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May 2001
Intonation
You are standing on stage waiting for that incredible moment when you
bang out the first chords to your opening song. You can't wait for the
anxious crowd to be blown away by your awesome guitar sound and
playing abilities.
It is time, and your E chord rips through the sound system. It sounds
great!! Then your A chord, but you realize something isn't quite
right. Then you hit your D chord and to your horror it is horribly out
of tune!! Arrrgghhh!! What happened??? The E chord sounded great!!
You have just become the victim of an intonation problem. You may be
asking yourself, "What the heck is intonation?"
Intonation is the overall "tuning" of a guitar. On a perfect guitar,
every note on every string would be perfectly in tune. All chords on
the guitar, no matter where they were played would be perfectly in
tune.
But alas, guitars are imperfect creatures. Furthermore, they change
over time due to different temperatures and humidity levels, etc.
Intonation can be affected by these changes and more. Simply changing
strings can affect your intonation, especially if you change string
gauges. If you adjust your guitar's neck tilt or bow, this will also
affect the intonation. Playing hard, or banging, or dropping the
guitar can also knock the intonation out, just like hitting potholes
with you car will knock the front end out of alignment.
Well Steve, if the intonation is off, how do I fix it?
On most electric guitars, it is a pretty simple process. First, let me
say this. If you aren't experienced at making adjustments to your
guitar, take it to a professional. If you feel comfortable doing it
yourself, here's how.
ITEMS YOU WILL NEED
1. A good, accurate tuner
2. A screwdriver or hex wrench (depending on your guitar)
3. Patience
STEP 1
Hook up your tuner and tune your guitar.
STEP 2
Play your low E string on the 12th fret. Look at your tuner. Is the
note slightly flat or sharp? If the note is flat, using a screwdriver
or hex wrench, adjust the bridge saddle toward the neck. If the note
is sharp, adjust the bridge saddle the opposite direction. Please keep
in mind that minor movements of the bridge saddle make major
differences in the tuning. When starting, just move the bridge saddle
very little.
STEP 3
Retune your guitar using the tuner. Play the low E string again on the
12th fret. If it is still out of tune then repeat Step 2 again.
STEP 4
Repeat this process for the remaining strings.*
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*NOTE - If your guitar uses a "floating" bridge, setting intonation
may require more time and patience. Tuning one string affects the tune
of the other strings. Make sure the string you are checking intonation
for is in tune open before you check it at the 12th fret.
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The next time you crank out that huge guitar intro, you can bang those
chords with confidence.
Until next time,
STAY TUNED
Steve
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