Never had this happen on multiple guitars...

alphadog808

New member
Hey guys,
Just wondering if you might have some insight on this...So, the other night at practice I noticed the charvel I was using with a '59 in the neck was acting strange. Certain notes(some fret 9 and above) on the high e were louder and harsher than the other notes when I'd play harder...significantly so. Sustain seemed ok.

I took it home and verified that it was still happening. I played it unplugged and it did seem to have a little bit of a fret noise in those areas. I thought maybe it was the amp or my modeler(atomic amplifire), so I tried another charvel(in a case)...same issue?? I tried another charvel(in a case)...same issue?? Then I tried a Les Paul, no issue. Then my beater charvel(NO case), no issue. So I went back to the first charvel(which had it the worst) and tried all kinds of things, dropped the pickup, put the screws down, etc. Was still harsh and louder unless I was very radical in the settings, but then overall the pup didn't sound good. I even tried raising the floyd to see if the fret noise was causing it-no difference.

As a last resort, I took off the strings(floyd rose) as I was thinking about changing the truss rod setting. I didn't, but put the strings back on. Somehow, the problem went away?? The strings weren't new, but they were far from being rusted out/old.

I can only think that maybe taking pressure off the neck and putting pressure back on helped keep the e string from slightly fretting out the string which cause the harshness?? Could it be that temperature/humidity effects are finally doing something to my guitar necks? Never had issues like this before and 2 of the charvels were in cases and my beater is always out lying around...

Thanks if anyone can shed any info on this! I'm lost...and don't feel like bringing spare guitars to gigs in case it happens again or have to worry about picking notes on the high e too hard.
 
Re: Never had this happen on multiple guitars...

hard to say what it was without seeing it. could absolutely be temp/humidity related
 
Re: Never had this happen on multiple guitars...

hard to say what it was without seeing it. could absolutely be temp/humidity related
Thanks man. It did seem that the guitar that had it the worst seemed to have alot of relief compared to the other ones. Would a slight fretting out of a string cause it to sound louder and harsher(almost like there was a overtone associated with it) but not really affect sustain like a usual fret out would cause?
 
Re: Never had this happen on multiple guitars...

The relief is going to go back to where it was. The neck just hadn't settled yet when you tried it after putting the strings back on.
 
Re: Never had this happen on multiple guitars...

The relief is going to go back to where it was. The neck just hadn't settled yet when you tried it after putting the strings back on.
Hmm. How long does that take? Because I played a gig the night after and it was fine. That was around 24 hours after I had restrung. Unless it's not a neck relief thing...??
 
Re: Never had this happen on multiple guitars...

Maybe it's not a relief thing but the point is that this is just common sense ... you have a given amount of relief in the neck determined by the truss rod adjustment along with the tension of the strings. When you remove the strings you now have no string tension to work against the action of the truss rod and so you essentially have less relief while the strings are off ... in other words, the neck will flatten or beyond, bend slightly convex (back bow). If you put the same strings back on and tune to pitch (same tuning as before) you are adding back the same tension as before and the relief is going to return to where it was before you removed the strings. This, of course, pertains to a guitar within a limited time period and under the same environmental conditions.

How long? I would think if all you did was pull the strings and then put them right back on, It would return pretty much right away. Certainly within a day.
 
Re: Never had this happen on multiple guitars...

Maybe your playing consistently starts to suck above the 9th fret.

:dance:

J/K

Better keep your truss rod wrench handy....
 
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