Westwood electric guitar

[Starlight456]

My ds’s electric guitar needs replacement strings.

I have googled but in reality no idea at all.

Can anyone give me any advice which to buy

Your local music shop can help, or else your DS's guitar teacher (if he has one)
YouTube has videos showing how to change them so once you know what ones he needs you can do it yourself with ease.

Electric guitar strings come in different gauges (all as part of a set) and are referred to by the gauge of the thinnest and thickest strings.

There are generally 5 standard sets which come in the following size references from thinnest to thickest:

8-38
9-42
9-46
10-46
11-48

Depending on the style of guitar, it will almost certainly be fitted with either 9-42 or 10-46 as these are by far the most popular gauges.

If his guitar is a strat style guitar as per the link below, it will have 9-42 gauge strings.

reverb-res.cloudinary.com/image/upload/v1512406810/Strat-1_kaym74.jpg

If it is a Les Paul style guitar as per this link, it will likely have 10-46

58eca9fdf76150b92bfa-3586c28d09a33a8c605ed79290ca82aa.ssl.cf3.rackcdn.com/gibson-custom-1960-les-paul-standard-reissue-vos-tangerine-burst-925691.jpg

There are many different manufacturers of strings and unless you are a professional player, there's not much between them.

Popular brands are Ernie Ball, D'Addario and Fender.

As a player of nearly 30 years, I'd recommend either of these depending on the style of guitar above... (super or regular)

www.amazon.co.uk/Ernie-Ball-RPS-9-Slinky-Nickel/dp/B0002DUW1C/ref=sr_1_2?crid=362TFG8KSMZUH&keywords=ernie%2Bball%2Brps%2B9&sprefix=ernie%2Bball%2Brps%2Caps%2C148&th=1&tag=mumsnetforu03-21&qid=1577398245&sr=8-2

Thank you so much . It is just like the first one . He is 12 so definitely not a professional player

Set of Ernie Ball 9-42s will be perfect.

Thank you I have seen lots of YouTube in how to fit strings is it pretty straight forward?

Yes, very much so.

The string feeds in with the bare end first from the back of the guitar in the middle of the body - you'll see the 6 holes that the strings go through.

The thickest string on the top (as you play it), the thinnest on the bottom.

Pull the string through the body until the little brass ball end reaches the end of it's pocket in the body of the guitar and make sure the string passes over the little V shaped slot in the string saddles.

Pull the string through the nut at the top of the neck and through the tuning key hole. bend it round and then wind the tuning key until it reached pitch.

Have a good look at the path of the strings before you remove the old ones so you can be certain you have routed them correctly, but really, it's not difficult.

New strings can take a little while to stretch into their final length so it can need tuning several times until it stabilises. Fit the thickest strings first.

He should do this.

It is reasonably straight forward, just take your time and don’ t try and rush it - it’s not that difficult and definitely gets easier the more times you do it.

The advice upthread from ground floor is absolutely first class, and just to add that my personal choice would always be Ernie Balls, but is is just that - personal choice gained from years of experience.

If you haven’t already got one, I would recommend getting an electronic tuner too. These are quite cheap and I’ve been playing guitar since the 1970’s but am still not very good at tuning by ear.

There are free tuning apps.

Thank you we did have a tuner my son now uses an app. Ordered strings thank you so much.

Youtube is your friend for restringing!
I play classical guitar (more complicated to restring) and used to shuffle shamefully to my local music shop and pay for them to do it, but finally decided to woman up and used youtube to teach me!