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Posted

I thought at first that it would make sense to use the stretch compensated fret placement calculators, but I noticed in the tutorial that the "non-compensated" scale was used. I was just curious which is preferred by most of you and why.

For what it's worth i plan on making a bass (may not stretch as much???) but I will use jumbo high frets or whatever is often on a bass. I would think that bass strings wouldn't stretch nearly as much as a guitar.

So I guess I have 2 questions: 1) why not compensate for stretch on a guitar neck? and 2) should I compensate on a bass neck?

Thanks!!!

Posted

do you mean compensating the nut? or just setting up the intonation correctly... or are you refering to something along the lines of the buzz feiten system?

Posted

That's really odd. I don't quite see how it'd help though. Seems like those strings would be out of tune on those frets. Once I saw something like "fan frets" or something like that...didn't look very playable, though. Supposedly helped the tuning/intonation a lot though. I'll see what I can find.

Posted

Actually I was just talking about regular fretting, and if you guys compensate for string stretch so that the notes aren't sharp when they're fretted. It was mentioned in a few books I was reading on guitar making. If you go to the bottom of the link below, and use the fret placement calculator it asks whether or not to calculate w/ stretch compensation.

http://www.windworld.com/emi/tools/fretcalc.htm

It's still a straight parallel fret job, but the placements are moved slightly to compensate for the fact that the string is bend a little when fretted, especially on a guitar w/ high frets.

I guess if you guys have been using the scale on the projectguitar tutorial, or those numbers look right to your for a 25.5" scale guitar, then you must not have noticed any tuning or pitch problems, and that's what I was wondering.

When I slot my fretboard I didn't know which version of the scale to use, uncompensated or not. I believe Cumpiano (sp?) compensates in his book "guitarmaking".

Thanks.

Posted

I don't think you should worry about this. If you're pressing that hard behind the fret, enough to alter the note, I think you need to examine your playing technique (think of players of scalloped fretboards.) I just tried on my bass guitar... I had to really TRY to press down hard enough to alter the note.

Posted

I think gibson does this with their guitars. The scale isn't quite 24 3/4 inches, but I think its more like 24 5/8. I have seen a Picture of 3 different fret boards lined up. One was 25.5, another was 24 3/5 and another was 24 5/8. they change by the 3rd fret was quite big. The caption under the picture said that the 24 5/8 was a direct gibson replacement fret board and no others would work.

Thats just my worthless info. Rob

Posted

I wouldn't want one, but I wonder if it really does what it says it does. I just looked at the link you posted. You don't need to compensate if you are using a bridge with adjustable saddles. Most bridges on electrics can be compensated at the bridge. It'd be a waste of time to do it twice :D

Posted

There's been a thread on this fairly recently. The benefits are many. It is certainly not a joke. :D

Posted

Before you put big frets on your bass, check out the fret size that Sheldon Dingwall uses on his basses. Seems to make more sense to me, and I am a decent bass player ( I think that Jackson bass I played about 10 years ago, which had the best playing neck of any bass I ever played, had low and narrow frets)

Bridge saddles are always moved a little for "string stretch". That's why the low E lenght on a Strat is more than 25.5" long

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