Wolf tone?

[big_black]

Last night as I was tuning up my new Standard, I noticed a strange harmonic at the fifth fret of the low E. When I hit the fifth fret harmonic under gain, the tone is uneven. It is just like hitting the fifth and seventh fret harmonics on two strings that are out of tune- you get that fluctuation. It is only on the low E, no other strings. Is this a "wolf tone"? The string tunes and intonates fine, and fretted notes sound fine. It is only when I hit a harmonic. I just checked it again, and accually it does has tha fluctuation on all the harmonics all the way down the neck. I tried raising the action, it did nothing.

 

[Erlend_G]

Re: Wolf tone?

Yes... our great guru Dr. Zerbe did a great post about this .

As far as i know, it's caused by the guitar resonating

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

So is this in anyway curable?

 

[Erlend_G]

Re: Wolf tone?

Well... i've heard that strapping a "Fat Finger" on the headstock would move the resonance of the neck up (or down) and therefore removing the wolf notes... but i'm not sure

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

Ehh...if that is the only solution, it's incurable IMO.

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

Anyone else...?

 

[metallicajs1]

Re: Wolf tone?

Put a piece of foam under the strings behind the nut, it should take care of it.


-DSS3 on MJ1's account.

 

[TattooedCarrot]

Re: Wolf tone?

this is Wolfetone !!!!

http://www.wolfetone.com/

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

Thanks for the :spam: , but not exactly what I was looking for.

 

[Amateur]

Re: Wolf tone?

If your guitar is resonating, that means it has the natural frequency of one of the harmonics or multiple of the natural frequency of the harmonics. You may be able to change its natural frequency by adding or subtracting material from the body. Since you said it is an SG, I assume it is a solid body and there is not much room for you to add any material and I don't think you want to cut any material out neither. May be you can tie a piece of wood at the back of the body and see if it make any difference. If that makes a difference, then you can figure out if you can attached some weigh in the pot cavity to improve the situation.

Best of luck.

 

[The Golden Boy]

Re: Wolf tone?

this is Wolfetone !!!!

http://www.wolfetone.com/

Mad props to Wolfe!!

 

[The Golden Boy]

Re: Wolf tone?

Put a piece of foam under the strings behind the nut, it should take care of it.


-DSS3 on MJ1's account.

There's not a lot of space behind the nut for the strings to resonate on an SG. The old Epiphone "batwing" headstock had a lot of free string space for things to vibrate, in that case, if you hit a quick chord and muted it right away you could still hear sympathetic vibrations, nothing like what's described here.

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

It's deffinately not sympathetic vibration. It happens only when a harmonic is struck. I've done some playing around and I've found that I can get a clear harmonic going just little flat of the fret. If I go right over the fret, I get that double tone.

 

[sgstrat]

Re: Wolf tone?

My idea of "Wolf tone":

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

This kind is far less pleasant.

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

I was thinking maybe it is an improperly cut nut or saddle? It doesn't make sense to me that it is a tonal imperfection. It only occurs on the low E, and on all natural harmonics on that string- no other strings. It seems to me that if it happens at one fret, the same should happen at the octave (that is if this is indeed a "tonal imperfection"). I am scratching my head with this one. Any other ideas?

 

[Ironjose]

Re: Wolf tone?

have you try changing the string? maybe its due to the old string vibe... i use to hear this on the high E and B, but i didnt pay attention to that, so the low E started to do it, then i changed strings and that prob was gone.
JJ

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

I changed the strings when I got it last week.

 

[big_black]

Re: Wolf tone?

*Bump it up again*

Any more ideas?