About this UV - Things I like & dislike about it

[kennydoe]

Okay. *I took my new/used UV777BK on my gig last night. *I plan to do two more gigs with it before making my decision to keep it or return it.

Keep in mind that my guitars are usually strung with .011s and I strung this one with .009s so i didn't have to set it up before taking it out this weekend.
I didn't change any settings on my Zoom 9030 Gtr processor, so it's EQed for my Evo ans PAF pro p'ups that are in my rg550.

I had to adjust the bridge to balance better - it was leaning way back when I bought it.

Here's what I've found so far:

As far as sound:
I love the heavy tones. My distortion is nice 'n thick and it cuts thru much nicer than the 550

The clean I found okay for regular chorusy "with arms wide open" kind of parts, but when I move to do funky 'chacka chakca' parts (2 &4 positions)this guitar has no bite whatsoever. *

The gain was good in the middle positions - *much better than the Jems I bought and returned, but it couldn't get that funky "stratty" sound that's used on the motown and fast r&b stuff (which I do a lot of). *Curiously though, when playing these kinds of parts with a wah (wakka-wakka-wakka) the guitar sounded much less harsh than my 550, which was welcome.

As far as playability:
I played it all day to get myself used to the extra string. *I adjusted pretty easily - much more so than I've ever adjusted to a 5-string bass with a low B. *I compare it to driving a car from the middle seat, rather then the drivers seat. *everything's almost the same, just slightly displaced.

I found the Low-B to be very floppy and unpleasant to fret on. *I really couldn't find much use for it other than the occasional R-5 chord. *There's not really many chord positions that worked well for me other than R-5. *The B also got caught on the p'up at one point. *I didn't even notice, but the guitar was all outta tune.

In the 3rd set of the night, I finally broke a string (Hi - E)during Prince's "let's go crazy" *It was towards the end of the first solo and I knew I wouldn't be able to change it for the big solo thing at the end, so i grabbed my RG, expecting to be all thrown off by the 7/6 issue. *Happily, I wasn't. *I was actually happy to have it back in my hands. *The p'ups were definitely hotter - had to pull the gain down a bit.

As far as stability:
The low B-E and sometimes the A, despite being locked and re-locked (just to make sure) went out of tune a lot and the rest of the strings accordingly. *I never had this problem before with a locking guitar. *It just did not stay in tune well at all.

So the jury is still out - that clean *"cutting" sound that i'm not getting is a big issue for me. *In a 6-string, i can easily replace the middle p'up with a strat-type p'up - I don't know if there are any 7 string single space/coil p'ups that would give me that gain & high end that i'm looking for.

I'd like hear about anyone else's experiences with this stuff and how they solved the problems. *

If you want to hear the kind of stuff I do on guitar check out www.invisibleband.com/sounds.html . *Nothing real fancy guitarwise - i'm more about the groove. * I do all the keyboard/drum programming by hand - there's no midi downloads involved anywhere in the process.
~Kenny

[Rich]

I can almost guarantee your tuning issues are due to not fully stretching in the wound strings. Critical ESPECIALLY on a 7, that low B will stretch forever till it's done! And until you can stretch it twice in a row with no drop in pitch, it's not done.

[kennydoe]

One more thing....
My fingers are KILLING me today! *My callouses are sore and my joints are achy.

I don't know if it's because I played more than usual yesterday acclamating myself with the new neck or if my fingers were in a slightly different position on a wider neck. *Maybe even because going from 11s to 009s I was putting unneccesary pressure on the strings,

Has anyone else experienced this?
~K

[bob oakman]

Tight band! You guys sound great.

The first time I spent a decent amount of time on a 7-string the muscles in my hand and arm felt the difference the next day too. I think you unconsciously strain because of the different neck width. Not sure about that though.

I have had continuing trem related problems with staying in tune. I should say “up to pitch”. *My UV777PBK stays in tune with itself but remains just slightly flat after bending down. I do not have the opposing problem when pulling back on the trem. Some of the trouble cleared up after repairing the pick guard, which was rubbing against the block. The knife edges look good to me, so I am a bit confused. Last night I was hangin’ in the studio with a fellow Jemsiter and UV777PBK player. (Hey G, you rock!) His UV had no such problem. Weird.

I may soon seek professional advice on this small, but annoying problem. I love everything else about the guitar… including the, usually annoying, level differences between the various pickup configurations.

Please take my comments with a grain of salt. I am far from an expert on these things. I just wanted to contribute what I knew.

[pri0531]

What is up guys? * I had a little tuning problem with my UV when I first got it, but when I put 10s on it and adjusted the guitar it was all good. *You just have to really stretch the strings before locking down. *Yesterday I had the pleasure of playing my UV777PBK through a Legacy head and got a intense education on the recording process (Thanxs Bob you are a true recording professional). *The Legacy sounded great!! *The distortion is so EVEN!!!! *
Out,
Gregory *

[kennydoe]

Night two with the UV....

Thanks for the replies, you two...I'm just trying to figure out if i'm nutz here or not. *After reading the sentence about knife edges I'm completely confused, but I got the rest of it. *I'm in Long Island NY - if anyone's nearby, I'd love to hang and talk shop sometime.

The guitar continued to have some tuning issues. *I cranked the hi-mids on my clean sound at the pre-amp. *Helped a little, not much. *Tomorrow I'll try a little compression and see if that doesn't do the trick.

After the guitar was out of tune and I wasn't going to have a chance to tune it (club date - song to song, no breaks) i grabbed the 550 and tonight I had 7/6 issues. *I definitely felt myself consciously shifting for the 7th string at least a few times. *Ugh. *am I getting used to this?!?!

I don't understand how that floppy low b string is ever going to stretch - it seems like it's hardly on there at all! *This set of srtings has about 6-7 hours of playing time on them now - if it's not stretched yet, WHEN????*

i put strings on and I go to the gig - I don't have that kind of time to let the strings stetch to full stretchdom before locking them down! *i never had that problem with the 550 - a few pulls twice up and down the neck on each string and good to go. *

Thanks for the nice compliments on my band. *The drums are out of an Alesis DM5 and the fact that you didn't notice makes me smile and smile some more

~Kenny

[deangelo]

Kenny,, I understand your concern. *I had a UV777BK and at first it drove me nuts while it was breaking in. *Many things come to mind when I hear your story. *First of all if it is new, she is going to need some time to adjust and cure ( in the neck ) just little things but all them little things add up,,,don't they. *What I was doing with mine,,,was when I changed the strings I would start with the low B and replace it first while leaving all the other strings on,,,this will keep you from tweaking the trems edge or blade, ( that little bit of hardened steel that rest against your mount screws) *I would then use a rag to protect my fingers and pull on that string starting by the pickups and sliding up the neck. *I mean pull on that son of gun! *then I would tune all the strings again, and move on to the Low E and again once the low E was on I would stretch the bee-jeezus out of the low B and then the low E. *Obviously you won't use quite as much pull when you get to the higher strings but the key is that you need to keep stretching and tuning the wound strings. *I have found that by doing a good stretch on all the strings while restringing that once you are done it will settle in nicely that same day. *Yeah it will take longer but these things are picky. *You also need to pay close attention to the position of the trem. *There is a sweet spot where it must ride, I had to do alot of spring adjustment on mine to get her in place. *Once you are there you are golden, it does take patience and sometimes like myself you get all worked up and start to miss things and get pissed. *I ended up taking mine to a Luthier who in no time tweaked everything and it was flawless. *There is a set up procedure some where in here that shows pictures of where the trem should ride, if you have problems finding it I am sure Glenn would be glad to hook you up. *Just remember when adjusting the heighth of you trem there are those 2 little locking screws that need to be loosened or tightened ( depending on which way you are going) that need that tiny little allen wrench. *You may all ready know of that,,,but I have been surprised of how many people didn't know about and went on to tweak there trems.

Good luck,

~A2K

[tomizm]

A wee bit of logic behind why the trem must sit like it does.
It is very important that the knife edges are resting at 90 degrees to the post. *The best way to tell that is not by looking at the knife itself, but on the outside of the entire bridge where the little tiny block of metal shows. *That is part of the knife edge and must be parallel to the guitar body (or perpendicular to the post). *The location of the little block you're looking for is kinda hard to describe. *Press your whammy bar all the way into the strings, and look on the side of the little "wings" on the edge of the trem, you'll see what I mean.
I imagine this post will get moved to the setup area but since this discussion was going in that direction, I figgered what the hey.....

[kennydoe]

Yeah -

I wanted this thread to be about peoples likes and dislikes about the UV in their first weeks of ownership and beyond. *

The trem setup is not one of my complaints. *It was a bit wonky when I got it, but I fixed it and it's sitting nicely now. *Hwo about the rest of the things I mentioned?

~Kenny

[jemsite]

Good advice above. I would give it a total setup personally. *If you want to DIY look at the jemsite --> guitar --> tech setup area for starters. You should not experience problems such as this if everything is OK and setup right. *

Also i would not expect to gig with a 'new' axe for several weeks... until you are 100% comfortable with it. I'd say take it to practice along with your main axe for a while. Enjoy... glen

[bob oakman]

Hey “pri0531” (Greg),

Thanks for helping me with the setup on my UV. That was a big misconception I had about leveling the trem. Also, thanks for helping me with sweep picking. It was cool to get the girls together for a photo in the studio as well. One UV777PBK takes a nice picture. Two is even better. Unfortunately, the batteries died on the camera (RAM storage) and I lost the photos. We’ll just have to get them together again.

BTW, that pick you gave me ROCKS! I’m serious. It has helped me loads.

[pri0531]

You are quite welcomed Bob. *Thanks for the tour of the studios. *BTW - The pick is made by D'Andrea. *The bad thing is that I am only able to find that pick in NYC (48th Street). * If anyone knows where u can find these picks in the Houston, TX area please inform me. *For sweep picking the heavy picks (i.e. 1.5mm) make it easier for me. *When ever you want to jam just give me a call.
Out,
GP * * *

[davenit]

Not sure what "model" D'Andrea you are using but you should be able to find it here...

http://www.dandreapicks.com/

Dave