Pesky treble strings fret buzz

[Napthol]

I don't know why it's so hard to get your treble strings to play cleanly. I'm playing my Hendrix Strat and the bass strings play pretty well, but I can hear some fret buzz and chirping going on in the treble strings. Neck relief measured at the 8th fret right now is about .006.

I did have the neck totally straight so there was no relief but boy the action got a little too low and there was still some buzz goin' on.

So now what I did was loosen the rod to put back in a little relief, but those treble strings are bastards to work with. Don't know why.

My frets are level. I had Ron level them and when I got my guitar back it played pretty good.

But I'm in Minnesota and we are going through a transitory period in the weather and this happens to every guitar. Weather and humidity change and then you get fret buzz.

How do you get the treble strings to play without buzz?

 

[beaubrummels]

Raise the action. And play with your teeth?

 

[Securb]

I am in New England so I have the same problem. It is worse going into the summer when it gets hot and humid. However, when my guitars are newer and not settled in yet they are also affected going into the winter. I give them subtle tweaks knowing they will swing back in a few months. Once they settle in I rarely need to touch them. I also have noticed my guitars finished with auto paint are never affected by weather or humidity swings.

 

[Napthol]

Raise the action. And play with your teeth?

Less than helpful.

 

[beaubrummels]

Less than helpful.

I have an actual '66 Strat, left-hand strung right, and raising the action is an immediate way to solve fret buzz if you already have sufficient relief and frets are good. The next would be playing around with shimming the neck, but that's more drastic.

 

[Napthol]

I've never had much luck eliminating fret buzz by raising the action. All I can do I guess is keep experimenting. I hope that as my guitars age, they will stabilize.

 

[GuitarStv]

I've never had much luck eliminating fret buzz by raising the action. All I can do I guess is keep experimenting. I hope that as my guitars age, they will stabilize.

Do they have really thin necks or something? Unless the neck itself is moving/bowing a fair amount, raising the action should be a pretty surefire way to fix buzzing.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Is the buzz at every fret or just the higher frets or only some frets?

If it's at all or most of the frets, raise that side of the bridge slightly.
If it's just the higher frets, adjust the truss rod so the neck is dead flat and have your luthier (or do it yourself) level the frets. Then adjust the truss rod and/or the saddles to get the relief you want.
If it's just a few frets, use a Fret Rocker to determine and adjust the offending frets.

 

[ErikH]

And also check the depth of the nut slots. If they are too deep and everything else checks out OK, it'll buzz no matter what you do if it's buzzing at the first fret.

 

[GuitarDoc]

And also check the depth of the nut slots. If they are too deep and everything else checks out OK, it'll buzz no matter what you do if it's buzzing at the first fret.

Absolutely! But, as you say, that will only affect the open strings/first fret buzz. Once a string is fretted, the nut is out of play.

 

[GuitarDoc]

It's important to know WHERE the fret buzz is occurring.

 

[Top-L]

If its buzzing in lower frets, when previously it was not, and you didn't lower the action, chances are that the neck has less relief than it did.

This could be a side effect of using a lower tuning with the same gauge strings. Even tuning down a half step will have much less tension, and the neck will be flatter (or maybe even back bow).

If the guitar was recently leveled by a competent luthier, chances are the buzzing is caused by a lower tuning and less tension. To fix this, you could try adding some relief, relax the truss rod a little bit. Or just tune to a higher pitch and see if it fixes the problem.

If the buzzing is in the high frets, it is less affected by relief, and the only solution would be to check the frets to see if one pulled up, or raise the action.

 

[Explorer84]

You must have an incredibly light touch if you have your relief set at .006.

 

[Napthol]

Everybody says set relief to this...or that...or this...or that. I have heard one guy say he has ZERO relief. Other people have recommended .006 or .008. One guy said .016 is where he starts. One of my techs also suggested .016.

My frets have been leveled.

The buzz is kinda noticeable on every fret, not just a few. So I'm thinking it's a truss rod adjustment and action issue.

 

[ErikH]

Since you clarified it's kinda happening on every fret, that helps. Before adjusting the TR, how much space is between the string and the top of the first fret on all strings? .010 is a good point to shoot for and really comfortable, IME, and where I set mine when making new nuts. If that checks out, measure the relief and go from there.

 

[Napthol]

If the neck is not sitting correctly in the neck pocket, can that cause fret buzz?

 

[beaubrummels]

Yes

 

[Napthol]

I remember when I got the guitar the high E string was kind of veering off to the right, which is a common misalignment found on new Strats. So I loosened the bolts so the neck was movable, and I pulled the neck towards me, thereby getting the treble strings not to veer off the fretboard anymore.

 

[dave74]

First off, quit measuring in inches!

.006 is like .1mm,,,,,,,,,,,,way too low.

Set your relief to at least .3mm on the treble side, and not over .7mm on the bass side.

You can have 3 people measure the relief and you'll likely get 3 different measurements, so there is that too.

 

[Napthol]

I don't like this millimeter stuff. I like using inches. Easier to use. My feeler gauge does not list things like .1mm or .3 mm so I can't use millimeters.

I found a sticker on the underside of the neck. I peeled it off. And there is leftover paint in the neck pocket. Maybe these things are causing the problem.