Nut Sauce
Motif
Nut Sauce[?]Affiliate Link is a lubricant that you can apply to your guitar nut to reduce binding, pinging, and string breaking.
Why do strings break?
Strings break when they fail. Under ordinary circumstances, strings will not fail often and therefore will not break. If the guitar has no setup issues, the strings have no defects, you are not tuning back and forth between different tunings, and you are not doing big bends, the strings will seldom—if ever—break.
On the other hand, bending the strings or retuning them to alternate tunings will increase the risk that they break. That’s because it will increase the friction. Most of this friction occurs at the nut, where the string passes through a narrow channel before suddenly breaking off into another angle and heading for the tuning machine.
When a string breaks, you can examine the length of it to see where it broke. Ordinarily a string will break at the headstock and or at the bridge end, with most cases being at the headstock end. Therefore, reducing the rubbing and friction at the nut will reduce the amount of strings that you break.
Why else lubricate the nut?
Another reason to lubricate the nut is to reduce the “pinging” sound that strings sometimes make during tuning. This is caused by the string getting caught in the nut. As you continue to adjust the tuning, the string will suddenly un-snag itself, causing a disturbing sound. This also makes it harder to keep the guitar in tune because if the string is getting snagged in the nut, then the pitch you hear from the string is not actually the same as the string’s tension. And while you are playing, the string will un-snag itself and the pitch will suddenly be different.
In short, lubricating the nut will lead to better performance, better tuning stability, and an easier tuning experience.
How to use Nut Sauce
Nut Sauce is a viscous lubricant that comes in a miniature syringe-like applicator. After you’ve taken the strings off, apply a drop or two of the lubricant onto each of the six slots carved in the guitar nut. Then put the strings on, taking care not to smear too much of the lubricant away.
Alternatively, after installing the strings you can loosen each one just enough so that it can be pulled away from the nut, and then add the lubricant and tune the strings back up.
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As the creator of Hub Guitar, Grey has compiled hundreds of guitar lessons, written several books, and filmed hundreds of video lessons. He teaches private lessons in his Boston studio, as well as via video chat through TakeLessons.