Fender factory setup

[pedulla-2007]

60$ seams cheep. I did not think you could get a professional to do a setup for twice that. What kind of music and how aggressively you play seam like good questions if you do not have specifics to go by. I find it strange that people do not do their own setups, at least anything that does not acquire files.

Here the the Southwest, Guitar Center sets the standard for setup costs. Their going fee is 75.00. I live in a small town of 4,300 where there is only one small music store called “CRAIG’s. Their cost for setup from an authorized factory trained/schooled repairman, is 60.00. As you well know there are so many variables to an ideal playable bass. Correct strings, nut depth/ height, neck relief,pickup height/radius, intonation, bridge saddle height/spacing and string radius or curvature to match the shape of the basses neck.
Now, IMHO, anyone that thinks they can dial in the science of a bass better, or, as well as a professional luthier such as BRIAN BARRETT of the LOWEND bass shop, who builds and sets up thousands of guitars and basses a year, is fooling themselves. To me a professional setup is well worth the money.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

If you buy a bass at Guitar Center, chances are good it will have whatever setup it left the factory with, and whatever effects of temperature and humidity accrued in transit. They don’t do ANY setup unless you commit to buy a specific bass, at least at my local GC. This results, randomly, in decent setup off the shelf, or unplayable high action, luck of the draw.

 

[Bassdrifter]

Not so much normal as lucky. Regardless of how it is set up at the factory, in shipping the bass may be subject to hot and dry or cold and wet conditions, either of which will throw a setup off.

What in your opinion is the exact mechanisms in play?

Steel of course reacts to temperature and wood to moisture content. The "circumference" of wood has twice the dimensional change of the "diameter" and the "length" has almost no change at all. Lets not fall in the "tonewood" pit, i think that may have been discussed before, but the kind of wood used should probably make a difference on stability trough changes in temperatur and moisture. Same with quartersawn and torrified wood. Graphite rods should also behave differently than steel. Some basses are notoriously unstable and need frequent adjusterts and some much less. It does not seam to be a function of price.

It seams to me that changes in setup due to changes in temperature and moisture mostly affect neck relief, all other parameters are usually much more stable. I guess the thickness of the body could vary to affect string height and maybe pickup height, length of body and neck could affect intonation and thickness of the neck could affect the nut height, but i can not remember seeing these changes

As to "lucky"; we usually have 10 degrees C and light rain all year around so the instruments are quite stable at least.

 

[Turnaround]

What in your opinion is the exact mechanisms in play?

Steel of course reacts to temperature and wood to moisture content. The "circumference" of wood has twice the dimensional change of the "diameter" and the "length" has almost no change at all. Lets not fall in the "tonewood" pit, i think that may have been discussed before, but the kind of wood used should probably make a difference on stability trough changes in temperatur and moisture. Same with quartersawn and torrified wood. Graphite rods should also behave differently than steel. Some basses are notoriously unstable and need frequent adjusterts and some much less. It does not seam to be a function of price.

It seams to me that changes in setup due to changes in temperature and moisture mostly affect neck relief, all other parameters are usually much more stable. I guess the thickness of the body could vary to affect string height and maybe pickup height, length of body and neck could affect intonation and thickness of the neck could affect the nut height, but i can not remember seeing these changes

As to "lucky"; we usually have 10 degrees C and light rain all year around so the instruments are quite stable at least.

It is the neck that is of primary concern when it come to differences in relative humidity. This will affect flat sawn necks primarily in their width, quarter sawn in their thickness. But it also affects the wood along its length, up to as much as .2%. On a 34" neck that's a change of .068". It doesn't seem like much, but that's the equivalent of about 2 full turns of the typical truss rod. And since the wood shifts but the truss rod doesn't, the relief will change with changes in relative humidity.

Changes to the neck's length would not be a significant problem were it not for the fact that the strings that are attached to it do not expand and contract in length with changes in humidity. So when the neck gets longer but the strings don't, the neck bows. We use the truss rod to counteract that.

Different pieces of wood react differently to changes in humidity, certainly from species to species, but also within the same species. Even pieces of wood cut from the same tree may react differently to changes in RH.

With roasted necks, the structure of the wood changes that makes it less reactive to changes in humidity.

To be honest, the length of the wood shrinks about .2% going from green to fully dried. But it still does react in length to changes in RH, perhaps 1/8th as much. That still is significant in terms of the amount of bow it cases in the neck.

And concerning "lucky", my point was that you were lucky with your bass when it arrived perfectly set up. That may be the case only because the bass was manufactured in a plant with the same RH conditions as where you live. Or maybe it's because that particular piece of wood was on the less-reactive side of the spectrum. Or a combination of factors. The fact that your environment doesn't change much bodes well for longer term stability.

 

[tvbop]

Never understood the 'factory setup thing'. If I have a particularly warm gig especialy in the summer months.. or cold one in the winter I invariably have to tweak the thing the next day. Trick is to learn to do ur own 'setups' then you can tweak as often as you like.