PSA: Tune your guitars - happy 4th! UPDATE

[andrewsrea]

Since 2008, Rob's holiday public service announcement to Tune - Truss - Intonate on major holidays. They seem to correspond to key humidity and temperature events.

What happens when humidity increases in the rainy season, especially spring and summer? Wood guitars swell, which increases the effect of the truss rod. Normally in these cases, you reduce the truss tension by turning the truss nut to the left, as seen facing into the front of the nut. I tune the guitar, relieve it by 1/8th turn, retune, then check for a credit card width of space in the 5th to 9th fret range. Repeat as necessary.

Due to atmospheric conditions and home furnaces, the air tends to get less humid in the winter - so our friends south of the equator needs to look for the truss relief gap widening.

I check the truss relief with a 14" draftsmen's straight edge and a fretboard straight edge (notched for the frets, so as to let the straight portion on the fretboard. For guitars I know intimately or if I am in a hurry, I'll use the '1st fret - last fret' method. Which is pressing on the 6th (E) string on top of the 1st fret, and another on top of the 2oth or last fret on the fingerboard, same string. Eyeball the gap in the middle frets. Repeat on other strings. The object is not to fret as normal, as that can lift the string after the fret and distort the measure.

Check your intonation at the 5th - 12th - 17th. Below the 5th may be prone to going sharp (nut height) and above the 12th can get variable, because the frequency of the frets get's shorter and is typically where manufactures struggle. So I like to get the 5th to the 12th dead-on, below the 5th and above the 12th - consistent string to string. If those extremes are consistently sharp, play with less pressure and pull the string a bit towards the bridge (Jeff Beck method). To intonate string which is mostly flat, you need to shorten the string by moving the bridge saddle toward the nut. Sharp, make the string bigger by moving the saddle away from the nut.

For our USA members or any world members who wants to celebrate along with us, kick up your heals and enjoy your freedoms - happy 4th!

Be safe - keep all appendages and bones in their original positions.

[andrewsrea]

UPDATE:

Man, my guitars were as out as I have ever experienced. My E-standard guitars were almost perfectly in F-standard with all the Missouri humidity! Wierdly, the truss rods did not need adjusting.

[slowhand84]

UPDATE:

Man, my guitars were as out as I have ever experienced. My E-standard guitars were almost perfectly in F-standard with all the Missouri humidity! Wierdly, the truss rods did not need adjusting.

I think this REALLY varies depending on where you live and the climate. I'm here on the east coast, even if I leave my guitars out on a stand for months without touching them they are never more than a quarter step out of tune on any string. Almost all my guitars have quality locking tuners too so I guess that plays a role as well.