The Steel Guitar Forum

Recently I have noticed that when played together, especially above the 12 fret, certain strings pairs have a bad harmonic, or beat.. Strings 1&2 and 3&4. It seems to be during the attack, a minor third is worse than the major 3rd. Listen:

http://soundcloud.com/frank-mon/stings- ... 12-7-47-43
and
http://soundcloud.com/frank-mon/strings ... 12-7-48-06


It's worse at the end of the clips, when the bar is up near the 15-17 fret. What is it, how to get rid of it?

I have tried the following without much effect:

Changed strings, and string brand, made sure the ball ends are centered in the slots and the twisted end is not on the changer radius.

Moved the strings to the side a little on the changer, away from any possible groves.

Turned the rollers when changing the strings.

The pickup is taped, switching the 3 way switch has a minor effect.

A little oil on the ends of the strings at the changer and rollers.

Tried to tune it away.

Tried a different amp.

Lowered the pickup.

It's still there when picking softer, or using ear phones or another amp. It's still there through earphones and an RP-155 (no amp).

Only 2 things worked a little, cutting 400 & 800 HZ on a 7 band EQ or using compression with the RP-155.

It seems to have gotten worse over time. I didn't notice much because lately I have been drilling single note scales and chords near frets 3-7. Decided to play some harmonized scales and revisit some other things and found the problem.

I do not use a volume pedal, it's guitar straight into the amp. Seems the strings have an off pitch when first picked, when they settle down, the beat goes away. Is it a natural thing, just sounds louder because of some pickup, cord, resonance thing? Something loose or vibrating? I am missing something in equipment or technique?

Check your wrist. I bet the bar ain't square. That aint harmonics, that is a sour interval.
Many people have a hard time keeping the bar straight once it gets in front of the torso.
I suppose it's possible the guitar is out of tune, but you only complain about it up high.
All of the fixes you have tried are misdirected energy: the problem is in your ass. It needs to move from behind the desk to behind the guitar

You are just playing out of tune. Practice playing in tune along to some drone notes real slow. The fact that you can tell it sounds bad is a good start.

Yeah,what they said.I used to sound like that,then figured out my belly was in the way,lost some weight,slid my seat back a little tied a rope to my hand,greased my pickin' hand then quit & poured another drink.My story 'n' I ain't changin' it.

Sounds like string buzz or mechanical resonance to me, usually caused by a problem with the radius on the tops of the fingers. It could also be a speaker or amp problem that's causing the artifacts I'm hearing.

No, simply out of tune, nothing more. No need to try to come up with some way out explanation.

Yeah,what they said.I used to sound like that,then figured out my belly was in the way,lost some weight,slid my seat back a little tied a rope to my hand,greased my pickin' hand then quit & poured another drink.My story 'n' I ain't changin' it.

Let me guess, you poured yourself some more "Beers" that you were holding "Ransom"!

...some more of that good Cajun Jacques Daniel wine perhaps...

Mine was bar pressure and making sure your fingers behind the bar were firmly on the strings. Also making sure the bar was lined up on the fret, in tune. I overcame this with practice and memory. Lots of practice and then some more practice. You'll overcome it. Just keep on Steelin'.

I'm more in tune on the high notes if I move my seat further to the right. I used to think centering on the 12th fret was good. Now the center of my body is at the 17th fret. It really did make a difference.

So I'm sitting sideways at the 17th fret with my head swaying back and forth, my right hand twisted up bouncing up and down a thousand times a min with my right elbow up in the air, hunched way over looking right straight down the bar and fret while I playing at a gig.
A guy comes up to the stage and says to me
"Boy! For a severally disabled person you really play in tune.”

Could it be the sound of springs vibrating?
Either the springs that are part of the mechanics, or the springs under the pick up?
Try to dampen them with a piece of foam.

I just listened again, after seeing Donny had a different conclusion ( I do that if somebody I respect has an alternate idea).
I think there maybe something to Georg's take on too much gain augmenting a clash, but I think I'll stick by my "sour interval" theory.
Other suggestions having nothing to do with the bar: turn master volume up, earlier gain stages down; make sure that your legs don't start moving 1 of the knee levers when you get high up the neck. New players often end up twisting their bodies as they get out of the way of the bar hand, bumping 1 of the knee levers will knock those strings out of tune

Tuning and bar movement does not make this go away. I have tried moving the bar from a forward slant to perpendicular to the strings, to backward slant, the pitch changes but it does not diminish in volume or go away. I have tuned each string in turn, sharp or flat by up to 40 cents, no change. (of course it sounds out of tune when I do that but the beat of harmonic does not go away.)

I'm with Georg on this.

Amp-distortion - overdriven pre/eq stages on the attack

At least, that's what it sounds like to me.

Strings discording. A very common problem. I remember talking with Weldon once where he goes through several sets of strings to get a full set on the guitar that will tune. JD Maness has had this same problem and I have as well. The strings diameter must remain consistant throughout it's length or this will occur. It is not a tuning issue. I once had to split the difference so that I could find a way to live with the tuning above and below the 12th fret.

I'm hearing 'wolf tones' that die out before the strings do... is that what we're talking about? It does sound like the springs underneath... is it picking-level dependent? Does it happen with softer picking? It kind of sounds like intermodulation distortion, where the two frequencies mix and non-harmonic resultants come out... think playing complex chords into a fuzz box. Make sure you're not clipping your pre section... crank the volume pedal down and pick hard. Goes away? Not the guitar then.

I've heard this come from guitars with the pickups too close to the string... I've heard this come from stretched strings (varying diameter)... I've heard this come from speakers needing break-in... I've heard it come from old filter caps in the (tube) amp... lots of different things possible here.

Have somebody else play your steel and see if the problem is still there.

This could be your problem..Listen very carefully and see if one string beats by itself..If it does,,then you may have a scale problem, a real bad set of strings or something else within the instrument is causing it... Carson

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inharmonicity

First, I will make the concession that the tuning could be a wee bit out - check the pair on a high fret by standing and looking down to see the bar is exactly perpendicular to the strings.
OK. My fiddle teacher said, You picked the hardest instrument, and then you had to find one harder, the pedal steel. I've noticed there are more than a few steelers who also play fiddle so I will bring up the principle of complex arcs.
In drawing (or learning to) a bow across the strings, you have to recognize how the shoulder joint makes the upper arm move in an arc that interacts with the arc that the elbow joint makes the lower arm move in. Yes, after a while it becomes intuitive, but it is a definite hurdle. This principle most definitely applies to moving the bar in front of oneself and finding (or not) that the geometry of the wrist demands a different twist because your lower arm has moved so far to the right. That leftward twist the wrist has to do is not as intuitive as we might like. But coming to terms with the anatomy will bring the bar into the perpendicular and three or more, not just two, strings will chord right. (I say that because my fiddle is a five-string.)
The extremes point out clearly the curve nature of our bodies where we like to think we move in straight lines. We can if we remember how to blend the curves. Oh - isn't there a movie out now about trouble with curves?

It seems to be some type of IM distortion due to pre amp overload. When I play through a Digitech RP-155 using earphones I still hear it, but when I turn the RP-155 output vol down, most of it goes away.

If I run the RP-155 into my amp (Roland Cube 80XL) I hear it with the RP-155 output high and amp vol low, but it goes away with the RP-155 output turned down and the amp vol. up. Using the compressor in the RP-155 also kills it.

I should have realized this. I had I similar sound from my Emmons student model. It sounded good, but the PU had an open (still played OK), had JW rewind it and when I installed it I bypassed the vol control. I don't use a volume pedal so that mattered. Then things didn't sound so good when picking 2 or move strings. At the time I thought it was just the sound of old strings. Never changed them because I was about to switch to the new guitar.

Still would like to play through a "known good amp" and have a "known good guitar" play though my amp to make sure.

Is this a problem with the Roland Cube?

Frank Montmarquet wrote:It seems to be some type of IM distortion due to pre amp overload. When I play through a Digitech RP-155 using earphones I still hear it, but when I turn the RP-155 output vol down, most of it goes away.

I could be totally wrong, where it's not a musical instrument player problem at all. But somehow I feel the PSG is still an instrument played by players, at least as much as a source of sound for electronic amplification, in the sense that we are the source of subtleties at least as intricate as any piece of equipment could introduce, and we are capable - being more than a box of components - of finding how we are playing our box of joy and correcting our physical limitations to play as intended. Play. But I maintain that I could be wrong.

Does it do it when not plugged in to an amp? I have the same problem, amped or not.