How low do you guys set your action at the 12th fret?

Gear
#15

Looks like you have a wrap around bridge, loosen the strings before you turn the big height screws, you should use a wide screw driver or the side of some metal object that will not scar the screws, they are sometimes made of soft material. Try not to disturb the two intonation screws if any on back side of the bridge.

It’s a big of a trial and error adjusting to your tastes, depending on your string gauge, I personally go by lighter stings, higher the action I can get away with. The idea is tone over playability, but in my case I’m at 46-8 1/2 step down, so playability is not an issue.

You will find the tone improve as you raise it, mind you pickup height is part of this equation, once I have the action set right, I start with the neck pickup to get it where I like the tone ( look for a sweetspot, different for every guitar/pickup ). Then adjust the bridge pup.

You may need to adjust the truss rod as well, I’ve found the tone to improve with a not so tight truss rod and also I like added relief. What I do with new guitars is loosen the truss rod till it’s got no tension, then start to add tension.

Truss rod and bridge adjustments can take many days and iterations to get it right, give things time to settle, make small changes at first till you get the hang of it.

The main thing is be patient, lots of folks like to measure things out, I prefer to do it by feel, if I was a luthier I’d be using measurements to save time too, but not on my personal instruments.

There’s a possibility you don’t know what you want so I suggest you experiment, different setups and string gauges.

Sometimes you can over think things, in my case I obsess over these things. It took me a year of playing on my YJM to find what suits me best, so take your time. I could not understand how malmsteen played with such high action till I tried his strings and setup, it was very awkward that first year till it all clicked, and I played 10 hours a day on average during that period.

Your journey is your own, good luck :slight_smile:

edit: about your bridge if it’s stock, should have come with a little tool, like a flat spanner, loosen strings, loosen the screws, only then adjust the underside nuts with the tool, careful not to scratch the body if that matters to you. It’s tedious but there’s no way around it. If you turn the nuts under the bridge with the screws tight you will damage the tool. I use the flat edge of the tool to loosen and tighten the big screws.
If restringing is an issue without disturbing the bridge, make a loop from an old 3rd string you send from the back hole to the front to pull the new string through, or use a small gauge crochet needle etc if you can get one, saves a lot of time.

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#16

Thanks for that! I’ll need to reread this a few times before I get started! I’m so bad at this type of stuff haha
Everything is actually feeling good except I want the action a little bit higher, I’ve no idea how much, I’ll have to just feel that out.
I’m liking the pups tone where they are, but if I need to raise them slightly that’s not an issue.

I picked up this guitar second hand so no tools came with it. I’m sure I should be able to find what I need in a music store, hopefully!

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#17

By the way, most of what I learned about setting action on a guitar, way back in the day, came from Rich Harris’s Ibanezrules.com site. I assume his tech section is still up there, and it’s VERY good.

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#18

I bought my Ibanez JEM from Rich Harris back in 2005. I can personally attest that he knows his business. His tech section is the best resource for anybody who wants to learn how to set up and maintain a floating double locking tremolo.

I’ve been thinking about the effects of action height a lot lately. I recently bought a Vigier Shawn Lane model. It has a perfectly flat fretboard (no radius) and the lowest action of any guitar I have ever played. They claim a factory set action of 0.7mm on the high E to 1.4mm on the low E at the 12th fret, but it’s lower than that according to my tools. Barely over 0.5mm at the high E to barely over 1mm on the low E at the 12th fret. I have a light touch and I’m not having issues with buzz.

My Canton headless guitar (in my profile pic) has a 20" radius. The action measures just under 1mm on the high E to about ~1.35mm on the low E at the 12th fret. Super low by most peoples standards. No issues with buzz or choked out bends.

My Ibanez JEM has a 16.9" fretboard radius. The action measures about 1.2mm on the high E to just under 1.5mm on the low E at the 12th fret. Again, no issues with buzzing or choked out bends. If the action were lower, the strings would choke when the bar is pulled all the way up.

My Charvel Pro Mod has a 14"-16" compound radius. The action measures about 1.5mm on the high E to 1.75 on the low E at the 12th fret. It might be possible to get it lower but I haven’t really tried.

My Strat has a 9.5" action. The action measures ~1.75mm on the high E to about 2mm on the low E at the 12th fret. Any lower and bends choke. It’s also strung with heavier strings that all of my other guitars.

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#19

Cool breakdown. What gauge strings are you using on these various guitars? Curious since it seems like there is some type of relationship between string gauge and action height. I’ve honestly never given any of this much thought. I always:

  • Played medium to heavy strings (.10 or .11, .12 if doing any dropped tunings)
  • Checked intonation
  • Lived with it
#20

The Canton headless guitar is strung with La Bella double ball strings, 8-38. The tension on a headless guitar is different from the tension on a guitar with a headstock.

The Strat is strung with D’Addario EXL110, 10-46. Everything else is D’Addarios EXL120, 9-42.

The Vigier has a 24.8" scale length. Everything else is 25.5" scale length.

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#21

Interesting, I never thought about this. Do you mean the tension is much higher than a regular guitar? I recently got a headless and I’m trying to match the feel I have on an LP-scale guitar with 9s in E standard.

#22

Yes, the tension is higher. The difference in feel will be about the same as moving up one guage.

It will be difficult to match the feel exactly, but you’ll want to string with 8s.

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#23

Good to know! I had already switched to 9s, but I’ll give 8s a go as well.

#24

If your headless is a 25.5" scale it will feel a little tighter than a 24.75" Les Paul, even with the 8s.

Also, if you need double ball end strings, the 8s can be a little hard to source. I buy La Bella 8-38s in bulk from Headless USA.

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#25

Luckily don’t need double ball ends, just used regular nickel Ernie Ball’s!

The low E is 25.5", so I definitely expected a tighter feel right away compared to 24.75". 9s already felt better, but I’m excited to try out 8s and see what happens.

#26

Just wanted to follow up: I’m really glad I ran into your comment! 8s have been feeling awesome, thank you for the explanation / recommendation!

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#27

This broadly tracks with my experience - flatter radiuses, or multiradius necks with a flatter radius towards thebridge, all else equal choke at a lower action than rounder radiuses.

The tradeoff is allegedly flatter radiuses are less comfortable to chord on, but you have to get pretty flat for this to bug me, and anyway a compound radius is a pretty low-cost compromise here, I’ve always thought.

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#28

I actually find a flatter fretboard more comfortable for everything, chords included. It might just be a case of getting used to it.

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#29

I guess to be fair I’ve never played anything flatter than an Ibanez, and it didn’t really phase me much. That’s one of those “conventional wisdom” things, and honestly it probably applies more to open chords than anything else.

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#30

I’ve been making some adjustments on two of my guitars. Both Gibson style.

One guitar had buzzing on the open strings. I adjusted the neck and initially went way too far, it’s my first time doing this…. And the high frets started to completely choke out.
So I started to go back the opposite way, adjust, tune, adjust again etc and it’s still a bit buzzy on the high frets. I have the action on the bridge set quite high

I’m a little confused as to how exactly I should be adjusting the neck.

I was watching a video and it said to capo the first fret and hold down the strings higher up. Then at the 8th fret, slide feelers under the string, but I don’t know how much of a gap is supposed to be there, and if it’s measured from the fret bar or fret itself?

My other guitar, a Gibson special, I just raised the action at the bridge but now it feels like the neck needs to be adjusted. Like there is a bow in the neck, but I don’t want to touch it until I know exactly how I’m supposed to measure at the 8th fret and what to look out for…

Any tips greatly appreciated!!

#31

Ill try and describe neck releif, it usually coincides with the radius and Fender has speck on their website etc. 7 1/4 I believe is .012 inch and 9 1/2 and flatter is .010. you capo the first fret hold the low e down on the 17th fret and measure at the 8th. Make adjustments 1/4 turn at a time on the truss rod and recheck etc. There are plenty of websites and videos on setup and truss rod adjustment etc. i do want to mention that between every adjustment you want to tune it play it and see how it feel etc. you are checking for dead notes, buzzing and overall feel and ease of play. You can almost tell when a guitar need setup by playing it because you know what action you like and are used to. I recemtly picked up a low end jazz bass copy that had low E string buzz, I corrected it by truss rod ajust and string height ajustment. The intonation surprisingly was spot on. But even a high end guitar should be checked and set up if there is string height issues and fret buzz etc.

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#32

Thanks for that! What are you looking for at the 8th fret? How much of a gap should there typically be in a sort of “factory” setup?
This is where I ran into some confusion with videos, as they didn’t show it quite close enough.

#33

I have buzzing now on the high frets, but the action height at the 12th fret is not low. It is a down tuned guitar though so I’m unsure if that makes a difference…?

#34

In my opinion, factory setups are hit or miss, they build and ship the guitar, and it could be on a shelf for months. It used to be that a guitar shop would then sell the guitar, and set it up with the price of purchase, now with internet guitar sales, it is safe to say that even a high end guitar may need setup, guitars such as Fender USA, for example should at least be checked upon receipt.

These are Fender setup specs, taken from their website:
Neck radius Relief (at 8th fret) String height (at 17th fret)

                                                                                  Bass side      Treble side

7.25" .012" 5/64" 4/64"

9.5" to 12" .010" 4/64" 4/64"

15" to 17" .008" 4/64" 3/64"

This would be with capo over the first fret wire, string held down at 17, checking with feeler guage at 8th. Also slack strings, turn truss rod 1/4 turn at a time, retune and recheck. Clockwise flattens the neck counter concaves the neck. You may also want to let it sit a day and recheck. You also can feel the action get better a back bowed neck ( concave) will feel like high action even though the string height checks out. You can also sight down the neck from the headstock to the body and see the back bow (concave) and you should be able to see it straightening out as you adjust, but you don’t ant it perfectly flat, you still want the specified measurement at the 8th fret that coincides with your neck radius, if you want to watch a video of someone setting up a Strat, look up “Dave World of Fun stuff” on Youtube. He goes over setups step by step. He does it the same every time and chances are he has a video of a setup on your style guitar. He even covers fret leveling and neck pocket shim if you need that. Also, keep in mind that, you should set the string height on the low E and high E to spec than use a radius gauge to adjust the rest of the strings if you have separate height adjustments on the saddles, a Floyd Rose for example you’d set the low and high e side and be done. You also play it in between adjustments, and see if it is to your liking, when someone says a guitar “plays like butter” that means they have it dialed in to their liking, we all have different action settings that make us play to our own style and what feels comfortable. so I would get your guitar action somewhat in spec to the factory setup, but then tweak it by playing it and seeing how it feels etc. In toher words dont beOCD about the facroity specs but trather how it feels and plays and dsounds to you,I went through tihi srecently with my scalloped Ritchie Blackmore Strat, it just didnt feel that great to play, I thought it was the scallops, but my Malmsteen is different,and feel so much better so iI ooked into the setup, a truss rod ajust got it playing and feeling so much better. I am to the point where I am not afraid to ajust a truss rod on any of my guitars, and it hasnt always been that way, whan starting out as a teenager everyone said “oh no don’t mess with that…” but sometimes it doesn’t need it , I would definitely check it with the capo and feelr guage. But sometimes action issues ore other things like string height, frets, and neck angle etc.

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