Signs and symptoms of lack of humidity in electric guitars

[Kerry Krishna]

I know what the signs are in acoustic guitars, but other that necks shrinking side to side and frets starting to stick out, and lacquer starting to check, what are the other things that happen that a lay guitarists can easily see? Thanks so much folks...

[Russell Vance]

HI Kerry,

Obviously neck relief will change when the neck loses a bit of humidity and its a half a tweak here or there of the truss rod from season to season where we are.  You got the fret ends.

Other than that I cannot cite anything that matters happening as a result of a reduced humidity environment wrt electric guitars. 

Temperature changes tend to do in lacquer finishes, and increase humidity corrodes nickel silver frets and hardware/switch contacts bt that's another question.

Regards,

 Rusty. 

R.

[Roger Häggström]

All screws in the wood needs to be tighten.

[Bobby Davis]

Razor fret is the most obvious, but a few other things can happen...

• A hump in the fretboard somewhere between the 12-14th frets (causes string buzz)
• A concave top (more string buzz)
• A very flat back
• This one's pretty subjective: the guitar can develop a brittle or “tinny” sound
• If bad enough, you can hear unnatural rattles when the guitar is played or tapped in certain areas (glue joints have pulled apart)

Hope that helps!