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Intonation and acceptable variations

A

Aziraphale

Dec 3, 2010
22
1
#1
I am trying to set up my 5 string / 24 fret Marleaux bass as perfectly as possible. And it gives me a headache. I fear I am on the verge of neurotic behaviour - I know that it is impossible to get every fret right, I try anyway.
On the A,D and G string I try to achieve perfect intonation around the 12th which gives a 2 cent shift around the 5th. I think that is about good?
But on the E and B string set for corect intonation around the 5th as I seldomly play them 12th and higher I get an offset on the 12th of about 7 cent...
What are acceptable variations here? And what is normal for a decent instrument? Am I being to perfectionist here?:hmm:
 
#2
if you are that worried about it.....Here is a few things to think about.

You can capo your second/third fret and do intonation from your 14/15th fret....that will only work if all your frets are in the correct position on the fret board.

Start playing lighter. The harder you press down on the strings while fretting, the more likely it is to go out of tune. The harder you play with your right hand, the more likely it is to go out of tune.

You could also consider a compensated nut.

Also, consider your tuner. If you aren't using a strobe tuner that is perfect, your intonation is +/- 2 cents, some are as accurate as .5 cents but they are more expensive.


Also, consider that your band mates probably wont hear 2 cents.....for that matter they may not hear 7 cents. There are 100 cents between semitones....When you get that many people together....stuff tends to get lost in the room.


OR you could pay someone to do it for you.
 
#3
To intonate for certain frets is futile. E and B strings are so big its difficult to get s good stable reading tuning open. Too much mass moving around and too variable.

Tune your bass all strings at 12 harmonic. Then the 12 fretted to see where the intonation is. Adjust, re tune for the harmonic. Check 12 fretted again. Repeat until both match. When satisfied, check any fret and it will be close enough. Intonation is a compromise, too many variables on any strung instrument. A few cents means nothing. Works for me.
 
#4
look at other parts of the setup, like the overall action and especially the height off the first fret.

also, make sure the strings are not curving up off the witness points at each end, but are dead-straight for their entire vibrating length.

if you get the rest of it right, the intonation will close in on being better all over. (you still won't get perfect, and the next set of strings you put on will be imperfect in a slightly different way, but you'll be plenty close. hell, with a real strobe tuner, you can see the string going slightly sharp or flat just by pushing a fretted note towards or away from the bridge!)
 
#5
Why are you worrying about something youd never ever notice without your electronic tuner? As others have pointed out you will never have perfect intonation up and down the fretboard and no one including yourself will ever be able to hear that in the vast majority of cases.
 
#6
Aziraphale said:
I am trying to set up my 5 string / 24 fret Marleaux bass as perfectly as possible. And it gives me a headache. I fear I am on the verge of neurotic behaviour - I know that it is impossible to get every fret right, I try anyway.
On the A,D and G string I try to achieve perfect intonation around the 12th which gives a 2 cent shift around the 5th. I think that is about good? But on the E and B string set for correct intonation around the 5th as I seldomly play them 12th and higher I get an offset on the 12th of about 7 cent...
What are acceptable variations here? And what is normal for a decent instrument? Am I being to perfectionist here?:hmm:
Click to expand...

If the neck and body are right for each other when the frets & nut are set up correctly, you should have no problem setting the intonation so it's good all over the neck. Pressing too hard sends a great setup out the window, though. If you have correct intonation higher than about the 5th fret and it's sharp at the 1st, 2nd and 3rd frets, your nut slots are too high and/or you're pressing too hard. If you set the intonation/harmonic at the 12th and it's fine at the lower frets but not higher, your fret locations aren't right, or you're pressing too hard.

Find the lowest string height without unacceptable buzz when plucking the strings without fretting, then check it when you fret at the lower end. If you have no/little buzz with open strings but you have buzz at various positions, make sure the neck's relief is correct, have the frets leveled, crowned & polished before trying to set the intonation. Once your frets are good, you should be able to have good fretted/harmonic intonation at the 7th, 12th, 19th and 24th frets as long as the frets are where they're supposed to be.
 
#9
1958Bassman said:
No, but if two instruments play the same note and the intonation is off, the beat frequencies can cause it to sound bad.
Click to expand...

I didn't suggest that it was OK for intonation to be "off", just that there are limits to how accurately the human ear can hear. In live performance, if you're intonated to within 10 cents or less, the chances of (a) a problem happening, and (b) it being audible to the audience in the mix, are so minimal as to be inconsequential. In fact, it's not an issue - period.

I'm not saying intonation doesn't matter - I'm asserting that if the human ear can't hear it, then by definition it doesn't matter. IMO tuning an instrument more closely than the human ear can detect is not a goal worthy of extra time and effort...and that opinion isn't about to change. If you can get it spot-on without hassle, cool. If not, close enough is close enough.

I consider that (referring to the thread title) an "acceptable variation."
 
#10
1958Bassman said:
No, but if two instruments play the same note and the intonation is off, the beat frequencies can cause it to sound bad.
Click to expand...

Nonsense. For the vast majority of humans music making history with strings instruments they had no intonation adjustment ability and no electronic tuners to "alert peeps about something no one can hear". 99% of instruments tuning was done by ear with another instrument providing a ref note for other instruments to tune to by ear alone. Most instruments varied by several cents or more as a result for absolute pitch. Microtonal diff between notes of two instruments seldom creates the stated negative effect. In fact its very very common when stacking voices with modern synths to purposely have the tuning slightly off for each stacked voice due to the nice sound texture this can give. If an instruments fretwork is so bad you have bad sound effect, intonation wont help anything since frets are wrongly placed. Intonation is important, but not nearly a smuch as those who rely on e;lectronic tuners to make them aware of the diff. If you take the time to compare to diff tuners by two diff mfg you will also find that the two tuners dont exactly agree with each other. Luckilly musicians of old relied on their ears not eyes for things like tuning. They where better musicians for it to imo.
 
#11
darkstorm said:
Nonsense. For the vast majority of humans music making history with strings instruments they had no intonation adjustment ability and no electronic tuners to "alert peeps about something no one can hear". 99% of instruments tuning was done by ear with another instrument providing a ref note for other instruments to tune to by ear alone. Most instruments varied by several cents or more as a result for absolute pitch.
Click to expand...

Exactly. Orchestras DO have multiple instruments playing the same note at the same time, (ferexample, sometimes numerous violins play the exact same passage at the same time) and guess how they tune? The first violinist plays a note, end the entire orchestra tunes to THAT note - without use of electronics. And every tuning is only as accurate as the human ear can make it.

And that one note, usually is (at least when I played in an orchestra) an open G. Guess how the violins, violas, cellos and basses tune all the other strings? By ear, using a finger placement (on fretless instruments, remember) at what is equivalent to the 5th fret on an electric bass.

Q: So tuning (which is not the same thing as intonation, but the effect relative to this discussion is the same) is traditionally done how?

A: To the accuracy of the human ear.

Q.E.D. Q.E.D. - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
 
#12
Pilgrim said:
The human ear can't hear variations of less than 10 cents. If you get it that close, anything better is wasted effort.

If you can't hear anything wrong, nothing is wrong.

Chill.
Click to expand...

It´s relative... An A4, 10 cents higher is 442,16 Hz. Big difference. An A1, 10 cents higher is 55,327 Hz. Not so big difference. But since a bass has a lot of overtones, a couple of cents off pitch will be audible. At least to my ears. At 500 Hz, I can differentiate two tones 0,3 hz apart. That´s 1 cent.
 
#14
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Test your hearing there. The average test subject scored less than 4Hz at 500Hz.

Musicians should do far better - i can reliably tell the difference at 1.4Hz, which is around 4.8 cents. This is worst case scenario with computer generated tones.

To the OP, check your witness points - nuts cut appropriately low, string bent at a nice sharp angle over the bridge and nut - as well as your relief.
 
#16
Hi.

basmartin said:
It´s relative... An A4, 10 cents higher is 442,16 Hz. Big difference. An A1, 10 cents higher is 55,327 Hz. Not so big difference. But since a bass has a lot of overtones, a couple of cents off pitch will be audible. At least to my ears. At 500 Hz, I can differentiate two tones 0,3 hz apart. That´s 1 cent.
Click to expand...

My condolences ;).

If I had that kind of hearing accuracy I couln't play with the people I play with. Hell, I probably couldn't play by myself either.

People with perfect hearing or perfect pitch have often a hard (or impossible) time playing with less accurate people, how hard is for You if you don't mind me asking.

Regards
Sam
 
#17
Fun link :)

For the general intonation question, did you ever talk to a piano tuner ?
That's a job where you learn that, to sound well and "musical" on such a range you cannot be perfectly in tune with your pitch fork for every single note.

It's a whole compromise to minimize the dissonance and emphasize some of the consonance.
 
#18
Probably a little background info on my side to explain why I bother; I just started playing on a fretless bass, did so for 3 weeks, and then went back to my fretted instrument (because I had to return the fretless - will buy one soon...) and this is where it started to bother me. I realised that somethings not right and then discovered the intonation was off on my old instrument. It just didn't sound right. So for myself I obviously can hear it if it's 7 cent off. If it's only two I don't. That is where I am aiming at for my self-setup experiments. It's much better now btw...
 
#19
Aziraphale said:
So for myself I obviously can hear it if it's 7 cent off. If it's only two I don't. That is where I am aiming at for my self-setup experiments.
Click to expand...
OK, that sounds sane. carry on! :smug:

going from fretless back to fretted, you're also running into the whole "equal temperament" thing that fixed-pitch instruments have to deal with.

12-tone equal temp averages out all the mathematical errors in the western music scale, so no interval is different from any other; the price is that now none of them will be perfect except octaves.

the violin players and singers can unconsciously adjust themselves so that they're more in-tune with whatever key or chord is happening at the time. same with fretless bass.
 
#20
Oh boy; am I looking forward to that new instrument. I know it will be a lot of work, but it all just happens as I tremendously enjoy playing the fretless. And in those three weeks I learned more than ever before - unconciously. It just feels like a "real" instrument. Creating the tone yourself is such a joy:)
 

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