Parts of Guitar - Acoustic Guitar

Introduction

Hello all guitar lovers and friends. Everyone wishes to learn guitar whosoever first looks at this beautiful instrument. You just fall in love at first sight; that's why it is so appealing instrument. Many students who come to me and even those who are learning guitar already; do not have much knowledge about the parts of the guitar. That is what is called what and what purpose does it serves in the instrument. Although my first lecture gives them enough detail that they would never gets confused. I am posting here all of them in detail. Enjoy enhancing your guitar knowledge.

 
Headstock

Headstock, Tuning Keys & Nut

The headstock is located at the end of the guitar neck furthest from the body. It is fitted with tuning keys that adjust the tension of the strings, which in turn affects the pitch. Traditional tuner layout is "3+3" in which each side of the headstock has three tuners. Many guitars feature other layouts as well, including six-in-line tuners or even "4+2".

Tuning Keys

These keys are used to adjust the tension of the strings. Basically every stringed instrument requires a proper adjustment of all the strings. This adjustment of strings is known as TUNING. You need to tune the guitar before playing. The standard tuning used for the guitar is E-B-G-D-A-E (from string 1 to 6).

Nut

The nut is a small strip of bone, plastic, brass, graphite, stainless steel, or other medium-hard material, at the joint where the headstock meets the fretboard. Its grooves guide the strings onto the fretboard, giving consistent lateral string placement. It is one of the endpoints of the strings' vibrating length. It must be accurately cut, or it can contribute to tuning problems due to string slippage.

Truss Rod

The truss rod is a metal rod that runs along the inside of the neck. It is used to correct changes to the neck's curvature caused by the neck timbers aging, changes in humidity or to compensate for changes in the tension of strings. The tension of the rod and neck assembly is adjusted by a hex nut or an allen-key bolt on the rod, usually located either at the headstock, sometimes under a cover, or just inside the body of the guitar underneath the fretboard and accessible through the sound hole.

Neck

A guitar's frets, fretboard, tuners, headstock, and truss rod, all attached to a long wooden extension, collectively constitute its neck. The wood used to make the fretboard will usually differ from the wood in the rest of the neck. The bending stress on the neck is considerable, particularly when heavier gauge strings are used, and the ability of the neck to resist bending is important to the guitar's ability to hold a constant pitch during tuning or when strings are fretted. The rigidity of the neck with respect to the body of the guitar is one determinant of a good instrument versus a poor one.

Fret Board

Fret Board & Frets

The fingerboard (also known as a fretboard on fretted instruments) is a part of most stringed instruments. It is a thin, long strip of wood that is laminated to the front of the neck of an instrument and above which the strings run. In the playing of such an instrument, a musician presses the strings down towards it in order to change their vibrating lengths, causing changes in pitch. This is called "stopping" the strings. The word "fingerboard" in other languages sometimes occurs in musical directions.

Frets

Frets are metal strips embedded along the fretboard and located at exact points that divide the scale length in accordance with a specific mathematical formula. Pressing a string against a fret determines the strings' vibrating length and therefore its resultant pitch. The pitch of each consecutive fret is defined at a half-step interval on the chromatic scale. Standard classical guitars have 19 frets and electric guitars between 21 to 24 frets.

Inlays

Inlays or position markers are visual elements set into the exterior surface of a guitar i.e. fretboard. Inlays range from simple plastic dots on the fretboard to intricate works of art covering the entire exterior surface of a guitar. The basic principle function of inlays help the guitarist to locate the particular fret easily. Usually the inlays are marked on 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th and the 12th fret of the guitar fretboard.

Heel

Heel

This is the point at which the neck is either bolted or glued to the body of the guitar. Almost all acoustic guitars have glued necks or set necks, while electric guitars are constructed using both types.

Body

Body

The body of an acoustic guitar has a sound hole through which sound is projected. The sound hole is usually a round hole in the top of the guitar under the strings. Air inside the body vibrates as the guitar top and body is vibrated by the strings, and the response of the air cavity at different frequencies is characterized, like the rest of the guitar body, by a number of resonance modes at which it responds more strongly. Most electric guitar bodies are made of wood and include a plastic pick guard. Boards wide enough to use as a solid body are very expensive due to the worldwide depletion of hardwood stock since the 70's, so the wood is rarely one solid piece. Most bodies are made of two pieces of wood with some of them including a seam running down the center line of the body.

Strings

Modern guitar strings are manufactured in either metal or organo carbon material. Instruments utilizing "steel" strings may have strings made of alloys incorporating steel, nickel or phosphor bronze. Classical and flamenco instruments have historically used gut strings but these have been superseded by nylon and carbon-fiber materials. Bass strings for both instruments are wound rather than mono filament.

Sound Hole

Sound Hole

A sound hole is an opening in the upper sounding board of a stringed musical instrument. The sound holes can have different shapes: round in flat-top guitars, f-holes in instruments from the violin or viol families and in arched-top guitars, rosettes in lutes. Mandolins may have round or oval holes. A round or oval hole is usually a single one, under the strings. F-holes are usually made in pairs placed symmetrically on both sides of the strings.

Though the purpose of sound holes is to help acoustic instruments project their sound more efficiently, the sound does not emanate solely (nor even mostly) from the location of the sound hole. The majority of sound emanates from the surface area of both sounding boards, with sound holes playing a part by allowing the sounding boards to vibrate more freely, and by allowing some of the vibrations, which have been set in motion inside the instrument to travel outside the instrument.

Pick Guard

Pick Guard

A pick guard is a piece of plastic or other laminated material that is placed under the strings on the body of a guitar, mandolin or similar plucked string instrument. The main purpose of the pick guard is to protect the guitar's finish from being scratched by the guitar pick.

As well as serving a practical purpose, the pick guard may also be used for decoration and is often made in a contrasting color to that of the guitar body (popular variants are white pick guards on darker guitars and black pick guards on lighter guitars). As well as plastic, other pick guard materials can include acrylic glass, glass, plywood, fabrics, metal and mother-of-pearl/pearloid varieties. Expensive guitars may have luxury pick guards made from exotic woods, furs, skins, gems, precious metals, Mother of Pearl and abalone pearl. The pick guard is a very common site to place an autograph, since the signed pick guard can easily be detached and moved to another guitar or sold separately as a piece of memorabilia.

Bridge

Bridge, Saddle & Bridge Pins

The main purpose of the bridge on an acoustic guitar is to transfer the vibration from the strings to the soundboard, which vibrates the air inside of the guitar, thereby amplifying the sound produced by the strings. On both electric and acoustic guitars, the bridge holds the strings in place on the body. There are many varied bridge designs. There may be some mechanism for raising or lowering the bridge to adjust the distance between the strings and the fretboard (action), and/or fine-tuning the intonation of the instrument.

Saddle

The saddle of a guitar refers to the structure on or parallel to the bridge. The saddle is most commonly found on acoustic guitars, but some models of hollow-bodied electric guitars have it. Its basic purpose is to hold the strings above the bridge and guitar, and to mute the vibration of the string so the strings do not buzz and/or damage themselves or the bridge. It is comparable in size and function to the nut, and variations in its design are not uncommon.

Bridge Pins

Bridge pins are used on some musical instruments to locate the string precisely in the horizontal plane, and in the case of harpsichords to affect the sustain of the strings. They are usually made of steel in modern pianos, of brass in harpsichords, and bone or synthetics on acoustic guitars. Electric guitars do not usually have bridge pins as, in guitars, they are used to transfer the sound from the strings into the hollow body of the instrument as well as holding the strings in place.

Tailpiece

Tailpiece

The function of the tailpiece is to anchor the strings, so it must be strong enough to withstand their combined tension. Tailpieces of the violin family of instruments, as well as acoustic basses, are suspended with a tail gut looped around the end pin or end button. Originally made of animal gut and adjusted with difficulty by means of a knot, tail guts are now usually made of wire or nylon mono filament, and more easily adjusted with threaded collars, usually made of brass, on the ends.

The tailpiece itself may be made of wood, usually ebony, rosewood or boxwood. Other materials include cast light metal, and composites including plastic. Choice of material may have more than just cosmetic effect; a well-made instrument is sensitive to tailpiece weight, mass distribution, and tail gut placement on the saddle.

Pickup

 A pickup device acts as a transducer that captures mechanical vibrations (usually from suitably-equipped stringed instruments such as the electric guitar, electric bass guitar or electric violin) and converts them to an electrical signal, which can be amplified and recorded.