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"jkn" wrote in message
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I'm guessing you want this to mark off a guitar nut or saddle blank
for sanding down or notching?

You just need a penknife blade or stanley knife, to split the pencil,
and a bit of sandpaper to sand down the graphite core afterwards.

It's terribly easy - if you think you 'don't have the facilities' to
do this, I recommend you think again about the project you're engaged
in...

J^n

Now you've got me?
I made a guitar - well almost: term wasn't long enough to finish it! -
when I was at school, and since, I've refretted; nutted and bridged,
other guitars occasionally, but I cannot imagine why I would ever need
a half pencil (although, I dare say, that if one was to hand it might
end up getting *used* as a nut or saddle...)?

S
You can use it to make sure the string slots in the nut are the correct
height. If you place it flat along two or three frets you can make a
line on the nut which tells you the depth they should be cut to.
Obviously it would not be possible to do this with a 'full' pencil as
the lead would probably be above the top of the nut.
Ah, I see.

I think my technique to now has been to cut the slots, and then sand the
bottom of the nut until I had a comfortable fingering and minimal buzz.
I've tended not to have slots in saddles, but to let the strings make
their own - bridges usually being adjustable. Yes it would be handy to
have another fixed point at the nut, before going on to the angles and
curves of the neck and fretwire. Is there a 'correct' above fret height
to aim for, or is this a matter of string and tension personal
preference? The oft used 'zero fret' would indicate not much clearance
at the nut at all.


Interesting, and unusual question.

S

I am assuming you are talking about an acoustic guitar which normally has
a much higher string/fretboard clearance than electrics. If you go to
the Fender website you can download setup guides which give recommended
string clearances at various points on the fretboard for Strats and Teles
etc. For example, if you put a capo on the first fret and hold down the
bass E string at the last fret, the distance between the bottom of that
string and the top of the 8th fret should be about .005" - roughly the
thickness of a business card. I'm in the process of setting up a cheap
Strat copy I got on eBay as a project and have managed to get the string
clearance at various parts of the fretboard in the 'ballpark' of the
distances recommended by Fender. The problem is that open chords such as
the open D or G sound out of tune compared to a fully fretted G (F shape)
played at the 3rd fret. This seems to indicate that the nut slots are
cut too high which leads to undue pressure fretting strings near the nut.
I would rather not go down the route you use of filing down the base of
the nut as this would involve removing it - it's probably glued down -
cleaning up the leftover glue etc and getting the correct camber on the
bottom of the nut. That's assuming I could remove the nut without
breaking it!



If all manufacturers were to put a 'zero fret' on their guitars we
wouldn't have this problem because they would be forced to set them up
properly before they left the factory. Unfortunately most of them have
dropped this option years ago - probably to save costs.



Another problem I have is to locate files of the correct diameter for
cutting the nut slots. These should be just fractionally wider than the
width of the respective strings so, in theory, I would need six
different files to cut the nut slots for the six different diameter
strings. What I am using is junior hacksaw blades. For the plain
strings I have hammered out the offset so they cut perfectly straight and
I'm using ordinary blades for the wound strings which I twist slightly to
get a wider slot as appropriate. It's not an ideal solution but guitar
setup tools are very expensive and most have to be imported from the US.


Haven't done any of this for a while, but nut replacement is a common
requirement and I seem to recall it only took something like a hot iron to
warm them up and slide them off. I'm sure you used to be able to buy them
with the slots already in over the counter along with your latest
selection of picks.

My experience of others using electric guitars is that they tend to have
the strings almost touching the frets: which we'd never get away with on
acoustic. Your nut might indeed be unusually high if you are going out of
tune even on the third fret. If you have the variable length type bridge
assembly you may be able to take some of this difference out by
lengthening the thicker strings... However, as you have the G s on the
first and sixth strings in common whether you are using the bar chord or
the 'full' version, you do at least have two notes you can count on as a
reference, and it would probably be the ones in between that may need to
comedown a bit. However, there is always a bit of a compromise, and you
may find if you get 'G' 'right', you can't quite get another key right
without minor adjustments as you go: which is why, I've noticed, that a
lot of guitars have the strings locked down at the machine head end, and
have small screws for making minor adjustments as you go at the bridge
end.

Also, are your frets all evenly worn, or are you having to push some
strings harder than others to reach them: too low frets can be almost as
painful as too high in their own way (especially if you have finger
nails...).

Another thing that may come into play is the neck may be twisted. If you
take the strings off and peer down the neck, do the frets all look
parallel and in the same plane? Best to make sure frets and neck are at
optimum before going on to the finer adjustments - but I expect you have
already done that.

S
The intonation on the guitar is OK. That's one of the first things I
checked. Guitars with a nut lock are usually fitted with a 'Floyd Rose'
type vibrato. Mine has a bog standard old Fender type of vibrato. The
frets are not worn at all but one or two seem a little high. That's another
problem I will have to tackle but they are not in the lower part of the
fretboard so are not the cause of the guitar playing out of tune comparing
between open chords and fully fretted ones. The neck is very straight now
after adjusting the truss rod and is not twisted. The fret ends were very
sharp when I first got the guitar - so sharp that you could easily cut your
hand by running it up the neck - but I have filed these down and they are
very smooth now.