Quote:
Originally Posted by GBag  Well I'm getting string buzz on my A string when I play at the 6th & the 8th fret. Oddly enough the buzz occurs between my finger & the nut and not between the fret & the bridge. What would cause this? Nut too Low? Not enough/too much relief?? |
As a matter of routine, if you are troubleshooting almost any part of an instrument,
change the string first.
If it is, in fact, a relief problem, a lack of relief would be the direction of fault. There are several things that it possibly could be so I'd suggest that you just eliminate the possibilities one at a time.
Start with the least invasive tests that you possibly can. In other words, don't just go turning things in hopes that you may fix it. Most parameters of the setup procedure can be tried without actually having to make the physical adjustment to the bass.
One of the things that can cause the problem is a nut cut wrong or worn out.
Rather than cutting a nut to see if the problem is the nut, simply put a bit of paper, aluminum foil, match book cover etc. in the nut notch under the string. If the buzz stops, the nut is the prime suspect, for the moment.
There is some interaction between nut height and relief, especially in the case of back buzzing, so the relief should also be eliminated as the cause. Again, it's easy to check the reaction to a slight increase in relief without having to even take the TR cover off.
Remove the paper shim from the nut notch, and simply raise the tuning anywhere from several cents high to a full note higher. The increased forward bow from the increased string tension on the neck is exactly the same result as turning the truss rod nut, except quicker, less invasive and definitely safer for the bass. If the buzz clears up, a truss rod adjustment will probably correct the buzzing.
You can use the same method on the bridge saddles to simulate raising the saddles with the screws, and then having to get them readjusted if it didn't fix the problem.
Then there's the much less likely possibility of a bad fret.
