12th fret harmonics

[theodie]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

well this has been great fun to read. so even though i'm not a luthier and theodie is, from what i've just read, i'm right and he's wrong. i get a bit cheesed off when luthiers assume they are more knowledgable than the average joe on matters such as these. my ears, i think, are pretty good. i know when things are not right, and when they are. being a luthier makes no difference to these matters. of course they have skills and training that i will never get, fair enough. but that doesn't mean they can play a guitar better, that they can hear differences in notes, sounds etc better. so stop being so up yourself, theodie. and eat some humble pie, while you're at it.
(i can't wait for your response!) man, i love these forums.

I have already proved my point many times and you dont want to hear it. I guess you like doing this wrong but, I dont care. You say you get cheesed off when luthiers act like we know more about a matter like this than you. Well, we do! If you dont like it, get some training and expereince and join the club. Would yourself, the hack like to tell me how to do a setup, fretjob, or a build next and prove to me why your way is right even when you have no clue? No, wait, you will will probally post a thread like you did before and ask how to do it. Then, people will give suggestions and you will try to tell them why they are wrong. If you think you know everything, why are you even asking for advice? If your P.O.S. strat sounds good, and plays good to you, thats cool but, from the way it sounds, it could be better. I have no more time for your Idiocy and you will recive no help from me in the future on anything.

Now, go away and play your guitar in harmoincs and open notes only so it sounds good.

 

[watersbluebird]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

fret jobs blah blah. this has nothing to do with it, theodie. stop going off the point. others have proved, sort of, that you are wrong. harmonics and open strings are the same pitch (octave obviously). it's the laws of physics we are talking about, not some spanked up tuner. my P.O.S. guitar cost me £35 a month ago. I just sold it for £100. carried out some nice work on it. thanks to you, i got the nut sorted and it's bang on intonation-wise. thanks again, mr luthier. but what i didn't learn from you is how to re-wire a guitar to earth / shield it properly. copper, foil and stuff. i think for a hack, i did alright. (i can imagine the response to this bit). i wonder how much you used to do before you had any training. now i'm being childish, sorry. thanks again again for helping set up my guitar and earning me a few quid in the process!
considering you keep saying:
"i'm finished with you," sulked theodie
it's amazing how you just can't shut up. best wishes.

 

[watersbluebird]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

i've just had a thought. how much difference is this intonate with open vs intonate with harmonic? is it really worth so much cack!

 

[big_black]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

no no no no no no no no no NO!!

if you intonate to the fretted note, the harmonic may be slightly out of tune to the fretted note. but it will be in tune with the open note because THE 12TH FRET HARMONIC IS NEVER OUT OF TUNE TO THE OPEN NOTE. heres why:


when you pluck an open note the whole string gose back n forth. when you hit the 12th fret harmonic whats hapening is one half of the string is going in one direction while the other half is going in the other direction. this makes for twice as many hertz (cycles per second), hence the octave up. The perfect halfway mark along the string dose not move, this is why your finger sits there to get the harmonic going to begin with.


so you see a harmonic has nothing to do with the frets, it has evrything to do with the open note. now your gonna say "but but...
"

yes. yes this is very true the position of the harmonic will move as you change intonation because the string length has been changed. but the open note will change by the exact same amount because its on the same friggin string! the same string whose length has just been changed, therefore changign both the harmonic and the open note arrrrrrrgggg!!!!! understand allready!!!!!!****in hell!!!!!!!

ok im done now

All things being EXACTLY where they should be, you are correct. My experience tells me this sort of exactness is rarely used. 9 times out of ten if you intonate to the 12th fret harmonic, your fretted note will be out of tune. This is what players should be assuming.

 

[RW James]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

All things being EXACTLY where they should be, you are correct. My experience tells me this sort of exactness is rarely used. 9 times out of ten if you intonate to the 12th fret harmonic, your fretted note will be out of tune. This is what players should be assuming.

I'm going make a leap here and agree with you - because I think we are really just arguing semantics. If we were in the same room and working on the same guitar, we would agree.

Because of how you bend the string when you fret the octave, you should always tune the 12th fret to a good tuner - and don't tune to the harmonic. You can use the harmonic as a starting point - and maybe after a lot of experience you may be able to pull it off. But a tuner is always best - in my opinion.

And that thing about how the string is wound - well stuff like that always puts a fly in the ointment and changes how the laws work in an otherwise perfect world.

One of the things I learned in my college physics class was all about the Universal Fudge Factor - because nothing ever works as it should.

 

[big_black]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

I'm going make a leap here and agree with you - because I think we are really just arguing semantics. If we were in the same room and working on the same guitar, we would agree.

Yes, I think we are. :laugh2:

 

[ImmortalSix]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

The string on a musical instrument is (almost) fixed at both ends, so any vibration of the string must have nodes at each end. Now that limits the possible vibrations. For instance the string with length L could have a standing wave with wavelength twice as long as the string (wavelength = 2L) as shown in the first sketch in the next series. This gives a node at either end and an antinode in the middle.

Let's work out the relationships among the frequencies of these modes. For a wave, the frequency is the ratio of the speed of the wave to the length of the wave: f = v/wavelength. Compared to the string length L, you can see that these waves have lengths 2L, L, 2L/3, L/2. We could write this as 2L/n, where n is the number of the harmonic.

The fundamental or first mode has frequency f1 = v/wavelength = v/2L,
The second harmonic has frequency f2 = v/l2 = 2v/2L = 2f1
The third harmonic has frequency f3 = v/l3 = 3v/2L = 3f1,
The fourth harmonic has frequency f4 = v/l4 = 4v/2L = 4f1, and, to generalise,

The nth harmonic has frequency fn = v/ln = nv/2L = nf1.

 

[watersbluebird]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

well that clears things up!!!!! lol

 

[joeydude]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

okokokok here gose my last post in this thread(i hope):


theodie was not wrong. he never said the harmonic can be out of tune to the open note. he said it can be out of tune to the fretted note. and so you should intonate to the fretted note because you mostly play freted notes.


and yes if can understand that diagram it dose clear things up.

 

[Gearjoneser]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

I go even a step further in intonation. I like to make sure every note from the 10 fret to the 20th fret reads as close to dead center on a tuner as possible.
By fine tuning the intonation, you might find that open/12 fret fretted still isn't 99.9% accurate. As a lead guitar player, I want to know that my notes above the 12th fret are going to be perfectly in tune. At that point, the saddle adjustments are so small, I'm basically wiggling the allen wrench.

 

[kjrocks]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

"i'm finished with you," sulked theodie
it's amazing how you just can't shut up. best wishes.

Yeah ask for advice, be a wise @ss then say something nice , great etiquette.

Welcome to the forum :fing25:

 

[Jeff_H]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

could someone settle an argument, er, discussion i have going with theodie. can a 12th fret harmonic be out of "tune" with the open string?

I don't think most folks actually read the question. No one is contending that the FRETTED 12th note and the 12th fret HARMONIC can be out of tune with each other, because most of the time they are...slightly. I think most who are somewhat educated in tuning know that tuning to the harmonic IS NOT the most accurate, or recommended method of tuning.

The question is can the 12th fret harmonic be out of tune with the OPEN string, and that's impossible.

 

[Jeff_H]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

so stop being so up yourself, theodie. and eat some humble pie, while you're at it.
(i can't wait for your response!) man, i love these forums.

I do however think this is COMPLETELY out of line, regardless of what your personal opinion is. Theodie is a long time, respected forum member who happens to be a hell of a luthier and a good guy. I give him a healty ration of crap, but it's because I like the hell out of the guy. You may not, and that's your perogitive. However, when that's the case the best thing to do is shut your trap, not post it in open forum.

I believe that you owe Theodie an apology.

 

[Voxman]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

well this has been great fun to read. so even though i'm not a luthier and theodie is, from what i've just read, i'm right and he's wrong. i get a bit cheesed off when luthiers assume they are more knowledgable than the average joe on matters such as these. my ears, i think, are pretty good. i know when things are not right, and when they are. being a luthier makes no difference to these matters. of course they have skills and training that i will never get, fair enough. but that doesn't mean they can play a guitar better, that they can hear differences in notes, sounds etc better. so stop being so up yourself, theodie. and eat some humble pie, while you're at it.
(i can't wait for your response!) man, i love these forums.

I have to support you on this one any idiot could call himself a luthier

 

[The Golden Boy]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

my P.O.S. guitar cost me £35 a month ago. I just sold it for £100. carried out some nice work on it. thanks to you, i got the nut sorted and it's bang on intonation-wise. thanks again, mr luthier. but what i didn't learn from you is how to re-wire a guitar to earth / shield it properly. copper, foil and stuff. i think for a hack, i did alright. (i can imagine the response to this bit). i wonder how much you used to do before you had any training. now i'm being childish, sorry. thanks again again for helping set up my guitar and earning me a few quid in the process!
considering you keep saying:
"i'm finished with you," sulked theodie
it's amazing how you just can't shut up. best wishes.

Dude helps you out, teaches you how to do a bunch of stuff and you post this crap?

 

[LesStrat]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

*cues "Breakin' the Law"*

 

[Gr8Scott]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

I do however think this is COMPLETELY out of line, regardless of what your personal opinion is. Theodie is a long time, respected forum member who happens to be a hell of a luthier and a good guy. I give him a healty ration of crap, but it's because I like the hell out of the guy. You may not, and that's your perogitive. However, when that's the case the best thing to do is shut your trap, not post it in open forum.

I believe that you owe Theodie an apology.

Damned straight he owes TheOdie an apology...:argh: :dammit: :cussing:

Here's my take on this whole mess. Theodie is right. I'm not just saying that because I'm sitting at his desk and typing on his computer right now. I'm saying it because it's true. What all the physicists around here are forgetting is the whole reason that you intonate a guitar. You intonate the guitar so the notes you play up the neck will be in tune. When I say the notes you play up the neck I mean FRET UP THE NECK. As TheOdie stated earlier, you don't intonate a guitar so you can do nothing but play perfectly tuned harmonics up the neck. That would be incorrect intonation and it will sound like poop when playing up the neck or basically fretting anywhere along the neck IMHO.

As far as the physics of whether a string can be out of tune with itself doing a harmonic at the 12th fret. Just a personal observation here about that if you don't mind me delving into it. If one CORRECTLY intonates a guitar to be more or less perfectly in tune at the 12th fret WHILE FRETTED, that means the string is slightly bent because it is being fretted. This means that if you ring the harmonic at the 12th fret, it will be SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT AND OUT OF TUNE because it isn't being fretted and the string is not being bent. You can't have your pie and eat it too. If you want the guitar to sound good fretted up the neck, you have to properly intonate it. Sure the harmonics will be ever so slightly out of tune this way, but who honestly cares about a difference so small. Guitars are a series of compromises. One must compromise their ability to get perfectly tuned harmonics to get perfectly tuned fretted notes.

Anyone can call themselves a luthier, but few can back it up. TheOdie has backed it up when he refretted my Hamer. It's a killer now with ultra low buzz free action. That is what a LUTHIER does. Not some hack. Anyone who wants to play it can see for themselves.

Watersbluebird needs to apologise in a huge way. The man took his own time out to help him and he spit in TheOdie's face.

 

[emilio]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

*chants* the-o-die-the-o-die!

 

[Zerberus]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

Can a harmonic be out of tune with the open string? No, as it´s pitch is always a direct function of the open string´s pitch. The length is irrelevant becasue changing the length of the string also changes the pitch of the open note. But as long as you´re playing fretted notes, it´s a more or less fruitless debate...

On a properly intonated (fretted) guitar, the harmonics WILL be slightly out of tune to the fretted notes, this is a result of the compensation necessary as a result of the strings rising farther and farther off the fretboard as you go up the neck.

I have to support you on this one any idiot could call himself a luthier

Yeah, and any idiot can call himself President of the United States, but that doesn´t make it true. Knowledge, experience, and most importantly the actual work are the only factors here. There´s usually a sheet of paper or similar that accompanies such titles, as they denote that one has been professionally trained (or selected) to do something

 

[watersbluebird]

Re: 12th fret harmonics

umm, sorry theodie. i apologise for... saying nasty things.
but let's remember who started the sledging in these posts. i just made a flippant comment about it not mattering whether you intonate to open or harmonic. then theodie got aggressive. well ok, my fault, just to settle it.
but to be honest (chuckle) i'm still confused.
Gr8Scott says:
If one CORRECTLY intonates a guitar to be more or less perfectly in tune at the 12th fret WHILE FRETTED, that means the string is slightly bent because it is being fretted. This means that if you ring the harmonic at the 12th fret, it will be SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT AND OUT OF TUNE because it isn't being fretted and the string is not being bent.

but the string is not being bent when played open either. so how can it make a diff..... oh who cares.
please, i've said sorry, theodie's been mr nasty but not said sorry. i can cope with that. let's just end this matter then. (unless you agree with me of course ((joke))
best wishes to all posters/readers of this forum. i love it.