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Guys, I have this problem with my Peavey Tracer where the strings break very often and I don't know what's causing it. They always break at the bridge (usually the A or D string). At first I thought the saddles were bad, because they always broke at the bridge. But then I bought new saddles (Graph Tech string savers...) and thought that cured the problem. Turned out it didn't. At a recent practice, I broke the A string three times in a row and then the following gig I broke the D-string again. Any idea what could be causing this problem? I do break strings regularly because of my rough playing style, but not as much as with this guitar. I really like the guitar, but am afraid of gigging with it as long as I haven't solved this issue, so any input is welcome!

They break at the bridge? It's possible that the bridge saddles have some edges that you can remove with fine sandpaper. Your strings need a good and clean surface to live a longer life. You don't like stones in your bed while sleeping, or do you?

what gauge and brand strings you using?

Check the saddles for burrs, not that they're likely.

How's the nut look?

Thinking waaay outside the box of sanity here, but maybe it's binding somewhere else and breaking there.

rfurtkamp wrote:Check the saddles for burrs, not that they're likely.

How's the nut look?

Thinking waaay outside the box of sanity here, but maybe it's binding somewhere else and breaking there.

Aye, even though they break at the bridge, your nut (teee heee heee) is the likely culprit.

Thanks for your input guys. The nut doesn't look that bad to me actually, or am I missing something? Here's a link to an album with some close-up pictures of it (you can zoom in quite well on the pictures): http://imgur.com/a/c5OsW

Or are the "horizontal grooves/string prints" you can see a problem? If so, how do I solve it?

gnomethrone wrote:what gauge and brand strings you using?

I don't really use the same strings all the time, it's a mix of GHS, Ernie Ball and cheap Harley Benton strings. Gauges are usually .60 or .70 as the lowest string, then .36 .26 .17 .13 .10 tuned to Aadgbe.

Pepe wrote:They break at the bridge? It's possible that the bridge saddles have some edges that you can remove with fine sandpaper. Your strings need a good and clean surface to live a longer life. You don't like stones in your bed while sleeping, or do you?

I already replaced the saddles with brand new saddles that are marketed as "string savers" (by Graph Tech), so I would hope that can't be the problem anymore!

I thought you meant the saddle (nut) at the head of the guitar. Well, if you have already replaced them with good ones, I don't know what happens at your place. But it's always A and D? And that doesn't happen at other electric guitars? Are you sweating very much?

I didn't like GHS strings back then in the late 90's. Broke a string of these every few days when I used them (the guitar shop in the city only had these). "Harley Benton" is cheap China stuff, you know? It's the Thomann "brand name" that they use for everything that they mass import. Where are the A and D strings from?

Yeah, I know the Harley Bentons are cheap China stuff, but I never feel it matters? As for which strings are A and D: it just varies with what I have at hand, and it doesn't seem to matter for the string break problem (to me)? To be honest, I haven't paid a lot of attention to what brand of string is always snapping. I have used all those strings (GHS, Ernie Ball, Harley Benton) on different guitars I have and they don't have the same string break problems as on this guitar. That's why I think it's more of a problem with the guitar than with the strings

Obulus wrote: Gauges are usually .60 or .70 as the lowest string, then .36 .26 .17 .13 .10 tuned to Aadgbe.

This confirms my suspicion that your problem is the nut, not the bridge. Have a tech file the slots to accept heavy strings.

^^^ I was thinking the same thing.

Buy a decent pack of strings just for the sake of science. I used to break ghs literally every gig but kept on buying them cause they were cheap. DR last longer for me, as do d'addario.

I just wanted to say every time I scroll by I see "Spring Break problem" which is a totally different kind of thread.

Down tuning + heavy handed I used jazz gauge. You could try being less rough on them but that's not punk rock answer.

Okay, I'll definitely check out the nut some more then. The thickest string doesn't seem to have a lot of problems though (it is pretty floppy though, so that might actually help?), and the rest is standard thickness. Anyway, I'm hopefully picking up a guitar at a tech soon, and I'll bring this guitar and have him look at the nut!

neonblack wrote:I just wanted to say every time I scroll by I see "Spring Break problem" which is a totally different kind of thread.

I immediately think of this when thinking about Spring Break problems
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yq_qpLINfQ[/youtube]