How to Make a Righty Strat Guitar a Lefty
Jimi Hendrix famously played a right-handed Fender Stratocaster upside down, as a left-handed guitar. Hendrix's solution is the simplest way to turn any right-handed guitar into a left-handed one, and if you're a lefty who has bought or been given a right-handed Stratocaster, you can use the same method to make your guitar playable. Fender Stratocasters have been played by many guitarists, such as Jeff Beck and Yngwie Malmsteen, and you can add your name to that illustrious list after some minor adjustments to your right-handed guitar.
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Instructions
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Remove the strings from the guitar. This can be done easily by turning the machine heads to loosen the string. The machine heads on a Stratocaster are located on the headstock, all along the top side. Turn these until the strings are slack enough to be removed from the tuning posts on the headstock. Unravel the string wrapped around the metallic tuning post, and then pull the end out of the hole.
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Feed the strings through the hole in the bridge. The bridge of the guitar is located on the body, where the strings finish. You will notice that each string comes up through a hole in the bridge, and if you turn the guitar around you will see the corresponding holes on the back the guitar. Feed the string through the hole until you can see the end poking out at the back. Grab the metallic ring at the bottom end of the string and pull it through. Repeat this with the remaining five strings.
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Feed your new strings through the holes in the opposite order. To turn a right-handed Stratocaster into a left-handed one, you basically reverse the strings and turn the guitar upside down. Feed the thickest string (the E string) through the hole that previously housed the thinnest string. This is the hole closest to the metallic input jack on the Stratocaster. Push the string through the hole from the back of the guitar, and pull it through until the metallic ring at the bottom of the string gets caught inside the body of the guitar.
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Pull the string up the length of the guitar, ensuring that the string sits in the saddle, which is located just to the right of the string's dedicated hole in the bridge. Pull the end of the E string right up to the tuning post at the very top of the headstock, the furthest one to the right. Make sure that the string also sits in the groove in the nut of the guitar. The nut is the thin, white bar separating the neck from the headstock, and it has six grooves in it, for the strings that occupy those positions on the guitar. The E string needs to rest on the lowest of these notches, in line with its bridge saddle.
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Cut off any excess string. Generally, you should leave around 1 1/2 inches of string that extends past the tuning post. Wrap the remaining string around the tuning post once and then insert the newly cut end into the hole in the post. Turn the tuning head to tighten the string up.
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Work through the remaining strings in the same fashion, laying the next thickest string (easily identifiable by the numbers on the string packet -- a higher number means a thicker string) one position from the previous one. The further away you move from the input jack, the thinner the strings.
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Turn the guitar upside down, so the smaller arm on the body is the closest to you and the input jack is on the upper side. Tune the guitar using the machine heads and a guitar tuner.
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- Photo Credit neon electric guitar image by Peter Helin from Fotolia.com
