Rusty Strings!

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Brian_Buresh

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My strings rust out after a week or two, whether I play a lot or not. What are ideal conditions for storing my guitars? Is there something I can apply to my strings to prevent this from happening?
 
Wiping them down after playing is the first line of defense. Do you live in a humid area?
 
I'll second that! I wipe my strings right after I'm done playing and that's helped extend the life of my strings as well as keeping that nasty smell off my fingers. :)
 
Wash your hands before you play and keep them dry as possible. Do you store your guitar in a room or closet with real wood on the walls ? I used to leave my guitar in a closet with wood panels and my strings would rust almost overnight. It was probably a cedar closet and I'm lucky it didn't ruin my valuable Les Paul.

My electric strings seem to last forever. That's good because I hate changing them.
 
Sounds like you could use some Elixer strings, they're coated with Gore-Tex and won't likely rust.
 
You know if your strings rust in a week you could be in for bigger problems. In addition to wiping the finger grim off you may want to look into the overall moisture in your room. All your electronics could be fighting for their lives. This sounds wacky, but a small paper bag of crushed charcoal set in a random corner will actually absorb a certain amount of room moisture.
 
some people just have more acidity in there skin and strings will corode faster....if they corode in a coupe of week on me it is usually becase in giging and sweating all over the guitar.....i usually change strings every other week if if giging every week end.
 
Yeah, I think my ZOOM 505 pedal may have gone out due to moisture, too. I opened it up after it was dead and there was a bunch of crusty junk built up on one of the chips. I'll try the charcoal.
 
Stop leaving your guitar on the back porch after late night drunken post-BBQ jams! :p

In all seriousness though this could be a very serious and expensive issue. If you have lost other equipment due to corrosion that appears to be humidity related you should seek advice on how to deal with the problem (warping guitars, corroded electronics and rusty strings, oh my!). I don't exactly know where you would get info on what to do, but if it is a matter of a humid climate (as opposed to new wooden walls) you may want to start with some local music stores since I would imagine others are finding ways of dealing with the same issue as well.

If they can't help you at least you could run around the store and swipe all their little moisture-free packets from the guitar and microphone cases and throw them all around your room ;)
 
Room moisture is a real threat. Theres a lot of things that contribute to it too..... geography, the side of the house, air flow. I used to have my gear set up in a basement so this all reared its head to me. The cures all range in a huge expense curve. For the most part though, if you dont have moss growing on the walls or slicks on the floor you can buy powdered de-humidifiers. The sack of charcoal works, as does a few strategically placed open boxes of baking soda. Any hardware/home improvement store will also sell sacks of "absorbit" designed to get tossed and forgotten into a closet.
 
Foget the charcol, go tot the hardware store and get a little dehumidifier try thing, Way more effective, or a boating store. Cheap too.
 
Rusty strings!!! never heard of such a thing but apparently it happens i would recommend a dehumidafier thats probably why i don't have that prob....just trying to help anywaz thats weird.
 
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