Official Luthiers Forum!

Have you guys seen Harry Fleishman's article on making a compensated nut. It was in the "works for me" section of the latest GAL magazine.

He says, in brief, that strings one and six really do not need compensation, that strings 3 and 4 need the most compensation and that 2 and 5 need some but not as much and 3 and 4. He compensates strings 3 and 4 by 1/32 of an inch and 2 and 5 about half that. That makes an arc with a radius of about 9 inches. The end of his fingerboard is scooped out with a curve of that radius and his nut is shaped to fit. That part sounds tough.

John,
I don't know if I would go to the trouble. I have gotten excellent
intonation results just from shortening the scale at the nut about 1/64"
and using regular intonation at the saddle (although, I am very accurate in
saddle placement).

If I were to do a convexed nut, I would use a sanding jig. Cut out a 9 inch
circle, put some sandpaper on there. Use that to make a matching
concaved form, glue on some sandpaper. I wouldn't recommend just
eyeing it as it might be one of those situations where you keep sanding
just "a little bit more" and end up with too much compensation.

If you do indeed try this, let us know the results.

Peace Out,
Simon

I have not finished pouring over my copy of "American Lutherie" yet, but I'm not surprised.  There was a guy here in Charlotte, Fred Nance, died back in the early '90's., who probably built in the neighborhood of 300 guitars. He was a builder, not a finisher.  Most of his guitars werent lookers, but they all sounded great.  I have about 4 of them.  In a couple of our conversations, he discussed the need, on a classical, where a straight saddle is used, to compensate the G at the nut.  He used to prop a little piece of hardwood under the G to do it, and BOOM it played in perfect pitch all the way up the finger board.  Not very scientific, but it worked.  Otherwise, on most guitars, you have to temper the tuning to allow for those variances, and most people don't do that very well.  Probably the one downside of tuner technology. 

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Simon I think you are right. It would not be that hard to make a sanding wheel to fit on the drill press with a 9 inch radius to sand the end of the fingerboard, and then a nut carrier of sorts that would pivot 9 inches away from the face of the nut that could be used to address a sanding disk. Looks like that would get the fit down, and then you would just have to make the back edge of the nut conform to a straight line against the peghead veneer. Not so hard after all.

Waddy, what did that little piece of hardware look like?

Wow, John. Fleishman has more experience than I'll ever have, but I have to say that every guitar I've owned could have benefited from some forward nut compensation on the sixth string. They've all played sharp to some degree on the first four frets.

Here's something that you might find interesting--I put one of those plastic Earvana compensated nuts on an electric I own, and it solved the problem of sharp notes on those first frets. What surprised me, though, was that I had to drastically reposition the string saddles forward to get proper 12th fret intonation. Moved everything to just about the forward limit of saddle adjustment. In fact, I had to flip the 6th string saddle (Tune-O-Matic type) to get that last fraction forward.

Has any of you nut compensators experienced this? It would be important to consider when placing an acoustic bridge and saddle.

BTW, those Earvanas are about as pretty as a baboon's hind-end, but they work.

That is disturbing to hear Carlton. I thought I had THE answer.   Now maybe not. I too would like to hear more on this subject.

Ahem,
   Has no one else read that Fleishman article. Are there any comments on the intentional flatting of the 2nd and 3rd string and not the first and second. I sure would like to hear from some more folks who know more than I do about this subject, and I don't think that eliminates anyone.

    BUMP

OOps
I meant to say flatting the 3rd and 4th and not the 1st and 6th.
Man where is that edit button.

Fleishman's idea is very interesting and along the same lines as what the Earvana nut does. Fleishman's solution is more elegant IMO.

_________________
Stay with the happy people.
--Reynolds Large