Chapter 99: How To Set The Action At The Nut — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:05Now we are at part two of the setup
2. 0:08process which is the action at the nut.
3. 0:12This is determined by the string height
4. 0:14over the first fret which affects three
5. 0:17things. Number one just comfort.
6. 0:21Second the intonation at the lower
7. 0:24positions. And third, the tone and
8. 0:29clarity of the open strings. If the
9. 0:32string is too high off of the fretboard,
10. 0:35you're going to have to push it further
11. 0:38to reach the fret, and that is going to
12. 0:40stretch the string sharp, especially on
13. 0:44the first few frets. If the string is
14. 0:47too low, you're going to get buzzing and
15. 0:50dead strings. A properly slotted nut
16. 0:53lets the string sit just high enough
17. 0:56above the fretboard so that freted notes
18. 1:01play in tune that there is no buzzing
19. 1:04and that the guitar feels as effortless
20. 1:07to play as your skill allows. We start
21. 1:11by protecting our peg head. I usually
22. 1:15use an old hotel key that I've cut to
23. 1:19size to fit in between the nut and the
24. 1:22machine heads. You can use anything you
25. 1:25want, but just don't use tape. Tape
26. 1:29won't hold up against the edge of a nut
27. 1:31file and it could react with the finish.
28. 1:36The first thing we want to take a look
29. 1:38at here is to make sure that your nut is
30. 1:41seated all the way down. If you complete
31. 1:44this whole setup and then find out that
32. 1:46it wasn't seated properly, it's going to
33. 1:49be buzzy and dead, and you're going to
34. 1:51have to start completely over.
35. 1:54Action is usually divided into three
36. 1:57categories: low, medium, and high. I'm
37. 2:00going to set this one up for a medium
38. 2:02action. This will be a great starting
39. 2:05point and will give you great
40. 2:07playability with no buzz. You can mess
41. 2:10around later with bringing it down
42. 2:13closer to a low action, but that's going
43. 2:16to greatly increase the chances of
44. 2:18buzzing strings.
45. 2:20Now, we need to actually measure how
46. 2:23high the strings are off of the first
47. 2:25fret. There are four main tools that I
48. 2:29use for this. One is feeler gauges.
49. 2:32These are just standard machine shop
50. 2:35feeler gauges that measure in thousands.
51. 2:39They're easy to get and fairly
52. 2:41inexpensive.
53. 2:43Number two is a ruler that starts at
54. 2:46zero along the edge. A lot of rulers
55. 2:49will have a gap here at the very
56. 2:51beginning of it, and we don't want that.
57. 2:52We want we want this zero point at the
58. 2:55edge. And we need a ruler that is going
59. 2:58to measure in 64s. Rulers that measure
60. 3:01only in 30 seconds like this one are not
61. 3:06going to give us the accuracy that we
62. 3:09need. We really need 604s and a lot of
63. 3:12times I don't even find that that is
64. 3:14accurate enough which is why I use
65. 3:16feeler gauges and the next two tools.
66. 3:20The third one is a guitar setup card.
67. 3:25There are a lot of different
68. 3:26manufacturers of these. Now, one of
69. 3:28these will have just about every
70. 3:31measurement you'll need for your setup.
71. 3:33And for those of you who can't ever make
72. 3:36up your minds how you want to measure,
73. 3:37thousands, 64s, even millimeters, this
74. 3:41is your tool. This has everything that
75. 3:43you need.
76. 3:46Lastly, there are digital gauges like
77. 3:49this. They're quite a bit more
78. 3:52expensive, and unless you're doing a lot
79. 3:54of setups, it's probably not worth it. I
80. 3:58am going to do a separate video on the
81. 4:01digital setup.
82. 4:03And for our purposes here, these three
83. 4:06tools will get you everything you need.
84. 4:09And honestly, this set of feeler gauges
85. 4:12is pretty much all that you need for
86. 4:14this step. What I shoot for in a medium
87. 4:19action is about 20,000 on the low E and
88. 4:22the A. Getting slightly lower on the D
89. 4:25and the G.
90. 4:27uh about 18,000. And then for the B and
91. 4:31high E, I'm looking at about 16,000.
92. 4:36In the end, it's all about feel. So,
93. 4:39just get it close. And as long as you
94. 4:42don't need a high action, you can always
95. 4:44adjust it down later. We've already gone
96. 4:47over the layout of the strings in an
97. 4:49earlier chapter, so you should have
98. 4:52already gotten the strings somewhat in
99. 4:54place and your string slots already
100. 4:57started. It is important to do this
101. 5:01under tension. This will keep our string
102. 5:03ankles and neck relief exactly as they
103. 5:06would be as if we were going to pick
104. 5:08this instrument up and play it right
105. 5:11now. I always start on the low E side.
106. 5:16And for that again, I am looking for
107. 5:1920,000. I'm just going to use the feeler
108. 5:21gauge. I'm gonna go under here.
109. 5:25And that is that's pretty high. You can
110. 5:28see there's a lot of room under there.
111. 5:30We probably
112. 5:32uh are three to four times
113. 5:35as high as we need to be. So, let's
114. 5:38adjust that. So, to start out, I'm going
115. 5:41to pull this string up under tension.
116. 5:45And if it won't stay, grab a capo
117. 5:50and keep that into place. I'm going to
118. 5:53file all these slots about the same
119. 5:56angle as the peg head. You never want to
120. 5:59rock forward cuz that's going to mess up
121. 6:01the break point. We want to keep the
122. 6:03break point at the front of the nut and
123. 6:06we don't want to go any further back.
124. 6:09That's going to mess up our intonation.
125. 6:11These larger string slots will take some
126. 6:14effort to cut. Uh, but they do get
127. 6:17easier the smaller the strings get. That
128. 6:19also means they cut faster and it's
129. 6:21faster to screw up. So, measure often,
130. 6:25take your time,
131. 6:29and it should go just fine.
132. 6:36Let's see where we're at. 20,000.
133. 6:40Put it under the first fret.
134. 6:44Oh yeah, that's a lot of room. Got a lot
135. 6:47more work left to do.
136. 6:56All right, we are about halfway through.
137. 7:01Yeah, that means there's enough room
138. 7:03between the feeler gauge and the string
139. 7:05to actually tap it down. When it gets
140. 7:09just where we need it to be, we won't
141. 7:12hear that tap anymore and it'll just be
142. 7:15kind of dead. And I'm also I can see the
143. 7:19air gap in between those two. And I'm
144. 7:22definitely not pushing the string off of
145. 7:25the fret any higher. So, a little bit
146. 7:28more. Pull the string out. Capo to keep
147. 7:31it in place.
148. 7:40Definitely getting closer.
149. 7:46Not there yet.
150. 7:51All right, one more check. Hopefully
151. 7:54we're there.
152. 7:58Excellent. fret gauge is just getting
153. 8:02underneath that string. Not quite
154. 8:06grazing, maybe just grazing the bottom
155. 8:09of the string. Uh going between the fret
156. 8:12and the string and
157. 8:16open string sounds good. No buzzing. I
158. 8:20think we're good there. So, I'm going to
159. 8:22keep working my way down the strings,
160. 8:25moving on to the A, which will also get
161. 8:28to about 21,000.
162. 8:32The middle two strings, we're shooting
163. 8:34for about 18,000.
164. 8:37The uh D and G.
165. 8:40And then the B and the high E, we're
166. 8:43going to shoot for 16,000.
167. 8:45And again, as these slots get smaller,
168. 8:48with the smaller strings, the filing
169. 8:50goes way faster. So, you have to be
170. 8:52careful. It's okay to check as
171. 8:54frequently as you want to, even though
172. 8:56getting the strings in and out of these
173. 8:59channels is kind of a pain, it's well
174. 9:01worth it. You don't want to be doing
175. 9:03repairs on a brand new nut and you don't
176. 9:05want to start over just because you went
177. 9:07overboard by the time you get to the end
178. 9:09of this because these B and high E
179. 9:13strings go very fast. So, I'm going to
180. 9:16move through these and check in with you
181. 9:20in a little bit.
182. 9:25All right,
183. 9:28we're right there. Just grazing the
184. 9:30bottom of that string.
185. 9:34Open string sounds good. I'm not going
186. 9:36to go any further than that. The D and
187. 9:40the G, I'm going to shoot for 018 or
188. 9:44181,000.
189. 9:47[panting]
190. 9:49Got a little bit of room there, but not
191. 9:51much. That's not going to take very much
192. 9:53to get there.
193. 9:58It's just
194. 10:00a little bit high. There's a tiny bit of
195. 10:02movement there. I'm going to take a
196. 10:04couple more strokes with that file.
197. 10:11There's a slight tap there, but I think
198. 10:13I'm going to leave that. I'm going to
199. 10:14leave the A. I'm going to move on to the
200. 10:16G.
201. 10:21Just grazing the bottom of that there.
202. 10:24So, I think I'm going to call that good.
203. 10:26Let's listen.
204. 10:29That's pretty good. All right. I'm going
205. 10:31to leave that. I don't want to take that
206. 10:32down any further. Now, on the B and high
207. 10:36E, we're looking for 16,000.
208. 10:47I think I'm going to leave that for now.
209. 10:51High E again 1600.
210. 11:04I think I'm going to leave it there.
211. 11:10All those open strings sound good.
212. 11:14Yeah. But now I've got to touch up this
213. 11:17nut because these are super deep. If you
214. 11:21take a look at this, you can see how
215. 11:23deep these slots are. These are very
216. 11:25deep. And it's not radius. It's just
217. 11:27flat. So, what I need to do is to grind
218. 11:31this down so that about half of the
219. 11:35string is sticking out. We don't want it
220. 11:38too deep because the strings can
221. 11:40actually rattle side to side inside
222. 11:43these channels and it just doesn't look
223. 11:46very good either. So I am going to grind
224. 11:49this down. make a little bit of a radius
225. 11:51so that the strings are half in, half
226. 11:54out of the slot. And then also round off
227. 11:56the back just a little bit so that we
228. 12:00have a little bit more of a
229. 12:05rounded profile
230. 12:09on the back side. Here's the nut after
231. 12:13I've shaped it, ground it down a little
232. 12:16bit, rolled off the back edge. I think
233. 12:19that looks pretty good.
234. 12:21Let's install that and see how things
235. 12:24are fitting. When I go to do my final
236. 12:28setup in a couple weeks from now, when
237. 12:31the guitar finally figures out it's a
238. 12:33guitar and everything settles in, I'll
239. 12:36check all of these again and make any
240. 12:38final adjustments. But it's really
241. 12:41perfectly playable right now at the with
242. 12:44the action at the nut once we establish
243. 12:47the rest of the setup.
244. 12:50[music]
245. 12:58Yeah, those all sound pretty clean. So
246. 13:01now we can move on to the action at the
247. 13:0212th fret. And I'll see you in the next
248. 13:04video.
249. 13:15Oh