Acoustic Guitars and the Dangers of Heat
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Guitars and the Damaging Effects of Temperature & Humidity Extremes.
This article by Nigel Rowles discusses how important it is to keep your acoustic guitar in ambient temperatures, or risk long term damage to your valuable instrument.
An acoustic guitar is a remarkable piece of engineering. It is at the same time quite fragile, yet also remarkably strong. The entire structure is built around the need to produce a good sound while resisting the force of approx 180 pounds (800N) of tension exerted from the strings which are trying to pull the head of the guitar around toward the body. When this tension succeeds physics has won the battle and the guitar then ranges from difficult through to impossible to play. This can take a long time to occur, sometimes years, and we only start to notice when its getting too late to save the guitar. Only an expensive guitar is worth repairing (if it is repairable) and it will need an expert guitar repairer, usually at great cost.
Extremes of temperature and humidity greatly aid nature in its quest to bend a guitar out of shape. The inside of an acoustic guitar is unsealed timber. Timber will absorb and release moisture according to the environment it lives in and the weather it is exposed to. Timber will swell a little when exposed to high temperature and it will shrink a little when exposed to cold temperature. Timber will also swell when exposed to high humidity and will shrink when exposed to low humidity. If you combine high temp with high humidity or low temperature and low humidity the results are compounded.
If a guitar has change in environment it will adjust to the change without a problem, its the repeated change in extremes that does the damage so its best to avoid extremes and repeated sudden changes of temperature and or humidity. If your guitar lives in an air-conditioned environment then the guitar will have low moisture content, if you take it into and hot moist atmosphere will cause the timber to swell rapidly and if the guitar is then returned to the air-conditioned room it will then loose the moisture again causing the timber to shrink again. If you do the opposite will have the same effect except in the reverse order. Also, do not to leave your guitar in a closed car in the sun, as this can raise the temp of the guitar to extreme heights.
A lot is said about keeping your guitar in its case to keep the guitar more stable. Im not sure of the worth of this thinking as 1. The guitar case would have to be quite air-tight for this to work and 2. I would be very concerned with putting a guitar that has a high humidity content into a guitar case as this would help lock the moisture in thereby greatly increasing the risk of mould developing inside the guitar. Timber and mould do not get along together at all.
Just be sensible and you will get a number of decades out of a quality guitar.
www.nofretguitarlessons.com.au
1986 Diploma in Music - Classical Guitar Major. I have been performing for 34 years either as solo instrumentalist, in duos, trios and in rock bands playing guitar or bass guitar. 10 years ago I started teaching guitar, bass and music theory which led me to independently writing, producing and publishing The Guitar Instruction, Musicianship & Reference Manual with DVD on Left & Right Hand Techniques.
Recent Guitar News
- Festival explores the guitar's Italian roots (Fort Worth Star-Telegram)
By CHRIS SHULL Some things are innately Italian, though embraced by the world — Armani suits, Ferrari sports cars, Fellini films, pizza. Mitch Weverka wants folks to add acoustic guitar to the list. Weverka, a guitar player and artistic director of the Fort Worth Guitar Guild, says the origins of the classical guitar are as Italian as they are Spanish. The group’s concerts this week at the ...
