New Stainless Steel Nut

[octavedoctor]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

Yeah I figured that there weren't any more live Mammoths wandering around (although that'd be awesome if there were)

Well, you never know what the future might hold. Genetically they aren't that far from Elephants. Jurassic park and all that. Far more feasible to resurrect a mammoth than a dinosaur.

 

[octavedoctor]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

Incidentally, I have found that Walrus Ivory is subject to limitations under CITES, although the walrus isn't considered an endangered species and is listed as of "least concern". I still wouldn't be comfortable using it though, but I'd have no problem with MI

 

[wolf5150]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

Finally gigged the guitar over the weekend... learned a valuable lesson.
When you haven't gigged for 6 months, have all new gear that you're still trying to dial in.... don't invite the guy along who worked on your guitar and knows EVERYONE !!!
Disaster .. LOL
I had the wrong strap so the guitar was under my armpit ( my straps are Action Straps and aren't easy to adjust quickly )
I'd fiddled with my presets and messed up my lead and rhythm tones...
Hadn't warmed my voice up so struggled with the high notes...
Then realised yesterday I'd accidentally strung it up with 10's ( no wonder the tension seemed higher )..
I felt like a total dick !!!

Typically he left during the break, when I actually had time to sort out a couple of the issues !!

As for the nut, it sounded stunning, harmonics were a breeze and absolutely no sticking.
I'm very very happy.

 

[Diminished Triad]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

My Warmoth neck came with the Earvana nut but I hated it's tone, dull and lifeless.
I tried the LSR but could not get it to stay in tune.
A mate of mine suggested I try a stainless steel nut as he'd recently had one fitted to his Strat and loved it so I took the plunge.
The guy had to fill the slot with Rosewood to get the intonation point right but I think he's done a great job.
He's cutting the slots tomorrow so I should get the finished guitar back on Monday.. can't wait.
Anyone else tried Stainless ?

The Neal Schon NS-14 PRS guitar comes with what appears to be a stainless steel nut. Lots of sustain, lots of acoustic feel/sound although this could be from the F hole. Very nice sounding guitar and the feel is great.

 

[octavedoctor]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

Finally gigged the guitar over the weekend... learned a valuable lesson.
When you haven't gigged for 6 months, have all new gear that you're still trying to dial in.... don't invite the guy along who worked on your guitar and knows EVERYONE !!!
Disaster .. LOL
I had the wrong strap so the guitar was under my armpit ( my straps are Action Straps and aren't easy to adjust quickly )
I'd fiddled with my presets and messed up my lead and rhythm tones...
Hadn't warmed my voice up so struggled with the high notes...
Then realised yesterday I'd accidentally strung it up with 10's ( no wonder the tension seemed higher )..
I felt like a total dick !!!

Typically he left during the break, when I actually had time to sort out a couple of the issues !!

As for the nut, it sounded stunning, harmonics were a breeze and absolutely no sticking.
I'm very very happy.

Honestly Mark, you sounded fine. You played all the stuff I like to hear (Even Pink Floyd!) and the voice was on top form. I only left because I had t be up at 4.30 the following morning...

And you know this is true because I lack the capacity to dissemble.

 

[goblinboy26]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

I like metal nuts, I have made a few for my instruments.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

I'm happy with my nuts just the way they are, thank you. They work just fine.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

He does have stainless frets but actually I have to correct you on something; the nut material does have an effect on the fretted notes as well. The reason is that in addition to the lateral vibrations of the string which occur between the nut and the saddle the vibrating string stretches, causing proportional tensile vibrations to travel through the string between tether points - i.e. tailpiece and tuner. At any point where the string is displaced and rests against a supporting material - saddle, leading fret, finger, trailing fret, nut and tuner post - there is a vector component of the string's tension and the potential for energy loss at this point. Not much we can do about the damping effect of our fingers but at each of the other points the harder the material is and the higher it's co-efficient of restitution the less energy is lost. It happens that the lowest energy harmonics are the high end ones. These decay quite quickly and a stress analysis of vibrating strings shows that the high end harmonics are mostly encoded in the cyclic tensile vibrations, so the faster these decay, the faster you lose top end clarity. Having a soft material for a nut will suck top end response from even the fretted notes.

In theory this may all be true. Can't argue with physics. But one CAN argue with practicality.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

i always default to a material like bone, or a close substitute. I've used corian successfully, although it's crush resistance isn't as good as bone, and some of the phenolic thermoplastics are quite good as well; these are basically similar to bakelite, but a bit harder. I made a nut out of a mains plug patress twenty years ago which was intended as a stop-gap but which I gather is still going strong. Although I don't particularly like Graphtec products I have to admit that tonally, I've been impressed by Tusq, although I don't think it lives up to the "synthetic ivory" label; I think they just mean it goes toasty brown over time! I don't like working it as it seems a little soft but if you drop one it does make an appealing tinkle.

Some of the most commonly used materials I think are really rubbish. Micarta is junk despite it's use as a saddle material by Martin and WTF are PRS doing putting ABS nuts on their guitars? I think they only get away with it because the headstock rake is so shallow that there is hardly any string deflection though the nut. But then they have to make it wider to get the harmonic damping and make the slots really deep and narrow to stop the strings from jumping out so then they bind... Ugh. don't get me started...

Bone is a great nut material. I use it exclusively.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: New Stainless Steel Nut

it's a myth that stainless is so hard that it damages your files, it's just harder to work with that's all.

Yeh?, tell that to my files and drill bits. I have been working with stainless (in other capacities) for 60 years...it's NOT a myth that it damages files. I suppose that is why you are using diamond files. With conventional files, how many bone nuts can you make before you need to replace your files? Now, how many SS nuts can you make before needing to replace your files? If you factored the cost of good files into the cost of making a SS nut you'd have to charge $200 per nut. Good thing you're using diamonds, even though "it's a myth that stainless is so hard that it damages your files".