New Craigslist find. 2013 SDX

[gerryl98]

Made in Indonesia. Like new with and the seller included a Road Runner hard case. As is the guitar was in the following condition:

Action was super high, frets nicely polished, no sharp fret ends, neck feels amazing, neck and bridge pickup sound a lot better than expected....meaning unless a new pickup falls into my lap these pickups will do. Neck heel and pocket were nice and tight and the truss rod works and needed to be tightened slightly. Found a cheesy plastic shim in the heel and another one under the locking nut. Strings falling of the fret board. Intonation was perfect. One tuner needed the mounting screw tightened.

The fixes: In order to get the action lowered I had to order a Stew Mac 25 degree neck shim. Removed the shim under the nut. Fret rocker determined that frets 13-22 needed to be leveled and crowned. I blocked the tremolo. Replaced the nut with a R3. (didn't help that much).

Possible upgrades: If I come across a Floyd 1000 for a good price I'll probably swap it. Maybe try an R2 nut if I see myself slipping off the fretboard.


Overall a great guitar for the price.

[rjohnstone]

R2 nut won't fit. It's for a 1 5/8" neck.
The R3 is the proper nut size, but the holes from the R4 nut are in the wrong place as they're slightly off to the high E side. Fill the lock nut holes and recenter the R3 nut. Problem solved.
I have a 2017 SDX and that's how I solved the string slippage issue.

[Axewielder]

The R3 is the proper nut size, but the holes from the R4 nut are in the wrong place as they're slightly off to the high E side.

This is news to me, I've swapped back and forth between R3 and R4 and never noticed a difference.

[gerryl98]

My R3 is properly centered. I'm even using a little super glue to make sure the nut doesn't shift as it is being screwed down. I took out the trusty ruler to measure. The width of the fretboard at the nut is short 1/16th of an inch. Supposed to be 1 and 11/16th per the Jackson site. Mine is 1 5/8. Looks like I'm ordering an R2 nut. For comparison I measured my R3 Charvels and the nut is dead on 1 and 11/16th.

[rjohnstone]

This is news to me, I've swapped back and forth between R3 and R4 and never noticed a difference.

When I switched to the R3 nut, it was slightly off center when using the R4 holes.
Filled the holes, centered the R3 nut and then drilled new holes. Perfect now.
This might explain why the high E was falling off the fret board with the R4 nut. It may have not been installed properly to begin with.
I still prefer the narrower spacing of the R3, so the R4 would have been replaced regardless.

[gerryl98]

So here's what I finished doing. Added an R2 nut which required a Stew Mac nut shim on the nut shelf. Feels much better that the strings won't fall off the fretboard. As far as string spacing feel....no noticeable difference to me.