INTONATION

[thinlizzytsm]

MY EPI SG will stay round about in tune for quite a while but when it comes to intonation after about the 17th fret on the E A D strings they go quite flat and i am guessing its the intonation. ItS been like this ever since i bought it

 

[barbas23]

WELCOME TO ETSG

[move][size=30pt]thinlizzytsm[/size][/move]


maybe you'd want to take a look here

http://everythingsg.com/forum/index.php?topic=2078.0

 

[DavidJ]

Welcome!!!!!!!

Also try this link - the section on setting your intonation is a bit skimpy, but try the links to StewMac (good place IMO).

http://www.gibson.com/magazines/amplifier/1997/10/tipfile.html

DJ

 

[barbas23]

thanks for the link DJ :) :) :)

 

[thinlizzytsm]

THANK YOU

 

[Six String]

Welcome to ETSG thinlizzytsm!  :) :) :)

Tuning is a now thing that may or may not be a differant problem. But the intonation is more an overall long term issue...... If your intonation is out it always be out until you address it and the cause. Are you tuning the guitar now to fit the intonation........?

 

[thinlizzytsm]

No i am tuning it so that the first 16 or so frets are in tune its just improvising higher up the fret board can be quite annoying because the d strings intonation is as flat as a
pancake


it was like this out of the box but its got just slightly worse

 

[SG100%]

Welcome!!! Wow, another SG and THIN LIZZY fan!

 

[Six String]

..... so if you do a 440 tuning, the chording is good at all frets below about 10? If you do a 440 and it's perfect but the chording on standard or barrs are just a shade off, then you may need to address the intonation. If you can do it yourself, great...... But I would suggest someone who is very good at it. My 84 was good at 440 thru about the 7th fret but was just slightly out above it. Took it in to have my local guy do it and it ended up his wife had to do it because she had a better ear........... :coolsmiley:

 

[1Way]

POST 1of3

A better "ear"!!! For doing intonation! I'll let Six explain that one. But I think he's setting up for the, “get a real accurate tuner involved” recommendation. Very accurate electronic tuners (buy or borrow) are the way to go. My tuner is only accurate to three cents, or 3/100 of a,,, something,,, “step” I think it is, but I feel I can do a fairly decent job with it. The more accurate the fine tuning the tuner is, the better. One cent accuracy is recommended.

Some up front considerations are the gauge of strings, heavy fret ware, curved or twisted neck, action too high, etc. I recently redid my SG Std’s intonation after discovering how I could swap two of my saddles in such a way so that my darned G string could go long far enough to almost get intonated correctly. Doing so really smoothed out some of tuning struggles.

A “general rule” is that heavier strings tend to intonate and stay in tune better, and not break as easily. Also, if you change your string gauge, that can change your intonation needs. If the weather changes enough in humidity, most likely so will the action on your guitar! So keeping your guitar in tune and well adjusted not mal adjusted is a bit of an ongoing process that is inherent with most wooden guitars.

Here’s the basic step’s I take to intonate my guitars. If you do not want to do it yourself, then maybe this might help someone else sometime!

 

[1Way]

POST 2of3

PRECAUTIONS AND GENERAL RULES
- Be sure to use newer strings that have been stretched some, and not old/dull one’s.
- Stabilize the neck. Orient the guitar vertically like how it’s played most of the time to keep the neck in it’s normal orientation.
- Stabilize how you read the tuner. With my tuner, I check each string open like you normally tune with a tuner. There is a fluctuating reading involved especially for the wound strings at the beginning of each pick, it wants to go sharp and then slightly flatter. I tune toward the ringing out signal just after the sharp spike, not the first micro second that’s sharper. This effect happens less and corrects quicker as you check the smaller strings.
- Stabilize the tuners while tuning. Also, it’s a general rule that your last tuning motion should be to tune upward towards sharp, not down, so as to stabilize your tuning. If not your tuner’s mechanism can be a bit loose and susceptible to making the string go flat if you bend that string enough.

INTONATION PROCEDURE
- Carefully tune the open strings with an accurate tuner. A lack of accuracy makes intonation correction difficult to impossible.
- Then you fret (with the same typical fret pressure that you normal fret with) on the 12th fret to see if it went sharp or flat or stays even in tune.
- If the fretted note is sharp, then the distance between your fret and the bridge saddle is too close. If it’s too flat, the distance is too long. I use the handy analogy to remember which way to go by remembering that lower frequencies are larger while high treble frequency waves are smaller/shorter. So if the fretted 12th is too sharp, you want to increase it’s wavelength to make it sound lower/bassier.
- Get it as close as you can, but realize this is just the first adjustment and almost certainly needs more adjustment and then fine tuning, and then possible compensation efforts as well.
- Do that very for each and every string.
- That is the end of your first pass. You’ll probably get better the more you do this. I don’t mind spending the time fine tuinging, and I’m a bit of a perfectionist, so ;D when I did it, I may have made like 6 total passes. But by that time, I was concentrating on just getting a stubborn string or two to cooperate. :coolsmiley:

- After that, your guitar needs to be retuned very carefully and start the whole process over again until she gets dialed in real good. I am lucky, after making my G saddle able to go back far enough, she tunes and frets out much better.

 

[1Way]

POST 3of3

That is all standard practice. The part that might help your situation improve for adjusting your intonation with the saddles and possibly compensating for some potentially irresolvable problems of flatness in the upper register, is to not only fret the 12th fret while checking each string, but to also check some of the higher ones while your at it. Your first pass intonating is like rough tuning, so this comes into play more during fine tuning. The frets lower than the 12th tend to intonate better than the frets above the 12th* because of scale factors. The tighter fret spacing graphically indicates the tighter scale of accuracy involved if you want proper intonation.
*(Except for the first 2 frets or so where it’s common to fret somewhat sharp due to a high angle up to the nut, but that is another problem/issue for another time.)

To fine tune above the 12th, I just go up a few frets above the 12th and check it till I find a note that is in octave relationship of one of the other 5 strings. In other words my tuner thinks it’s check one of my other open strings but actually it’s a higher octave of the same note. If you choose the wrong fret, the tuner will typically be way off, but if it’s the right fret, it would be somewhere close to the tuning point. I usually do that at 2 or 3 different frets per string to see how the upper register is doing on average. Don’t go by just one fret, because individual fret irregularities are less important than what most of your frets are doing, so your trying to discover a best case scenario scale that works best for the entire fretboard.* Ideally you want the entire fretboard intonated.
*(Or sometimes a portion of the fretboard that you care about it’s intonation. (For example a rhythm guitarist who only rarely barely plays above the 12th fret. An easier intonation job to get it intonated.)

Don’t be surprised if in the upper register, that on the same string, one fret is sharp and one is flat up there, it’s a fine tuning situation and even the best of guitars are not fully perfectly intonated. Too many variable and unresolvable inconsistencies. Give the same guitar to two different people, the one right after the other and without making any changes to the guitar, and the intonation can change instantly! Why? Because one frets lightly and the other frets strongly which throws everything off! Or theoretically, one plays the guitar normally in a vertical orientation and the other likes to play while laying down in a horizontal orientation which would also throw off the intonation.

Besides simply adjusting your bridge saddles, you can also do more invasive procedures, but I defer to the pros at that point. Upgrades that can help are a compensated nut and maybe some professional (intonation oriented) fret work. Guitarists commonly upgrade the nut for tone reasons, so if you get to that point, you might check out the different materials and models, etc. For myself, I find it satisfying to be able to do this myself, but the time and procedure is quite exacting, and compensation can become complicated. I hope this of some assistance!

 

[vedran]

Hi. SG novice here. I notice in the above post that you mention problems and issues with G string twice. I have the same problem (G saddle can't go far enough to allow string to be intonated correctly), and I was wondering if it just on my guitar - I guess this is common problem with Epi SGs?

[quote author=1Way link=topic=6785.msg86259#msg86259 date=1140113378]
I am lucky, after making my G saddle able to go back far enough, she tunes and frets out much better.[/quote]
[quote author=1Way link=topic=6785.msg86258#msg86258 date=1140113335]
I recently redid my SG Std’s intonation after discovering how I could swap two of my saddles in such a way so that my darned G string could go long far enough to almost get intonated correctly. Doing so really smoothed out some of tuning struggles.
[/quote]

How can that be solved (except swapping saddles)?

I have a used SG EPI Goth, and it really needs some repairement and upgrades - electronics and nut definitely, and, perhaps a new bridge, if a new bridge would solve this problem?

 

[1Way]

Vedran
1
Hi. SG novice here. I notice in the above post that you mention problems and issues with G string twice. I have the same problem (G saddle can't go far enough to allow string to be intonated correctly), and I was wondering if it just on my guitar - I guess this is common problem with Epi SGs?

It's mostly the difference between the wound and unwound strings. The vibration characteristics change enough to alter the intonation in a similar way that large vrs smaller strings change the intonation as well.

2
How can that be solved (except swapping saddles)?

That's how I solved it. Don't forget to check the string notch position too.

3
I have a used SG EPI Goth, and it really needs some repairement and upgrades - electronics and nut definitely, and, perhaps a new bridge, if a new bridge would solve this problem?

You should be able to just swap out just that one saddle.