Truss adjustment win

[Winston H]

Just put a straight edge on the frets of my bass to check how well I'd guess-tensioned the truss recently when I re-did the setup to cater for colder weather. I was confident I'd done a reasonable job, but I'm also very new to setups (less than a year) and have done it solely courtesy of YouTube tutorials.

Boy did I surprise myself. Across the entire fretboard there is well under 0.5mm height disparity.

Chuffed level

 

[Zooberwerx]

Just put a straight edge on the frets of my bass to check how well I'd guess-tensioned the truss recently when I re-did the setup to cater for colder weather. I was confident I'd done a reasonable job, but I'm also very new to setups (less than a year) and have done it solely courtesy of YouTube tutorials.

Boy did I surprise myself. Across the entire fretboard there is well under 0.5mm height disparity.

Chuffed level

How much relief do you have onboard?

Riis

 

[byacey]

Was your goal to make a dead flat neck?

 

[Winston H]

How much relief do you have onboard?

Riis

About 0.3mm by eye of the gap between 1st and 12th.

Was your goal to make a dead flat neck?

Yep.

 

[Zooberwerx]

About 0.3mm by eye of the gap between 1st and 12th.



Yep.

0.3mm = .012" so that's on target. I would fret at the 1st and ~19th and measure at the 8th. Your # is good but not in the context presented.

A perfectly flat fingerboard is not necessarily desirable...a modicum of relief allows you to dial-in buzz-free performance in most instances.

Riis

 

[micguy]

You're in the ballpark - half a mm is about .020". A well set up neck has somewhere in the range of .006" to .012" relief - I set up instruments (for myself and others) in various point in that range, the exact number depending on a few factors.

 

[byacey]

About 0.3mm by eye of the gap between 1st and 12th.



Yep.

How are you checking this? Is this just the perceived height of the open string? When checking relief, you want to fret the string at the first fret and the 14th or so, and then measure the relief at the 7th fret.

 

[Winston H]

How are you checking this? Is this just the perceived height of the open string? When checking relief, you want to fret the string at the first fret and the 14th or so, and then measure the relief at the 7th fret.

I have a 3mm steel straight edge cut to length to suit the fretboard.

 

[sissy kathy]

I have a 3mm steel straight edge cut to length to suit the fretboard.

Ohhh, fancy!

 

[Winston H]

Ohhh, fancy!

$4 from the hardware store. Not fancy at all.

 

[byacey]

About 0.3mm by eye of the gap between 1st and 12th.

Reason I was asking was in trying to understand how, and what you were measuring.

So with the strings on, and tuned to pitch, you lay a straight edge between the 1st fret and 12th, and you were actually measuring (or by eye?) a 0.3mm gap? At what fret is the gap measured at?

 

[Winston H]

Reason I was asking was in trying to understand how, and what you were measuring.

So with the strings on, and tuned to pitch, you lay a straight edge between the 1st fret and 12th, and you were actually measuring (or by eye?) a 0.3mm gap? At what fret is the gap measured at?

The straight edge spanned from the first to 26th fret. I checked for rocking action that would indicate a back bow, then visually inspected each fret for a gap. Following that I used a shorter length straight edge (approx 12 frets) and slid it up and down the frets listening and feeling for snicks. Very, very slight.