The Steel Guitar Forum

Hi everyone, got a guitar setup question for ya.
sorry i didn't want to join another board and figure there are some VERY knowledgable people around here, so here goes.

I have a gibson les paul and recently its been having some tuning problems. Cold weather and soft case gigging aint so great I'm sure.

Basically its just the G string, in tune open at the nut and when I play chords up the neck its easily gets out of whack. Definitely an intonation issue. but when i hit the harmonic on the 12th fret its comes out straight G.

Any ideas on how to fix this problem?

man thanks.

check the fretted note on the 12th fret being careful not to pull the string up in pitch. If that is sharp to the harmonic 12th fret tone you need to roll back the bridge piece and keep checking until they match. If it's flat shorten the length.

I would also recommend a new set of strings before you adjust intonation at the bridge. No sense in having it only play in tune with old strings. As strings age the intonation will go off and you will be able to see it by playing the harmonic at the 12th fret and comparing that to the fretted note at the 12th fret.

Also, how high is your action? Guitars with high action tend to be out of tune more than ones with it lowered. When you fret a string you have to push exactly straight down. If your action's higher that's harder to do........JH in Va.

thanks very much guys.

My action is higher than most, seems its sounds better that way.

So the fretted note at 12 is higher than the harmonic at 12. Should I adjust the bride and lower the action?

can i fix this without lowering the action too much?

Check the nut slot, it may not be cut deep enough which will make the string intonate sharp when fretted. Here's a tutorial:

Thomas Bohlen wrote:can i fix this without lowering the action too much?

Unless the action is extremely high it shouldn't be necessary to adjust it at the bridge, as long as you're happy with it.
A higher action tends to make the intonation go sharp, what needs to be done then is to adjust the individual saddle(s) at the bridge,- pull the saddle(s) further back, effectively making the distance from the 12th fret to the saddle longer.

Steinar has it. A common Les Paul/SG problem.

Thomas Bohlen wrote: Should I adjust the bride and lower the action?

Every time I've tried to adjust a bride,my action was definitely lowered! sorry,couldn't stop myself!

if the intonation is correct at the bridge and the nut slots are cut correctly then you need to always temper the tuning on a standard 6 string guitar by tuning the g string a little flat. the fretted guitar is a tempered instrument. if you tune all the pitches straight up on your tuner, and play an E chord and then a C chord both first position, you will notice that that they are not in tune. the g string is all you need to compensate for.

just tune the g string a little flat until you can live with the balance between the two chords.

i have repaired and adjusted THOUSANDS of guitars in the last 35+ years. this issue is just so common to all of them.