Posted on Jul 14 2024 03:28 PM
BB_Bunny wrote:
I've been steadily working on getting my Jaguar more solid in those regards and have gone through the typical suggestions (shimming the neck, raising the bridge, sanding/smoothing the nut slots, lubing the nut slots and string tree) and the intonation is pretty good, but I can't imagine making my way through an entire set of surf tunes without having to at least touch up the tuning part way through.
Provided your bridge and trem unit are functioning properly, free of burrs, properly affixed to the body, and your strings are fully seated against their stops, that end of the guitar has little to do with tuning stability.
Tuning stability is all at the other end - the nut and the tuners, plus how the strings are put on and broken in (stretched). Cheap guitars come with cheap tuners on them, which is why a lot of folks who buy them struggle with tuning stability. So let's just say for sake of argument you've got top-of-the-line tuners on your guitar and it still won't stay in tune.
You have to find a sweet spot with how many times the string is wound around the tuner post: Too few windings and the string could slip. Too many and aggressive trem use could cause the string to slip and bind in the wrong place (somebody mentioned this above). This is one reason I like locking tuners - you never have to worry about how many windings go around that tuner post. Pass it through, lock it down, trim it and go.
Once you find that sweet spot (and it may vary between guitars with different types of trems), you've got to get your strings properly settled. What we call "stretching" the strings is in fact partly literally stretching them (working out any possible slack in manufacturing or materials), but it's also fully seating the ball ends against the stops AND it's also tightening down the wraps on the tuner post. (That's why, if you have too many, when you use the trem, they can loosen just a little and then bind without going back to exactly where they were, thus affecting the tuning.)
If you've got great tuners and your string installation & stretching technique is dead on perfect, you can STILL have tuning issues if your nut isn't properly cut. If the slots are the tiniest bit too narrow, your strings can bind when you bend or use the trem and boom, you're out of tune. If the angles of the slots is the tiniest bit off, that can be a problem too. A lot of folks use various lubricants, from the simple and practically free (graphite from a pencil) to complex chemical compounds that will cost you varying amounts (the only one I know of is called "Nut Sauce"). I use a little pencil graphite from time to time, but not regularly and not on all my guitars. Nearly every guitar I've got has had its nut either tweaked by a tech or outright replaced, mostly because I use heavier strings than come on most guitars. (Yes the difference between a set of 9s and a set of 10s is enough to cause a problem!) IMO plastic nuts SUCK and if your guitar has one, sooner or later it will have tuning problems. A nice polished bone nut will serve you well for a long, long time. Sometimes just replacing a crappy plastic nut will do wonders for not just the tuning stability, but the overall playability of your guitar as well.
Shimming your neck or raising your bridge will do nothing for tuning stability. (They do, however, affect playability.) Raising your bridge can affect your intonation, not just because it changes the distance between the saddles and the nut slightly, but because the higher your action, the harder you have to press down and that definitely affects your intonation. It might be fine in some places and off a little in others. I play really hard, so when people who play with a light touch play my guitars, they often sound just the slightest bit out of intonation as a result. Yeah, it sounds like a crazy thing but I've seen it enough times to know it matters. The opposite is true as well - I have a friend who plays 8s and with a light touch. When I play his guitars (carefully) I often sound like I'm playing out of tune simply because I'm used to playing harder and on bigger strings.
That got a little long and maybe sounds a little ranty, but I've been playing in bands for 40 years and tuning stability on stage and in the studio is absolutely critical. I've used (and continue to use) everything from double locking Floyd Rose systems to plain jane hard tails, but I never hesitate to tune up between songs, and sometimes when it looks like I'm tuning, all I end up doing is verifying for brain the guitar is still in tune - there are a lot of reasons on a stage in a live show why your guitar might sound a little funky tuning-wise. I've mostly played in two-guitar bands, and in that environment, if either guitar is out of tune a little, the band can sound like crap.
Both of my Jazzmasters have different bridges on them and stock (vintage-style) tuners. They stay in tune quite well because I take care when putting on new strings and have had my tech tweak their nuts for my chosen string gauges. I use the trems, but I don't lubricate either guitar's nut.
In a one-guitar band like Messer Chups, the guitar can be a little out of tune and it won't sound terrible. Obviously that dude's guitars are well set up and he's not just slapping a new set of strings on and running on stage. His ears might not be as sensitive to tuning as others, too - there's 100 reasons why he might only need to tweak his tuning once in a set. Plus you only saw one set. Could be the night before his strings were newer and he had to tune up after every third song. The data point of one set is tough to judge by.
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Last edited: Jul 14, 2024 15:30:29
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