don't work through the f-holes. Just drop out the bridge pick-up and work through the pick-up cavity.

And how do you do that in a semi? All the ones I’ve worked on still had sides to the pickup cavities. 330, yes, 175 yes, but a 335-alike? very unlikely. You might find some with a very thin side that’s largely missing, but in general, there’s only the pickup cable hole.

By all means, take out the bridge pickup and check, but I bet most of the time the side is still solid.

[zenguitar]

That could well be the case Wonks, but I've mostly experienced guitars where you can work through the pick-up cavity. And that included Gibson 335's, and 355's. Although, to be fair, it's been a few years since I've seen one.

All I have to hand right now is my old Aria TB semi bass. And that allows me to work through the pick-up cavity.

But I have no doubt that there are plenty of guitars out there exactly as you described. But certainly worth checking before heading straight for the f hole.

Andy

[BillB]

Thank you, both. Pardon me for asking dumb questions until I think I know what I’m doing.

No ambitions to become a luthier. It’s basically OK as it is, and I don’t want to mess up anything. I might be able to get stuff out, but I can’t see how, for example, I would get the jack, or the bridge pots, back into place.

White spirit to the body and neck, Andy? Will that just remove grease and dirt and not affect the nice varnish? And by polishing, do you mean applying polish of some kind, or just rubbing with a clean cloth?

Regarding the fretboard, Wonks, there is a little bit of crud either side of some frets. Back to my original question. Is it necessary to remove strings, or could I just loosen one side then the other? Or is it important to get access to the whole surface?

[zenguitar]

No such thing as a dumb question, so feel free to ask whatever you want, whenever.

White spirit to the body and neck, Andy? Will that just remove grease and dirt and not affect the nice varnish? And by polishing, do you mean applying polish of some kind, or just rubbing with a clean cloth?

To paraphrase my late teacher Norman Reed...
White Spirit is what you use to clean wood for painting and painted surfaces, and lacquer and varnish are just posh paint. It is precisely the right thing to clean the surface and it's not going to do any harm, it's not an aggressive solvent so nothing to worry about.

I use kitchen roll with the White Spirit to clean the surfaces, then buff it dry with more clean kitchen roll and finish with a soft cloth like the classic yellow duster. And yes, by polishing I mean using a polish of some kind. It isn't really necessary.

Regarding the fretboard, Wonks, there is a little bit of crud either side of some frets.

The single edge razor blades Wonks described do a great job. Stanley knife blades are a very good alternative. And for gunk building up on either side of the frets wooden cocktail sticks come in very handy. Used with care they can remove a lot of that crud.

Andy

[BillB]

Thanks, Andy, that’s clear. The reason I keep asking about string removal is because I was told, decades ago, that removing the tension of strings may flex the neck, so the best way to change strings is one at a time, leaving the old ones in place until they are all changed. So is there any halfway house when cleaning, or do they have to come off to provide decent access around the pickups, to the fretboard etc? Is there reasonable confidence that a decent guitar will just settle back into place once new strings are fitted?

[Wonks]

Just take them all off. You can't clean the neck without doing it. Yes, the neck may flex a bit more than if you change the strings one at a time, as you'd normally do, but unless the neck is very flexible, then it should return to pretty much the same shape as it was before, especially after a day of being back under standard tension.

You may need to tweak the truss rod a bit, but that's something you need to be prepared to do to any guitar, as the neck can move slightly under seasonal changes of temperature and relative humidity.

[Wonks]

And if you plan to adjust the intonation, only do it after you've put a new set of strings on.

[zenguitar]

I'm sorry Bill, you appear to be a victim of an old wives' story going back to the 60's that we've been debunking for decades but keeps on popping up its ugly head. Very much like Whack-A-Mole.

At the dawn of Rock and Roll and the beat group boom we all wanted the same guitars as our heroes. But in the post war economy imported guitars (especially the most desirable American ones) carried enormous luxury tax making them near unaffordable.

Spotting an opportunity, all the UK musical instrument distributors decided to manufacture their own guitars in the UK to avoid the tax on imports. Many of them are still in the business of owning their own brands which they now get manufactured in Asia.

Regrettably, in the beginning few, if any, of the people they employed to set up their workshops had any training or experience as luthiers. They simply didn't have a clue how to build guitars.

I remember an interview in Guitarist magazine back in the late 80's or early 90's with a director of one of those distributors who remembered those days. I won't name that company because it would be unfair to single them out when the problem was more widespread. But she specifically recalled being sent down to the dock in East London with a photo of a Strat and asking some Italian woodworkers there if they could make something like that.

It took a few years for these workshops to make enough mistakes before they began to learn from them and recruit people who knew what they were doing. And during that period they were sometimes using the wrong woods, or incorrectly cut woods. And this made some necks unstable. So if you discovered your guitar had one of these unstable necks you learned to be pretty careful when changing the strings, to avoid upsetting the equilibrium.

That was all well and good, but the reputation remained even when the problem was fixed at source.

And a whole generation learned to play on these guitars. Many of them went on to become guitar teachers and passed on this outdated and incorrect information to their students, many of whom also went on to become guitar teachers. And so the beast of an old wives' tale was born.

PLEASE forget this nonsense about changing strings one at a time. It was only briefly relevent 60 years ago. And even then it never applied to a properly made instrument.

Take all 6 strings off. Then leave the guitar with no strings and go to the pub for a celebration pint or two and revel in the joy of never having to faff about again when you are changing strings. Enjoy your new found freedom.

Edited to add that Wonks has made 2 concise and informative posts while I've been writing my essay.

Andy

[Wonks]

You may find that even after changing strings for a set of the same make/gauge, that the amount of neck relief may have changed slightly. This is because of the tolerance in the wire thickness used. Some may be very slightly thicker than before, some very slightly thinner.

On average, you'll end up with a very similar overall tension. But sometimes it will turn out that there's slightly less overall tension (in which case the neck will be slightly flatter) or slightly more overall tension (in which case the neck may have a touch more relief in it). But you'd still end up with the same result whether you changed the strings singly or removed and then replaced them all in one go.

I've seen people on YT videos who simply cut through the strings when they are at full tension. This is not a good idea as the strings can fly out in all directions. They could scrape the back of your cutting hand, and they could hit anyone else standing very close. The cut ends can also fly off with some force and hit and damage the finish.

So if you are gong to cut them, (and you generally will need to at some point to make it easier to feed the strings back through the tailpiece or trem block), then just take some time to slacken off all the strings by a few turns. Use a string winder and it will take seconds.

[BillB]

Thank you both, great advice (as is to be expected )

As to weight and brand of new strings… what is on the Aria at the moment feel good. How might I match those, or is there just a ‘typical’ set that you would recommend?

Also where to buy from? I would guess a guitar shop rather than eBay/amazon as there are likely to be counterfeits around?

[zenguitar]

The best way is to use a caliper or micrometer, I use a digital caliper (Chinese ones are reasonably cheap). But for the very rare occasion you will use it I wouldn't recommend spending your money on one.

A local guitar tech might have one. Alternatively, try politely asking at a local engineering workshop.

There's a trick worth trying that will get you close if you can't access a decent tool.

When you get a new set of strings they are wound into a neat loop in the package. If you take one of those strings and hold it top and bottom between finger and thumb you can squeeze it so it flexes from a circle to an oval. You will feel the resistance as it tries to spring back to a circle.

The thicker the string, the more resistance you will feel. When you are changing a set of strings in poor light (or near darkness at the side of the stage) you will be able to easily identify which string is which. So you can make sure you get them all right without being able to see clearly.

If you have a friendly local guitar shop that sells individual strings from a box of individual gauges you can visit them and ask for help choosing the set of strings you want to buy.

Just take off the old strings carefully and wind them into a loop the same size as they were when they came out of the packet.

For each string compare how it feels when you squeeze it with examples from the gauge box. When you find one that has the same resistance, note down the thickness and move to the next string. You will end up with a good comparison for all 6 strings and you can then compare those gauges with those in different sets of strings to identify a close match. Your sense of touch can be remarkably sensitive and accurate. And, of course, you can always double check visually if it is a close match.

As for buying strings, I will either use a local guitar shop or if they don't carry an option I prefer I will use strings direct who are a reputable online retailer.

Andy

[Wonks]

I’d hazard a guess that they are a set of 0.009”s. I just stick with D’Addarios, but I’ve nothing against other brands apart from cheap Chinese sets.

[zenguitar]

Wonks reminded me that I forgot to mention brands.

My rule of thumb is to always buy strings actually made by the company whose name is on the packaging. That way you can always be confident that you know what you are getting.

So the main names to look for are D'Addario, Ernie Ball, Rotosound, Dean Markley, Pyramid, as well as smaller firms like Newtone.

Then you have companies like Martin. They used to make all their own strings, but for a long time they have outsourced their budget lines to commodity makers.

I recall a Gibson rep 25 years ago proudly announcing that Gibson strings were being made by D'Addario and were priced very competitively in comparison. However, they are less inclined to announce when production is shifted from D'Addario to a commodity string factory in Mexico. And possibly the only change on the packaging is hidden in small print.

So buy a reputable brand from a reputable dealer and you'll be just fine.

When I set-up a guitar I always hand it back with the packaging from the fitted strings and the advice that replacing with the same Brand and gauge set should cause no surprises when they next change strings.

Andy

[Kwackman]

This is a great thread.
I’ve learnt a good use for cocktail sticks, and other stuff too
As well as the excellent advice from zen and wonks about your string choice, if you are happy with the strings on your Vox guitar, maybe buy a set of those to start with?
That’s a Lovely looking guitar you have.

[Wonks]

I also use cocktail sticks for keeping the end of a top E string in the hole in the middle of Fender split-post tuners. Sometimes necessary for the B string, but almost always for the top E, otherwise it comes out before you can wrap it around the post. Even if you bend the top of the string over first to form a springy-V shape for a bit more grip.

[BillB]

Good string tips, thank you!

The plan forming in my head is:

• measure up for strings (I do have a cheap vernier caliper that will probably do the job) but noting what you said about .009", Wonks

• order new strings

• give the body and neck a basic clean

• then put it away and out of temptation's reach until Christmas

At which point I will get the old strings off and give it a deeper clean and re-string (referring, of course, to this thread) and have some festive guitar fun.

Might measure the Vox strings too and see if a lighter set might be an option for easier playing. Conscious this might mean truss road adjustment as you previously stated.

[Sam Spoons]

I use 10 thou sets on my Strats and am about to change the Les Paul to 11's. But I'm primarily an acoustic player these days so like a bit of resistance. Your guitar has the same scale length as the Pas Paul so I might stick with 10's if I wanted a light 'electric' feel to it. If you can find out the string gauges on the guitar now you can decide if you want to do lighter or not, taking into account how high the action is. But strings are (relatively) cheap so you can always afford to experiment.

[BillB]

Thanks, Sam

[BillB]

This is a great thread.
I’ve learnt a good use for cocktail sticks, and other stuff too
As well as the excellent advice from zen and wonks about your string choice, if you are happy with the strings on your Vox guitar, maybe buy a set of those to start with?

Now that I have the Aria, I realise that I find the Vox ones a little heavy. I like how easy the Aria is to play. Maybe it’s setup better, maybe it’s the strings. I will measure them though and see what the reality is.

That’s a Lovely looking guitar you have.

I assume you mean the Aria. Yes, I have really taken to it. I love natural colour on a guitar. It has a nice symmetry, in part due to the pickguard having been removed, but that suits me. And I like the way the headstock tapers, so the strings align more naturally with the tuning heads, rather than splaying out wide after the nut. As I have already said, it sounds good and it plays well.

Don’t want to over-romanticise anything, but it feels a bit like the guitar I have been waiting for…