Guitar Fall - Emotional?

sprint

Axe-Master
Have you ever had an emotional reaction to an accident involving your #1 guitar?

Of the guitars I own or have owned my SG is so comfortable and always seems to sound so "right". Today, due to my own carelessness leaving the cord in while it hung on a stand, I pulled it over (forward) when the cord got tangled in my chair. Took a pretty good whack at the nut - chipping out a good chunk of the nut. I think I got lucky as there appears to be no other damage, but still, I'm beating myself up about it, and worried it won't play the same after I take it in for nut replacement - geesh! - it's a guitar, not a person my spouse is telling me - take it easy!
 
Years and years ago I was playing my first "expensive" (to me, still in my teens) guitar. A fairly new BC Rich Mockingbird.

The phone rang. I reached over to grab it off of my dresser. BAM!

The movement of my arm caused the strap to pop off the strap button and the headstock slammed down onto the top of my dresser. :(

Fortunately, there was no visible damage.

I started using strap locks immediately after that incident. ;)
 
Oh man. I get it. I'm always a little bummed when my guitars get a nick or something. I can identify the time and location of every significant injury to my guitars (and I tour a lot!). At the same time, I try to remember that my guitars have earned those scratches, dings, and chips in the line of fulfilling their purpose: to make music. Sometimes they get bumped into, dropped or knocked over, and so on. I am careful with my instruments because I need them, and I value them. One of my local buddies looked at a good-size headstock chip on one of my primary strats, and said "that's a pretty good battle scar". True. It occurred on stage in St Kitts (in the Caribbean), when a coconut fell out of a tree, bounced around in the rigging, and dropped literally on top of me. I was attacked by a coconut. I do my best to get even by consuming them as often as possible.
 
Have you ever had an emotional reaction to an accident involving your #1 guitar?

Of the guitars I own or have owned my SG is so comfortable and always seems to sound so "right". Today, due to my own carelessness leaving the cord in while it hung on a stand, I pulled it over (forward) when the cord got tangled in my chair. Took a pretty good whack at the nut - chipping out a good chunk of the nut. I think I got lucky as there appears to be no other damage, but still, I'm beating myself up about it, and worried it won't play the same after I take it in for nut replacement - geesh! - it's a guitar, not a person my spouse is telling me - take it easy!

I did the same thing, although it wasn’t due to the cord. I had recently bought a Les Paul Goldtop and had It in a single guitar stand. I must not have leaned it back far enough and from across my den, I could slowly see it falling forward. It’s like it was falling in super slo-mo, but I still couldn’t get to it in time. It hit the hardwood floor, strings down. I thought for sure the neck or headstock snapped. Thankfully, the neck was fine and all I saw on the floor were bits of pieces from the nut.

I felt the same way...I was upset and worried it wouldn’t sound the same. The slots in the neck were still good, so I tried playing it and it still sounded great. I kept it that way for a year or more but recently I decided to try my hand at replacing the nut. Using a hacksaw on my $2,000 guitar was nerve wracking to say the least but I took my time and it turned out well.

https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/one-of-the-most-nerve-wracking-things-i’ve-done.161870/#post-1938810
 
That would give me a damn good reason to add a Floyd rose. ;)

Have you ever had an emotional reaction to an accident involving your #1 guitar?

Of the guitars I own or have owned my SG is so comfortable and always seems to sound so "right". Today, due to my own carelessness leaving the cord in while it hung on a stand, I pulled it over (forward) when the cord got tangled in my chair. Took a pretty good whack at the nut - chipping out a good chunk of the nut. I think I got lucky as there appears to be no other damage, but still, I'm beating myself up about it, and worried it won't play the same after I take it in for nut replacement - geesh! - it's a guitar, not a person my spouse is telling me - take it easy!
 
I was on a USO tour in the 80’s on the island of Iwo Jima. Flew a c130 from Mainland Japan. Miserable flight. 107 degrees , pure humidity.

Unloaded all our gear off the plane onto military trucks for trip down jungle road to coast guard base.

Noticed my favorite guitar bouncing on truck right in front of us. My favorite ever 80’s Kramer! It flew out of truck and we ran over it with all 3 axels. Nothing but splinters.

Here I am on what is basically an off limits island in the middle of the South Pacific with no Guitar for the show.

The US Coast Guard gets on the horn and discovers the band Loverboy was playing in Tokyo. The Air Force talks them into selling them one of Paul Deans backup Kramer’s. They threw it on an F-16 and I had a replacement guitar in about 7 hours.

That is one of three guitars that I will never sell.
 
I did the same thing, although it wasn’t due to the cord. I had recently bought a Les Paul Goldtop and had It in a single guitar stand. I must not have leaned it back far enough and from across my den, I could slowly see it falling forward. It’s like it was falling in super slo-mo, but I still couldn’t get to it in time. It hit the hardwood floor, strings down. I thought for sure the neck or headstock snapped. Thankfully, the neck was fine and all I saw on the floor were bits of pieces from the nut.

I felt the same way...I was upset and worried it wouldn’t sound the same. The slots in the neck were still good, so I tried playing it and it still sounded great. I kept it that way for a year or more but recently I decided to try my hand at replacing the nut. Using a hacksaw on my $2,000 guitar was nerve wracking to say the least but I took my time and it turned out well.

https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/one-of-the-most-nerve-wracking-things-i’ve-done.161870/#post-1938810
Yup - guess a forward fall = nut damage (backward is pretty well guarenteed a broken off headstock for LP or SG so I'll count my blessings).

Took it to the shop this evening. They'll order a pre cut nut from Gibson and put it in. Hope they know what they are doing - seems whenever I have brought in any of my lefty guitars for some sort of service the guitar tech/luthier guy seems to be scratching his head with somewhat of a glazed look as he reviews the backward looking task brought before him (which is why I tend to do my own setups, pickup changes etc - but nut work is out of my league.).

So will be at least 3 weeks without my guitar. I broke out the Carvin this evening (DC127) - it's actually a better made guitar but I never seemed to bond with it (darker sounding with a pronounced low end rumble, flatter fretboard, longer scale length) - who knows, maybe I can figure it out during SG hiatus.
 
My first day with a Schecter Nick Johnston Custom Shop USA

I was sitting, recording at the DAW, an it beat the desk when I inclined my body to grab the headphones.

I never drive without safety belt. From that day I never play guitar without a strap when sitting

Dent_01.JPG

The bright side: If I ever sell it, I could beat it further to make it relic and increase the price :D
 
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I have a PRS Custom 24 10 Top that was in near mint shape (2000-ish). A buddy came over to record and after he checked out my new axe, took it off and banged the tip of the headstock on the ceiling of my basement, taking a chunk of paint off the tip. Ugghh! Anyhow, its got several nicks and scratches now but it's still my #1.

I also have a 2008 SC245 10 Top that was practically perfect until a few months ago. I leaned is against my music desk, got up and snagged the cord with a foot. It fell over and now has a 1/4" gash on the neck around the 8th fret by the position dot. Damnit! I was about to list it on Reverb to help finance an Axe FX3, but I probably lost a bit of value.
 
I have a PRS Custom 24 10 Top that was in near mint shape (2000-ish). A buddy came over to record and after he checked out my new axe, took it off and banged the tip of the headstock on the ceiling of my basement, taking a chunk of paint off the tip. Ugghh! Anyhow, its got several nicks and scratches now but it's still my #1.

I also have a 2008 SC245 10 Top that was practically perfect until a few months ago. I leaned is against my music desk, got up and snagged the cord with a foot. It fell over and now has a 1/4" gash on the neck around the 8th fret by the position dot. Damnit! I was about to list it on Reverb to help finance an Axe FX3, but I probably lost a bit of value.
That's a nasty one - neck is the last place I'd want to get a gash of any size.
 
When a family member knocked over my first good guitar (brand new Gibson LP studio - $$$ for a high schooler) I was pretty upset for a bit. Since then though, it doesn't bug me.
 
My Parker took a direct fall to the ground, to the face of the guitar from a stand. I turned green for a minute. All was well.

a guy around town had one of the first few pointy San dimas charvels with Eddie paint. Had it on a stand backwards, walked away and bang, now the guitar was no longer a tilt back headstock. Would be worth a fortune today.
 
My beloved PRS custom 24 was in a single stand on stage. We had a guest singer come up onto stage wearing a cape which snagged my guitar and sent it clean off the stage down into a pit between the edge and fence, probably 10 feet down bouncing off scaffolding. I was so upset I didnt open the case to look at it for over a year.
 
In the early '80s I was touring and playing a very early BC Rich Mockingbird (one of Bernie's handbuilt prototypes for the Mockingbird model line). Beautiful koa and maple axe. We had just finished soundcheck for a show with Head East, and the guitar got knocked off the stand and onto its face. It landed on the knobs and caved in the front of the control cavity. I was able to take the cover off the back and push it back out (for the most part), but the cracks in the wood are still visible to this day. That's just one of road war wounds that guitar has now, but it was a biggie, and I was crushed when it happened.
 
When I first started playing I did not have strap locks. The mixer was on a table and I was adjusting the settings when the strap let loose and the neck hit the table. My Strat has a nice dent at the 11th fret. Strap locks from then on. Hurts me to this day.
 
Damn .... I did almost the same exact thing about 3 months ago. But,..... I got lucky. My number one - Gibson LP R0. She’s a gem. I have a guitar hanger mounted on the side of my rack. I caught the cord that was plugged in to it , and watched it spin out of the string swing “in slow motion” and was unable to grab it. It spun around and slammed directly onto the side of the headstock , hitting the tuners , and then gently flopped onto the fretboard. I was in shock. No damage - at all.
..... I wasn’t always so lucky. I’ve done numbers on guitars by straps coming unhooked ( prior to installing Schaller strap locks on EVERYTHING ).
Needless to say , I took a moment and installed the rubber washers that go on the string swing arms - AFTER this near fatal incident. For you , a smashed nut sounds like the best case scenario - after no damage at all. Sorry for the injury. I also made a point of keeping my favorite axes in more protected areas.
 
For you , a smashed nut sounds like the best case scenario - after no damage at all. Sorry for the injury. I also made a point of keeping my favorite axes in more protected areas.
Yes - Looks like Just the smashed nut but I won't rest easy until I get it back from the shop and confirm it still plays the same.

To keep from running over my guitar cord with my chair, I installed a cord that hangs down from the ceiling with enough slack to allow me to wheel around as needed but not enough slack to get the cord "under my wheels" as Alice would say. Works great but introduced risk of my chair headrest grabbing the cord. I knew I had to ALWAYS unplug my guitar if leaving it in the small stand behind me (normally my guitars hang on the wall but I have 1 stand for the "in-use" guitar) - I was disciplined about the unplugging except for this one time which is why I am so totally bummed with myself about it - grrrr .
I went wireless for a while to rid myself of the cord. Worked well (no tone difference I could detect) but the one I got is 2.4ghz so would interfere with our wireless router - my spouse got upset - "every time you play that damn guitar my Netflix goes out - lol!"
 
Have you ever had an emotional reaction to an accident involving your #1 guitar?

Of the guitars I own or have owned my SG is so comfortable and always seems to sound so "right". Today, due to my own carelessness leaving the cord in while it hung on a stand, I pulled it over (forward) when the cord got tangled in my chair. Took a pretty good whack at the nut - chipping out a good chunk of the nut. I think I got lucky as there appears to be no other damage, but still, I'm beating myself up about it, and worried it won't play the same after I take it in for nut replacement - geesh! - it's a guitar, not a person my spouse is telling me - take it easy!

My first great guitar was a red Les Paul Custom (in my avatar). Got it my senior year of high school. At my final high school concert I went to put it on a stand. I set it down quickly and it didn’t stay. It fell forward and smacked into the hard gym floor. The neck got some damage. I haven’t even had it a year. I’ve replayed that moment so many times in my head. Whenever I set down a guitar on a stand I am so extra careful.
 
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