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I will concede this to you Barry, The nut will still have an effect on any note that is open when playing a chord that contains open notes in the triad+. I think this is really the crux of your point.

The nice part about the Taylor method is that a lot of people slotting their boards on a tablesaw are probably already doing it without knowing it. If your 'zero' position isn't offset half the kerf of your saw, then the saw is going to be cutting half its kerf 'over the line' which should be just about 0.013+a couple thou.

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Bob Garrish
Former Canonized Purveyor of Fine CNC Luthier Services

No, that's not it at all. Nut and saddle compensation is not about the open strings. After all, the open string is tuned to a certain note and compensation at the saddle or nut don't affect it. Compensation only comes into play when you fret the notes. You have to look at this thing differently.

If we go with your concept of nut compensation, there would really be no reason to do it all. Is there no one else on this forum with something to say about this???????

That's exactly what I recently realized. I started another thread about it, but I think it kind of died.

It really seems to me that this shortening needs to be taken into account somehow though when setting the overall intonation of the guitar. Although my guitars play very well in tune up and down the neck without doing anything else differently.... I'm still trying to wrap my little noggin around the intonation articles posted in this thread.

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Mike

"The Dude abides. I don't know about you but I take comfort in that. It's good knowin' he's out there. The Dude. Takin' 'er easy for all us sinners. Shoosh." The Stranger

Ok , I'll have a go at explaining it.

Nut compensation DOES affect the fretted notes in this manner.

When the nut is moved forward from the theoretical positionby 0.16". the distance from nut to the frets is reduced.
So now the innotation at the 12th fret is off because the distance nut to 12th fret has been reduced by .016, so you move the saddle back towards the nut by twice this (0.032) and all is well at the 12th fret.

So you have reduced the open string length by 0.32" but hey we have these things called tuners and we reduce string tension slightly and we have the original pitch and all is well.

Now we fret at the 1st fret,
String tension has been slightly reduced and the relative distance from nut to first fret reduced, the end result is a slight lowering of the pitch at the first fret with this result diminishing as you go further up the fretboard.
Cant do the maths at this time of morning but it is a real effect.
.

Sorry maths wrong in the above post and I cant edit now,
Saddle position only moves .016"
String length at nut is reduced by 0.032" (Saddle 0.016 plus nut 0.016)
Fret it at the first and string length is only reduced by .016"
This gives a slight reduction in pitch compared to using an uncompensated nut

But move the saddle .016" in from where? Intonate as normal first, then move the saddle forward?

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Mike

"The Dude abides. I don't know about you but I take comfort in that. It's good knowin' he's out there. The Dude. Takin' 'er easy for all us sinners. Shoosh." The Stranger

Innotate saddle as normal to give an exact octave at the 12th
It is moved compared to the situation with an uncompensated nut.
the amount of compensation at the saddle(which allows for string stretch when fretting) should be the same but you have slightly changed the scale length(defined as twice the nut to 12th fret distance)
Theoretically the distance from 12th fret to saddle is reduced by.016 to match the reduction from nut to 12th fret otherwise the octaves will be out

I've never tried to do it but I read the Stephen Delft article and it made sense. So I agree with Barry. This subject always makes me think of the elder statesman of British folk song, Martin Carthy. He used to (and perhaps still does) spend an inordinate amount of time, on stage, tuning his Martin OM. He'd even stop in the middle of the first verse of a song and re-tune. I wonder now if nut-compensation might have been the answer to his problem.

I know it is a big issue with Classical guitars, particularly the G, too, but I do not know what the solution is. There are so many "ways", and which is the way to go? Or do you just make sure you fret it right, and keep the action as clean as possible, and hope for the best?

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Dave,

I don't think it was a problem, he's just a perfectionist. Also he hardly ever changes his strings as he loves the percussive sound he gets and those strings are super extra heavy gauge - I got to play his old Martin guitar at a workshop he gave a few years ago.

Also watch how long Martin Simpson tunes - the difference is his tuning is like listening to most guitarists concert pieces

The biggest factor in guitar intonation is the players fretting hand and their ears. The best players have instantaneous micro adjustability of these - instant looped feedback if you like. Get the guitar in the ballpark and these do the rest. I have played around with nut compensation and pretty much understand the theory, but for the extra work and "funky" looks, I personally don't believe it is worth it.

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Dave White
De Faoite Stringed Instruments
". . . the one thing a machine just can't do is give you character and personalities and sometimes that comes with flaws, but it always comes with humanity" Monty Don talking about hand weaving, "Mastercrafts", Weaving, BBC March 2010

"the difference is his tuning is like listening to most guitarists concert pieces "

You're right there Dave! I listened to him 'in concert' on the Mike Harding show last night, recorded at Celtic Connections. You (or anyone else) can 'listen again' until Wednesday evening.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/r2music/folk/