Could be a well-worn subject but...how do folks store their guitars? I currently keep my oh-so wonderful D2H on a guitar stand but am thinking about hanging it on the wall It seems the case is the ideal place but I want easier access since I play often throughout the day. Isn't dust a long-term concern?
This is my first posting. I must say the info is always interesting. I also must say the D2H is one of the nicest dreads ever made.

jalew,

I have forced-air heat in my house, a situation that's particularly likely to dry out guitars. So I need to keep my guitars in their cases to protect them.

What I have found is that it's fairly easy to access them if I prop the cases, unlatched but closed, nearly upright in a corner. While the seal is imperfect, I'm confident the internal environment is fairly stable, and when I want to play, I can easily open the case with one hand, while reaching in and removing the guitar with the other.

B

P.S. If you have a black case, you need to guard against marking up the corner walls, e.g. by covering the edges of the case with duck tape.

quote:

Originally posted by B Woods:
What I have found is that it's fairly easy to access them if I prop the cases, unlatched but closed, nearly upright in a corner.

Yikes! Forgive me, B, but that scares the crap out of me. I'd be prone to pick on up and have it fall out of the case. Be careful!

Guys anything less than a humidity controlled
envioronment , either in the case, out or both
is exposure to cracks and damage to your guitar.

I finally broke down and got an adequate humidifer for my home areas where I keep mine
and when that gets unstable I put them sealed up in the case with adequate water soaked pumice
tubs and a hybrometer in each case to monitor
them. The gutars themselves will give you some
indication where they are as well

A dry guitar will have a grain stressed look. Hold it up to the light and see if you wood is
sunken looking beteen the grain. This is a sign
of dryness and it doesnt take long in 20 % humidity to bring that out in one.

Other things to do are getting a humidifier as I did. I have forced air and after checking was shoked to find on a cold dry day the houshold
humidity was down below 20 per cent. This is
NOT where you want guitars to live.

My humidifer is one you can get at home depo
or Lowes or Sears and has two big bladders you
can fill and get about 24 hours use between
fillings and has a rheostat to vary the amount
you keep the room at. Some even have led showing the ambient humidiy and temp. I uste
the Radio shack batter op little ones in both cases and scattered about where I use them.

I can't believe I used to just place a bowl of
water under a stand and let it evaporate . That was better than nothing but didn't really provide consistency. The little tubs can be bought and I take the pumice out of them and soak them overnight before putting them back in the plastic tubs and putting them in the case.
Two per case with ambient 20 percent will raise the case to 42 per cent and a light misting with an atomizer then close the case for a while to let any extra ''wetness'' evaporate will bring a case to 45 or 50 per cent then you
put the guitar in side and seal it up and when you go back to use in a a day or so the guitar will be well balanced.

If like me you humidfy a room then leaving them
ona stand near by words well too. I have found it takes about two whole days for a room to stablize and because I have paddle fans, I can reverse them to draw air up instead of blow down and it sucks all the humidity throughout
the house making the one large unit pretty
effective to humidify the whole place.

Good luck

dberch and Stixx,

Thanks for your concern and good advice. Re dropping a guitar, been there, done that with an old Guild of mine: memories of the sound of the guitar cracking are vivid enough that I always take care in these situations. Also, since I handle both guitars just about daily, I'm quite aware that the cases are not latched.

Re the humidity, my rooms are in the 40-45% range, and I have humidifiers in the cases and one case has a hygrometer that stays at about 50%. So I'm pretty comfortable that the guitars are well humidified.

B

This message has been edited. Last edited by: B Woods,