Guitar Whisperer: Guitars and Stuff That Interests Me
GW – Engineering Your Guitars Per 1st Principals.
Listen To The Data.
Recordings: Using this Telecaster, Apple Mac, Scartlett Solo audio interface, Garage Band DAW
Chet Style
Why use top loader bridge instead of the through body ashtray bridge?
I personally cannot abide the feel of the 10-46 string with the through body strings. (Maybe it’s just me.)
10-46’s are too hard to play with how I set up my guitar, I don’t like the sound of 10-46 though body, too much tension, too much meat and clunk. Thus, I cannot get on the Tele through body 10-46 string train. I tried and tried and tried for decades.
9-42’s are easier to play, sound okay initially. BUT I keep getting the flappy vibe when I try to thumb pick and articulate flat picking. Also, 9-42’s have tuning issues for me. So I am not on the 9-42 Tele through body string train either.
I tried 9.5 gauge and felt it was a somewhat better compromise and liked it okay- for a while. But I felt something was missing. And, 9.5 tended to sound pretty good at first but lost life, audio luster and tuning stability after a short time.
What’s a fellow to do? I decided to re-engineer my Telecaster and re-think the top loader approach. There are some top loader bridge players out there. Jimmy Page I think uses a top loader. Jim Campilongo is another and Jeff Buckley too.
But, all the top loader Teles I have seen have the 3 adjustable saddle thing, where you have three adjustments and spread the intonation error across two strings. I tried these, and hated them. There is a variation of the 3 adjustable saddles using angled compensated saddles that takes intonation issues into account. I tried these and hated them, or maybe had a very lukewarm feeling on them at best.
For setup reasons and requirement explained in detail below, I decided to buy a 6 saddle adjustable top loader bridge and hacked my Tele and installed it. This worked for me.
The top loader Tele bridge with 6 saddle intonation adjustments with 10-46’s has just enough less string tension because the string length is slightly shorter, maybe 1″ – 1.25″. For me, that is just enough less string tension that it hits the sweet spot. Now, I can set the guitar up, set saddle height, set intonation, set neck relief and the darn guitar plays well, plays in tune, plays in tune with itself, plays in tune with other instruments, plays in tune with cowboy chords and plays on tune all the way up the 22nd fret.
And it stays in tune when I play. And it it very playable.
I settled on D’Addario NYXL Balanced Tension 10-46 based on a recommendation I saw online from Nashville Session Wizard Brent Mason.
I would say the NYXL 10-46 Balanced Tension set has really delivered as I have had these strings on my Tele for months and have not had any playability, intonation or stability issues at all.
Summary: with the top loader 6 saddle bridge Tele and the D’Addario NYXL
10-46 Balanced Tension strings is a good place.
Postlogue:
Now, I have heard from a lot of people out there on the interwebs hypothesizing that the reason top loader Tele’s are slinkier is that there is less of a break angle for the strings.
At the risk of being a contrarian, I beg to differ. I believe the real reason the top loader action is slinkier is that the string length is shorter and thus requires less tension to tune up to pitch.
Follow First principles.
The length of the string determines the vector force required to bring a string up to a given pitch. The break angle might add friction and cause some binding resulting in tuning instability, but break angle does not really impact the force required to tune the string to pitch.
TELE/STRAT 25.5″ STRING LENGTH INSTRUMENT IS SETUP.
WHAT STRINGS ARE USED.
I use D’Addario NYXL Balanced Tension 10-46 strings. I installed a through top string feed saddle with 6 compensated bridges I bought off Amazon.
On a Stratocasters I use D’Addario NYXL Balanced Tension 10-46 strings also and string hight setup is generally the same as a Tele.
I believe this is physics based (string length versus string dimensions and composition, string height, neck relief, how the guitar is built, how everything resonates, etc.
CORRECTLY SETTING UP A GUITAR IS AN ABSOLUTE CARDINAL RULE!!
If you have a valued instrument, and you don’t want to chance screwing it up, stop right now and take it to a qualified guitar tech.
If you are bold and want file the nut slot height yourself you will need a good set of nut slot files.
OR pay a luthier to file the nut slot. NOTE: Filing your nut slot can cause a lot a problems to sort out and fix if you don’t do it correctly.
THIS SETUP SHOULD WORK FOR ANY FENDER WITH 25.5″ FRETBOARD LENGTH.
Neck Relief: We need to set this up with some neck relief, not too much, not too little relief.
Use about .2-.3 mm/ (notecard thickness, maybe a little more) at the fifth fret measured on the E sixth string.
Use your truss rod tool, don’t overtighten.
RULE: Righty Tighty/Lefty Loosy
Set up string height at the 22nd fret (use your appropriately sized hex key):
E 6th string 5.5/64″
A 5th string 5.5/64″
D 4th string 5/64″
G 3rd string 4.5/64″
B 2nd string 4.25/64″
E 1st string 4.25/64″
Individual string nut slot depth should be cut such that the height of the open string to the1st fret for all strings should be as close to 1st fret as fretting the string at 1st fret to 2nd fret height as you can make it. If the nut slot is too high for any string, you will immediately start out with intonation and playability problems.
Intonation: Match the 12th fret harmonic to the fretted twelfth fret on each string. (Each string harmonic at the 12th fret should be exactly on pitch using an electronic tuner.
But wait we are not done yet.
Now, fine intonate:
Tune all 6 strings with your tuner.
Basically, you will intonate each string past the 12th fret to an open string harmonic played at the 12th fret as is available. See below for details.
Using screwdriver, adjust each string intonation set screw:
Intonate: fret E string at 19th fret, match to B string harmonic at 12th fret
Intonate: fret B string at 17th fret, match to 1st E string harmonic at 12th fret.
Intonate: fret G string at 16th fret, match B string harmonic at 12th fret
fret G string at 21st fret, match E string harmonic at 12th fret
Intonate: fret D string at 21th fret, match to B string harmonic at 12th fret
fret D string at 17th fret, match to G string harmonic at 12th fret
Intonate: fret A string at 19th fret, match to E string harmonic 12th fret
fret A string at 17th fret, match to D string harmonic at 12th fret
Intonate: fret 6th E string at 15th fret, match to G string harmonic 12th fret
fret 6th E string at 19th fret, match to B string harmonic at 12th fret
Why do this?
Because intonation for playing up and down the fretboard will be somewhat of a compromise. The goal is to get every note to play in tune on every string all way from open chords, to bar chords, inversions of chords, jazz chords, triads, inversions, ALL THE WAY UP TO THE HIGHEST FRET.
You balance playability, intonation, music styles, anything you can think of to test this hypothesis.
Believe you can and you can do this. You cannot fix a problem if you cannot identify what the problem is in the first place.
Checks and Pudding Proofs:
Play your open C D A F D cowboy chords in open position and then one octave higher.
Play skip string octaves on all strings as low as you can and as high up the fretboard as you can.
Play triads D F C A in all positions.
They should all sound reasonably in tune from open to as high up the fretboard as you can play. NO SOUR NOTES! (Nothing in even temperament tuning is perfect, but this one way to get the best possible (least worse) compromise for tuning and intonation. (Note: Your milage will vary. But, if this doesn’t work for you, there may be something else going on. I have sold guitars based on failing multiple times this intonation process.)
If your guitar does not pass this acid test
>> Check your relief, you should have some neck relief, no flat neck fretboards, the guitar won’t sound or play in tune, and likely will not stay in tune either.
Check your string heights. Make sure you turn both saddle screws to equal heights so that the saddle is always level. Find the sweet spot string height for all strings. Dial it in iteratively. A fraction of a turn with your hex key on the string height screws can make a world of difference. String height is something you feel works for you or against when you play different things. You want the guitar to feel like butter and be able to play anything without struggling technically to play. Play all the things you want to, testing how it feels. Keep working on all this back and forth until you dial it in. Voila! Like Magic It Will Come Together. Patience and being meticulous will pay off.
Rinse, repeat all the setup steps and do it again until it is as good as you can get it.
Be sure that you do not buy counterfeit strings online.
Counterfeit guitar strings are out there on line, beware. Sounds ridiculous doesn’t it? These strings can give you a lot of grief if you use them, their sound can be very sucky, sound out of tune and you can’t intonate them. I spent some time chasing this down. Head’s up.
Also, counterfeiting product it is stealing from the good guys and damages the brand name.
If you don’t have the patience for all this- then punt, take your guitar to a qualified luthier for setup. Hopefully, they can figure it out. Send them this link.)
If you are still with me, put the guitar down today and come back tomorrow and try again.
Stretch tune your strings and set up the nut so the string does not bind.
Apply some sort of string conditioner, once in a while and make sure you apply also in the nut slot and bridge.
Here’s a couple:
Music Nomad String Fuel
GHS Fast Strings
I set up my pickup heights as close to the strings as I can get away with and not cause wolf notes. I found that more pickup output gives you less noise in the signal chain. You can set your pickup too high and you will start getting out of tune or gong sound out of the strings, particularly the wound E, A and D
Your milage will definitely vary on pickup heights.
These setup guidelines gets you to or ought to strongly move your guitar setup in the direction of:
Comfortable, playable guitar action that works with you whatever genre you are playing and you do not feel you have to “fight the guitar action” to play what you hear in your head.
Nice resonant string vibration on all strings, good, respectable, usable tone that will sit well in the mix and carry authority played with other instruments.
Optimal intonation from open chords to the highest note on any fret on any string.
Very decent playability all the way up the neck.
Open chords sound nice full and in tune.
Pickups have optimal/balanced output avoiding pickup magnet proximity intonation issues.
You can finger pick, thumb pick and plectrum pick pretty well making the instrument very versatile.
Overall this approach is a win, balancing all the elements we are trying to manage in guitar setup and playing.
One more thing I do and I DO NOT RECOMMEND IT TO ANYONE:
Once I have the adjustable saddle height setup and intonation is the least worst I can get it, I superglue the saddle height and intonation set screws in place to keep it frozen in place.
This is heresy, but what I have in mind here is that, once you set it up ONE TIME the ONLY thing that changes is neck relief, for which I have hex key magnetically stuck to my headstock and I adjust neck relief as wish to compensate for changes in temperature and humidity.
Every few weeks I change strings.
That’s it.
