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.
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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Good to know! I had already switched to 9s, but I’ll give 8s a go as well.
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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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.
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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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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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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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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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!!
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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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.
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…?
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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It could be the frets themselves, or at least some of them. Does every fret in that range, on every string buzz? If it’s only some here and there I would suspect a fret or 2 has ‘popped’ in a few places.
Also could happen with a truss rod that is too tight (back bowed).
I used to play most of my guitars tuned to drop C and I did find I’d need lower action, unless I also went up in string gauge…which could cause more forward bowing, needing another truss rod adjustment…then the intonation needs fixing too. Ug. It never ends 
I’d rather play my guitars then mess with them so at the end of the day, an appointment with a great tech can save some time
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Ahh but a well setup guitar makes all the difference, if it plays like crap you wont play it. is the high fret string buzz across all strings? or the unwound ones? there is high e and low e string height, then you ajust the rest with a radius gauge off the high and low E. I do agree that a tech is the way to go if you arent familiar,but there are enough videos and resources out there to do it yourself, youd need the tools and measuring devices though. I have quite a few guitars to maintain so it made sense to obtain the tools. if you just have 1 or 2 guitars not so much…
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Thanks guys, lots to think about here!
I’d rather learn to do it myself as the last guy set my action quite low and although it made some things easier, bends and vibrato would grab the adjacent strings too much.
I have some tools I bought recently. There was a little card in it with various measurements. The guitar was spot on for the low action measurements, so I adjusted it closer to the high. Certain things are more difficult but bends and vibrato feel better.
I don’t have feelers with measurements on them so I’m not sure how much of a gap is supposed to be there around the 8th fret…
It’s mostly buzzing on the lower wound strings. Keep in mind I’m using a heavier gauge to compensate for the dropped tuning. When I first set it up this way, I sent it to a tech. Since then, the neck broke (my fault). I got it repaired but he set it up in standard tuning. When I tuned it back down, open strings were buzzing. I’ve solved that but literally given myself the opposite problem with high frets buzzing!