Help please - guitar setups driving m...

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Author Message   Bluepill Username: Bluepill Registered: 7-2004 Posted on Tuesday, November 20, 2007 - 10:56 pm:    hi guys i have 3 artist that i can not get right with setups, in particular low e fret rattles between the 5th and 15th frets...and its on all of them, being an ar305, ar50 and ar300 reissue i have taken all 3 guitars to respected luthers and guitar repairers (in melbourne australia) but they all come back with rattles even after fret dresses...prob could have bought a few new ones with the amount ive spent on setups. after much frustration i read a bunch of stuff on the net (mainly gibson setup) and tried myself, experimented for months with different releief combination, even over relief (back-bow) but its not working, the low e always has rattles, even at best frets 8-13 still buzz out somewhat...and im no action nazi, infact i play with the action pretty high. guys im after any advice to help me keep happy with these guitars, or some direction or best books to buy that cover these issues...i have a korean 335 copy that costs 250 dollors and i end up playing that all of the time cause its less frustrating...the neck on the 335 is very straight but this doesnt seem to work on the artist on all guitars i tune down half a step, use 11-49 strings and thats about it perhaps if anyone has the ibanez default setup measurements (in mm if possible), that would be great too thanks guys, hope you all have better luck than me adam   Bluepill Username: Bluepill Registered: 7-2004 Posted on Tuesday, November 20, 2007 - 11:04 pm:    heres my girls in question http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b275/bluepill/e4 ecf14f.jpg   Gemberbier Username: Gemberbier Registered: 5-2006 Posted on Wednesday, November 21, 2007 - 8:33 am:    CAREFUL! THINKING ALOUD! READ ALL AND DON'T START ADJUSTING YET First clue that rings a bell: "on all guitars i tune down half a step, use 11-49 strings and thats about it" First reaction: There probably lies your problem. You don't have enough tension in Es. Stevie Ray Vaughan tuned down a half-step too but he increased the gauge of his strings to avoid your problem: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stevie_Ray_Vaughan He used .013-.016 for a high e. My suggestion is that you buy a .013 set for one guitar and tune it in Es. Leave the truss rod as it is now. Let strings and truss rod fight each other for a day in the stand, so that the neck can adapt and then after you checked the tuning (because it probably will have altered now) you play and look if the rattle is still there. Second clue: Ho wait a minute. Just reread your message: it is the low E (or low ES) only! Hmmm... Second suggestion: You could give the slotted bolt on the bass side of the Gibraltar bridge some counterclockwise turn after you have loosened the little gold nut. Write down or draw the actual position of the slot of the anchor (that's how Hoshino calls the stud). Start with a 1/4 turn (so turn it back to 12 o'clock, try what happens with the rattle. Not enough? Another quarter back... and so on. Write down what you do, so that you can reverse all steps if necessary. As soon as the rattle has gone you stop. How ridiculously high is the bass side now? Is it still reasonable? Then the problem has probably been solved now. If it's WAY too high, then this was not the main cause, and you should reverse all steps and you're back where you started. Third clue: What bothers me is that ALL 3 guitars have the same problem. The chance that you buy 3 Ibanez guitars with a neck torsion is very very small. I just don't believe that torsion is the problem Fourth clue: But they all have been at the same luthier's and have been set-up there. Now what's important is that the luthier knows that you are playing tuned in Es. If he did not know that, his E set-up might have caused the rattle. (note: I said MIGHT) Final suggestion: I think you should actually communicate with the luthier and explain the problem AND how you wanted it set-up (in Es). You are an unsatisfied customer, so give the guy the chance to straighten that. Note: if you want to use heavier strings, he might need to file the nut slots. That's irreversible with the same nut. So talk it through thoroughly. Becaus the other 5 strings are not rattling, it might be possible to stick with the .011 set (perhaps with a solution for one string), so that you keep the .011 feel, because .013 and higher could feel quite different. Work out a solution plan with him (write it down) and let him try that on ONE of the guitars first and then test the guitar, before you decide what to do with the other three. Show him all three guitar and so that he knows it is a problem with three guitars he set-up. This one first guitar is just that he gets the chance that he CAN do better. I think that you don't have to worry about the cost, because he has to make it up. Perhaps there was miscommunication from your side, and then he will suggest a compromise. I did that with a few bad car repairs, and my garagist does his best to get the customer satisfied again. A good businessman is happy when you communicate his mistakes (not openly with other customers around, but face to face), so that he gets the opportunity to make you happy about him solving it. Because that's what you will communicate outside: your feeling about the last thing that he did for you! So give him that chance and you both might be satisfied afterwards. If he's ticking right, he will be proud about solving it even if he did it for free. If he's only thinking about getting his hours 100%paid, then he will meet the consequences and loose customers because of bad aftersales policy. Ginger   Gemberbier Username: Gemberbier Registered: 5-2006 Posted on Wednesday, November 21, 2007 - 8:57 am:    Like this one: http://www.ibanezcollectors.com/discus/messages/17 /19263.html Oops, that looks familiar... Ginger   Guitarwhisperer Username: Guitarwhisperer Registered: 6-2007 Posted on Wednesday, November 21, 2007 - 9:49 am:    A lot of times the bridges aren't radiused exactly to the fretboards on these style bridges. That would cause uneven string height problems. The saddle slots might need to be height adjusted. Get a couple of short straightedges and start checking for high/low frets, after setting the neck straight. A high 14th fret could cause the frets before it to rattle, you may need a fret dress. Also, you may need to consider the possibility that the problem could be technique related. Every guitar is different. I find that with most of my ibanezes, I need to pick a little lighter, and angle my pick perpendicular to the strings. Even keeping the same strum strength. I can make ANY guitar buzz or play cleanly (with the frets properly dressed and set up of course) just by changing the angle of my strum attack. If the string vibrates sideways, there's less buzz than if the string vibrates up and down in relation to the fretboard. The string vibrates in an ellipse, not a circle, based on the direction that energy is imparted to it, for every action, there is an equal but opposite reaction. This applies to string vibration as well.   Jazzzbo Username: Jazzzbo Registered: 9-2005 Posted on Wednesday, November 21, 2007 - 9:33 pm:    does your guitar buzz , and is it bothersome while plugged in the amp?? sometimes those buzzes dont come thru, but make you crzy when playin unplugged-lazzz   Bluepill Username: Bluepill Registered: 7-2004 Posted on Thursday, November 22, 2007 - 6:03 am:    hey guys all good info thanks guys...i tune all strings flat Eb, Ab, Db etc but yeah im pretty confident that out of the 4 'guitar techs' to 'luthiers' that ive been to, 1 could give a •••• about making more business and he was 2 hours from my house and kinda expensive. ive also shown them the tuning i use, string gauge and described how i play...not sure what else they need...maybe a stripper to make them care?? as ginger found that post from sometime ago, that was one of the most recommended guitar setup joints in melbourne, and that was a ••••••• nightmare!! i actually setup all 3 guitars when i got home and they played better and rattled less! (bit still rattled) ive had fret dresses on both of the 80's artist and that didnt fix the issue either ive also been playing for about 16 years and owned heaps of guitars. i dont really think my playing style has changed that much, but thats a good point perhaps im a heavier player now. 11-49 is also the heaviest strings ive ever used, i fell kind of awkward on 52 up low E (yep im no stevie unfortiantly. on that note im not going to change my style for a guitar, that make no sense to me but all in all, i think jazzzbo is onto it, outside of playing in the band i can always hear the rattles in my bedroom with the practice amp, so basically unplugged...but dang why cant it just be right!!! anyone got the default setup settings for ar300's so i can keep fiddling with em? cheers adam   Flatbag Username: Flatbag Registered: 9-2004 Posted on Thursday, November 22, 2007 - 6:17 am:    Who are you taking them to? I'm in Sydney so this is only second hand, but, Pete Crossley and Tim Lovell are 2 of the best around Melbourne from what I hear.   Daveh Username: Daveh Registered: 7-2005 Posted on Thursday, November 22, 2007 - 9:37 am:    If the rattle doesn't come through the amp, don't worry about it. In 40 years of guitar playing, I can't remember an electric that *didn't* rattle a little,un-amplified. As long as the notes don't fret out, it's not really a problem. If it is, simply raise the action.   Gemberbier Username: Gemberbier Registered: 5-2006 Posted on Thursday, November 22, 2007 - 1:43 pm:    Normally one shouldn't alter the setup if one is not satisfied but let the repairman do it, so that he knows the starting point. But what can one expect when that repairman is two hours away? That's about the maximum drive we can make in Holland. Our country is only 300 kilometres long and about 200 kilometers wide, so if we don't brake in time we land over the border or in the North Sea. If the problem is not there when plugged in, I understand that the luthier considers this a good setup. The fact that you test and practice practically unplugged, is the problem. You don't want to bother others with the noise. Then you should make an amp configuration with a wireless headphone and play with the headphone on, because practising on different acoustic guitars is a totally different feeling. I play all kinds of guitars, mandolins, mandolas, ukes. But I know that if I really want to excel on one instrument I should stick to one player for a while, but I love all those girls and different styles. Recently I have picked up my tenor mandola and octave mandolin again, because being guitar number 6 or 7 in an Irish session doesn't add much, does it? So last week I played the tenor mandola. So there was 1 bouzouki, 1 banjo, me said the fool with the mandola, an Irish bagpipe, 4 fiddles and 5 guitars and several tin whistles and stuff and an accordeon. I know that my Gallagher beats all present guitars but it's not a competition. So, I looked for the empty spots in the total musical space, which lied in the frequency range of my mandola (I brought my mandolin before, but I wanted something different now), and perhaps I try the octave mandolin, which is nearly as long as the bouzouki, next time. Huh... why am I telling this? Oh yeah, because choosing to practice a lot on a different instrument might cause the "Artist AR" feel in your case to go away, and your fingers might land on places you don't want them to. So, I hope you have a headphone connection on your amp, so that you can minimize the investment. Ginger

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